September
28, 2006
Autumnal
Equinox
By
Jack D. McNamara
The best time of
year in the Big Bend is now, when the day
is the same length as the night. Yesterday the sun rose at 7:45 and set
at 7:46. The air is cool and there is little wind. For these few months
the grass is green and all the old memories return. The high school
band tootles away morning and evening and the sound ricochets off
Alpine and Hancock hills. Alpine High School Homecoming is this weekend
and our 1950s reunion is the weekend after.
Some local merchants say that business has visibly slowed, perhaps due
to gasoline prices or perhaps due to the start of the school year.
The pace of local governments also slows as they end one fiscal year
and begin-or try to begin-another. This observation drew me back to the
Southwest Texas Municipal Gas Corporation’s board meeting Monday. I was
there a week ago but there
was no quorum so the meeting had to be rescheduled with
an identical agenda to try to do what wasn’t done last week.
This sort of event deserves scrutiny so I am delighted to report that
this week there was a quorum of both Marfa and Alpine mayors as well as
Marfa’s Hester Ann White and Alpine’s Avinash Rangra. Sadly, however,
there were a half dozen postponements of agenda items because those who
were not present last week missed the opportunity to talk to the
board’s attorney, Bill Fowler of Odessa. The discussion wanted is one
concerning the inter-local agreement. This is the sort of thing for
which there may be an infinite number of postponements as the board’s
members come and go, attend and are absent, and also try to arrange the
presentation of lawyers in person and by speaker phone. The same
problems attend the desire of the board to implement the board’s
by-laws, the organic ordinance regulating the gas company and the
appointment of new directors.
At one point there occurred a sudden flurry of activity concerning the
appointment of a Marfa director. Marfa Mayor David Lanman nominated
Rudy Garcia to a new term and in a whisk it was done (the other Marfa
director, Ken Whitley, is a city council appointee and no one on this
earth can guess when that might get done).
Alpine Mayor Mickey Clouse made a nomination but the motion died for
lack of a second.
The pace of the meeting picked up when item 14 was reached, a
discussion of “projects.”
Manager Melvin Davis reminded the board of pending projects in the
block that includes Alpine’s historic Holland Hotel and the trailer
park, Frontier Village. Mayor Clouse said she had been told that the
alley behind the hotel ”reeks of gas.” Is that a safety
matter? ”Yes Ma’am” said Davis. As are the lines in the trailer park,
Davis added. The gas hasn’t “migrated” to the buildings said Davis and
we don’t know how much gas is lost from the system but it is certainly
a problem.
Davis then told the board there was a new problem which came up last
Friday in Lines-Bow trailer park. Davis said he had to cut off eight
customers who had a defective line of PVC pipe, which is prohibited.
The shocked board members inquired when it began. Davis said no one
seemed to know.
This discussion was in the context of the board’s disputes over the
past several weeks when they have failed to act on the matters above as
well as failing to enact a budget for this fiscal year. And September’s
days are dwindling down to a precious few.
Mayor David Lanman was energized by the stories of failing gas lines
and said that he doesn’t think the manager needs the board’s approval
to act on these matters under discussion as obvious safety hazards. The
board quickly approved repair of the Lines-Bow gas lines on Lanman’s
motion. But Manager Davis doesn’t have either a budget or a blank check
for repairs.
The last word went to the manager who told the board he had arranged
for a leak survey in the towns of Marfa, Alpine, and Ft Davis business
districts. In addition, there will be a survey of about a one fourth of
the residences in the area. The leak survey began Tuesday. Manager
Davis said in the eight months he has been here with this company they
have fixed 150 leaks.
The board plans to meet again October 16.
One hesitates to seem alarmist…. but don’t those leaks require a sense
of urgency? Especially considering that some members have the time to
lunch and plan on the two cities’ division of the company’s cash
“surplus.” •
(Also published by the Big Bend
Sentinel of Marfa, Texas September 28, 2006.)
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