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Three Democratic candidates make push for county judge's seat
January 03, 2010 |
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Three Democratic candidates make push for county judge's seat
By Darren Meritz and Michael D. Hernandez / El Paso Times
Posted: 01/03/2010 12:00:00 AM MST
EL PASO -- Three Democratic candidates are making a 60-day sprint to March 2 in the race to become the next El Paso County judge.
Lawyer Sergio Coronado, Precinct 2 County Commissioner Veronica Escobar and businessman Larry Medina all have announced before Monday's filing deadline that they are seeking the Democratic nomination. No Republican candidate has entered the race.
Escobar became the most recent candidate to enter the race when she announced her plans Saturday. Because she announced her candidacy after the start of the new year, she will not have to give up her seat as county commissioner to run for the position.
Current County Judge Anthony Cobos announced in December that he would not seek re-election.
Though county judges elsewhere in Texas have limited judicial duties, in large counties including El Paso, those judicial functions are handled by county courts at law, and the county judge serves in an administrative capacity.
The next county judge, the chief executive of county government whose responsibilities include presiding over County Commissioners Court, will face myriad issues.
The economic downturn has led to deep cuts for the county, which in October found itself about $14 million over budget. Commissioners decided last year to impose a hiring freeze, lay off 25 employees and implement unpaid furloughs.
Commissioners also took $5 million out of the road and bridge fund, took $3 million from the health fund and saved $1.2 million by abandoning an agreement that paid the city to handle animal-control services in outlying county areas.
The next year could be worse, said Precinct 4 County Commissioner Dan Haggerty.
At the same time, the county is still reeling from allegations stemming from a widespread public corruption case that has cast a shadow on local government.
The race for county judge will be the first since prosecutors made a 2007 federal information public that implicated dozens of elected officials, vendors and businesses. Since then, a dozen people in and out of government have been indicted on charges stemming from the investigation.
This year's contenders all say they have the answers to fix the problems at the county. Here's a look at the candidates.
Sergio Coronado
The race is Sergio Coronado's second attempt to win the seat.
In 2004, the lawyer finished third among a field of six candidates and endorsed eventual County Judge Anthony Cobos, who defeated Barbara Perez in a runoff.
Coronado, 50, has been a trustee for the Canutillo Independent School District for the past eight years and said he could best guide the county government through a difficult economic period.
Coronado is a friend of and lawyer for El Paso County District Clerk Gilbert Sanchez. Coronado's half brother, Bobby Simental, was hired about three years ago as an office manager and since has become Sanchez's chief deputy. Simental for a time was Sanchez's campaign treasurer as well.
Coronado's wife, Kathy Coronado, worked as a data-entry clerk in the district clerk's office about five years ago. And a friend and second member of the Canutillo school district board of trustees, Armando Rodriguez, worked part time as a filing clerk in the district clerk's office about five years ago.
Sanchez said he never discussed with Coronado hiring the candidate's friends or relatives. Coronado called the hirings nothing more than coincidence.
Coronado wants to draw on his experience as a school board trustee if elected county judge. He said the district in recent years has implemented a series of internal audits that have successfully measured the performance of its departments and programs.
The county, he said, could benefit from such measures to ensure it is running efficiently.
Coronado said poor long-term planning led the County Commissioners Court last year to cut dozens of employees from the payroll and to reduce some county services.
"I don't think our county government has really focused on doing things in terms of a broader perspective for the future of El Paso," he said.
He said the county, at its own peril, is not ready for the growth that lies ahead.
It should bolster its efforts to draw down grant funding from the federal and state government, Coronado said.
It also should focus its resources on mandated services before setting aside money for organizations or ventures outside of the county government's basic obligations to fund the courts, jail and county sheriff's office, Coronado added.
Coronado said he could apply many lessons he learned while serving the Canutillo ISD -- a property-poor school district with a high poverty rate.
He said he pushed for the district to start a school that now provides dozens of Canutillo students with a way to earn college credit while in high school.
His district, which serves students in the Upper Valley and parts of far West El Paso, failed in a November 2009 election to win support for a tax increase and is facing a $1 million budget shortfall.
He said the district's budget crunch is due to inadequate state funding for Texas schools.
Veronica Escobar
Escobar was elected to public office months ahead of one of the most controversial times in El Paso County history.
Escobar, 40, was elected to the Precinct 2 county commissioner's seat in 2007, about six months before federal agents raided the offices of Cobos and then-commissioners Miguel Terán and Luis Sariñana in the public corruption case.
The case had a major influence on Escobar's time in office. She said she has tried to counter allegations of public wrongdoing at the county by advocating for the creation of a new county ethics commission and support of the competitive bidding process.
"I think people who have watched commissioners court saw the very firm positions I took these last few years," she said.
