Today the Mayor gave his “State of the City” speech before the political and business elite of El Paso.
After thanking his political allies for about five minutes, asking them to stand up one group at a time, he rambled about nothing of substance for another five minutes.
At that point, Robert Holguin of KFOX14 swooped in to interview the Mayor for 40 minutes without asking him a single question that mattered. Several cheerful videos with techno music and slick editing were interjected between questions.
KTSM NAILS IT
But while KFOX14 was stroking the Mayor’s ego with an inane, boring, and empty interview, their competitor KTSM was engaging in actual journalism.
Jesus Baltazar authored a report titled “Projected rise in city expenses cast doubt on El Paso Mayor’s promised tax cuts” in which he pressed the Mayor on his false promise to lower our property tax.
Baltazar pointed to the City CFO’s report indicating a $204 million deficit in the General Fund over the next five fiscal years that will pressure the City budget.
When questioned about the property tax, the Mayor responded that the City needs to grow its commercial tax base and collect more sales tax revenue, but then admitted “we have a lot of work to do in that area.”
When asked why the City did not adopt a no-new-revenue tax rate for FY 2026–that is, a tax rate with no tax increase–he immediately turned to deception by claiming “this was the lowest tax rate that El Paso has had in a long period of time.”
What a LIAR!
The Mayor knows the tax rate dropped only because property valuations rose sharply and that City Council voted for a net 4.3% property tax increase this past August.
We wish to offer our sincere thanks to Chris Babcock and Tony Antonio Abraham Rodriguez of KTSM and their able reporter Jesus Baltazar for airing a hard-hitting journalistic segment.
KTSM has come a long way in the last two years and is beginning to become serious about investigative reporting.