By Karen Gleason
The 830 Times
City council members voted unanimously Tuesday to deny a request by city staff for a
$100,000-plus marketing campaign for a proposed second international bridge.
The item up for approval at the regular city council meeting was “an ordinance
authorizing and directing the city manager to approve supplemental agreement No. 3 for
$107,610 from RRP Consulting Engineers, LLC, for the second international bridge
project.”
After City Secretary Mari Acosta read the heading of the agenda item, City Manager
Shawna Burkhart told the council Michael Riojas from RRP Consulting Engineers, the
city’s consultants on the bridge project, was on Teams video, ready to make a
presentation about the item.
Riojas began his presentation with a review of the second international bridge project,
including the stated purpose of the second bridge and noting the project is intended to
connect to Ports-to-Plains, a multi-state/multi-national trade corridor to link Mexico, the
United States and Canada, and to future Interstate 27.
Riojas said currently RRP is conducting environmental surveys needed to apply for a
presidential permit for construction of the second bridge.
Riojas said the marketing campaign being proposed would be subcontracted to Joaquin Guerra and Conexión, a “political and public engagement consulting group,” according to
its web site.
Guerra also appeared via video and told the council, “This supplement essentially would
go towards paying for our firm to work with Michael’s firm to do public engagement on
behalf of this project, to make sure there is awareness of this new construction for the
bridge, awareness of the proposed routes. We would also be conducting some research
and polling, to get a better understanding of what the public sentiment is, what concerns
exist out there, so we could use that information to answer questions.”
Guerra said a portion of the money would also go towards digital advertising “to increase
awareness,” then taking the findings from the poll and public comments “to put together
long-form videos that do public education in both English and Spanish for the residents
of Del Rio.”
Riojas told the council RRP will conduct another public hearing on the proposed second
bridge project in August, with an eye toward submitting the application for a presidential
permit in October.
Burkhart reminded the council that it and the city’s international bridge board had
approved the use of $25,000, which would not be used if the council voted to approve the
supplemental agreement with RRP.
“The $25,000 was simply a video, but it certainly wasn’t to this development. It certainly
wasn’t anticipated for this scope of work,” Burkhart said.
Arreola asked where the $107,000 payment would come from, and Burkhart replied it
would be paid from the bridge fund.
Arreola asked if there were any questions, and Councilwoman Carmen Gutierrez asked
Riojas about RRP’s expected timeline.
“I’m just concerned about putting the cart before the horse. If this gets approved, it seems
like things would be starting to move, but as far as I understand, we have not determined
or decided on a route (between the proposed bridge site and area highways) yet, so how
would we be creating public awareness and conduct a public hearing if we don’t have
that down yet?”
Burkhart replied, “I believe this is not regarding the route that you would choose, but the
need for the bridge, and it is evaluating the concept and the need for the bridge, rather
than a route, per se.”
Gutierrez responded she believed the public’s “number one question” would be where the
route would be sited.
“Even our other governmental entity, Val Verde County, and others want to know where
is (the route) going to be, to see if they’re going to support it or not support it,” Gutierrez
said.
Gutierrez thanked Burkhart for her answer and added, “I want to go on record that I fully
support the need to have a second international bridge. We cannot have only one bridge
and something happens to it, manmade or a natural disaster, then we would be completely
cut off. We must start the process of getting a second international bridge because it will
take years to come to fruition, and we need to start now.”
Mayor Pro-tem Jim DeReus also commented.
“This whole thing confuses me. . . on March 11, the council authorized $25,000 for city
staff to do a marketing campaign, and I expressed my concerns and displeasure at that
point. I find this one even worse because not only is it four times as much, but the
information in here tells you what they’re going to do.”
DeReus said he agreed with Gutierrez that the poll to be conducted “doesn’t ask the
important question.”
“The first question is, and granted these are samples, ‘Do you support (a second) bridge
to support trade and ease congestion?’ That’s a loaded question if I’ve ever heard one. Who’s going to say no to that? But it’s not asking about the two main things; one, why do
you disagree that we need a second bridge at all? But more importantly – and we have
some of the people sitting in the back (of the audience), who are opposed, not to the
bridge, but the location – this does not talk anything about the location,” DeReus said.
He also said he had issues with a portion of the information about the marketing
campaign presented as part of the council packet: “It basically is threatening public
officials with ‘we’re going to do a marketing campaign, paid for by the city’ to get you
not re-elected because you have the audacity to not fully agree with the current plan.”
DeReus added, “As I’ve said many times, I’m not against the bridge, and maybe we go to
the north (of the existing bridge), but we have not done proper due diligence because
things have changed. This has been going on for 15-20 years, the MOU on the (proposed
second bridge) location was over a decade ago. A lot has changed on the north side of
town.”
DeReus’ comments drew scattered applause from some audience members.
Guerra responded that the sample questions were only intended “to give an idea” of the
kinds of questions that would be asked “to measure public sentiment.”
DeReus replied, “You are saying you are going to do this: You are going “to make
inaction a political cost. Show officials that blocking progress could mean losing votes.”
You’re basically. . . using city funds to get people not elected at all or not re-elected. You’ve already made that decision, versus actually asking questions and then, based on
the answers, trying to decide what to do and which way to go.”
“If we could have reassurance that the followup to those questions was going to be an
honest discussion. . . If RRP doesn’t know where people are, their perspective, their
mentality, their concerns, about this bridge, they have not been paying attention for the
past couple of years,” DeReus added, saying during each of the previous public meetings,
RRP has gotten “a lot of negative feedback” on the routes and the bridge location.
After additional comments from DeReus, Burkhart said the previously-approved $25,000
was a “guesstimate” she had made of what such a campaign would cost, but in
discussions with RRP, they suggested Conexión was better suited to do the campaign.
Arreola asked the council if they might want to postpone action on the item, then
Gutierrez said she had another question.
The councilwoman asked whether the city could seek formal requests for proposals
(RFPs) for a campaign, and Burkhart said the city certainly could.
“I’ve already stated I don’t believe we’re ready to kick off this campaign. I think it’s too
early. We have too many questions still to be answered,” Gutierrez said.
When Arreola asked for a motion, Quiñones said he would make a motion to deny the
item, and DeReus gave the second. The council then voted unanimously to approve
Quiñones’ motion.
The writer can be reached at delriomagnoliafan@gmail.com