Escobar worked in El Paso as an English professor from 1993 to 2001. Her first foray into politics came in 1996 when she volunteered for the congressional campaign of Jose Luis Sanchez, who lost a Democratic primary runoff against then-political newcomer Silvestre Reyes. She said she was devastated by the loss, but became intrigued with politics as a result of the experience.
Escobar said she was attracted to Sanchez's positions on immigration reform and she since has served on several immigration related boards, including the U.S.-Mexico Border Task Force, the Las Americas Immigrant Advocacy Center and the Border Rights Coalition.
When former Mayor Ray Caballero was elected to his only term in 2001, she left education for a position in the mayor's office as a spokeswoman, where she worked alongside her close friend and political ally West-Central city Rep. Susie Byrd.
Caballero helped shaped Escobar's perspective on public policy. He leaned on agencies such as the Environmental Protection Agency for personnel that helped shape policy in El Paso -- a strategy Escobar says she's used as a county commissioner in spearheading shared government services. She intends to use that same strategy if elected county judge.
When Caballero was defeated in 2003, Escobar became involved in the Community Scholars, a nonprofit student leadership program created in 1998 by Caballero's wife, Mary Caballero, and state Sen. Eliot Shapleigh, D-El Paso. She worked as executive director of the Community Scholars until she was elected county commissioner.
Escobar is upfront about the roles Ray Caballero and Shapleigh played in shaping her approach to public policy, but she cautions against a public perception that they are monolithic in political thought and ideology.
"I've had strong disagreements when it comes to policy and approach with Caballero and Shapleigh," she said. "The one thing that we see eye to eye on is the fact that El Paso has this tremendous potential."
Larry Medina
For more than a decade, Medina, 51, has been a fixture in El Paso politics. He is the recipient of three Conquistador awards, the city's highest honor. He's also been elected to two public offices and has been a business owner in El Paso for more than 20 years.
Among his policy triumphs was spearheading the public smoking ban in El Paso, which led to a Conquistador award from Mayor John Cook. Medina has traveled throughout the world to speak in other communities on the smoking ban implemented by the city in 2001.
He is framing his campaign around strong leadership as the county tries to work past the public corruption case.
"I think the county has lacked effective leadership and I think a lot of it has to do with the FBI investigations," he said. "The county has been run loosely, I feel, for many years now."
Medina said that his ambition, if elected county judge, would be to stay level-headed. He said that "ego destroys progress" and that some elected officials have fallen victim to greed, envy and jealousy.
Medina in 1997 was elected East-Central city representative. He served for three terms before he was defeated by restaurateur Jose Alexandro Lozano in 2003.
In 1999, Medina while a City Council representative was briefly arrested on public intoxication charges when a late-night argument took place at a Circle K. A police report said that one of Medina's two friends tried to leave the store with a bottle of champagne about three hours after legal alcohol sales had ceased.
Medina maintained his innocence, and the charges were quickly dropped.
Medina in 2001 was on an ill-fated flight from Mexico that crashed in the Chihuahuan desert south of El Paso. Fearing that they would perish, Medina and five others wandered through the desert and were rescued by U.S. military helicopters. At the time, Medina said he and one of his travel companions found shelter in a vacant ranch outpost, where they left a note and a $100 bill tucked inside a Bible to thank the outpost owners.
The crash briefly raised eyebrows because Medina, along with other elected officials, were traveling with representatives from Dimensions Architects International, a firm doing business with the city, the county and the Canutillo school district.
The city found no ethical misconduct, and Medina said he paid $500 for the trip.
Medina has twice served on the El Paso Housing Authority Board of Commissioners and most recently resigned from the El Paso Civil Service Commission to run for county judge. He also served on the Commissioners Court for nearly a year in 2006 to complete the term vacated by Barbara Perez, who ran for county judge.
Medina is president and founder of Pan American Insurance & Investments, which has 14 offices in El Paso County.
Darren Meritz may be reached at dmeritz@elpasotimes.com; 546-6127.
Michael D. Hernandez may be reached at mhernandez@elpasotimes.com; 546-6151.
The candidates
Sergio Coronado
# Occupation: Lawyer.
# Age: 50.
# Family: Wife, Kathy Coronado; children Catherine, 19; Elizabeth, 16; and Christopher, 12.
# Education: Bachelor's degree in psychology from UTEP; law degree from the University of Texas at Austin.
Veronica Escobar
# Occupation: County commissioner.
# Age: 40.
# Family: Husband, Michael Pleters; children Cristian Diego, 12; and, Eloisa, 11.
# Education: Bachelor's degree in English literature from UTEP; master's degree in British and American literature from New York University.
Larry Medina
# Occupation: Business owner.
# Age: 51.
# Family: Wife Ruth Reyes; son Larry Medina, 24.
# Education: Served four years in the U.S. Air Force. Attended El Paso Community College, UTEP and McMurry University in Abilene.
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