89th Legislature: Cortez lists the legislation Hidalgo County supports and opposes

EDINBURG, Texas – Hidalgo County Judge Richard Cortez has given a detailed account of the legislation his county both supports and opposes for the 89th Legislature.

Appearing as a panelist at a “State of the RGV” summit hosted by the Rio Grande Valley Hispanic Chamber of Commerce, Cortez said he had spoken to Cameron County Judge Eddie Treviño, Jr., about an overriding concern. Treviño was also a panelist at the event.

“The thing that’s very concerning to county government – and Judge Treviño and I were speaking about that earlier today – is that our ability to control development outside (city limits). Right now, we have more residential people living in non-incorporated areas than in the largest city (McAllen) in Hidalgo County, and yet we don’t have any ordinance powers to control that growth,”Cortez said.

Cortez said this fact should be of concern to cities in the Valley.

“When I was mayor McAllen, I had about 15 different sources of income. In the county we have one source of income. So, we cannot serve growth as well as the cities can,” Cortez said.

“But cities cannot annex anyone, unless the people want to be annexed. So, all of the development occurring in Hidalgo County is really going outside city limits. That is somewhat good, somewhat bad. What is bad is if the cities cannot control their areas outside, and you have this lesser level of development, when the city really grows and needs a nice, good subdivision, where are you going to put it?”

Legislation the county supports

Cortez ran through the bills filed that Hidalgo County likes.

“One of the bills that is being presented is House Bill 1080. It means that every time we have to publicly publish in the newspaper… some business we’re going to do, or transaction we’re going to do, that costs money. I know when I was mayor McAllen, it was an astronomical amount of money. Well now, this bill will allow for us to post it on our website, as opposed to doing it in a publication. Some of my newspaper people will not like it. But anyway, that’s a bill that we hope will pass.

“The second one. Counties also pay for certain taxes that the State of Texas now wants to eliminate with House Bill 1109. We’re supporting that.

“Then House Bill 1378. This creates a buffer between…  these battery companies coming in, they want to put a buffer as to what can be next to them. And we think that’s a good thing, because that’s something new. We don’t know what’s going to happen. 

“Then there’s House Bill 1575. This is good because it’s better care for pregnant women. I think that’s very important. 

“Then we also have House Bill 1461, which allows the counties to be reimbursed for mental patients and other parole violators and juveniles.

“So, all those will add money to us that we don’t have to get from our taxpayers. Those are the good things.” 

Legislation the county opposes

Cortez then ran through the bills filed that Hidalgo County dislikes.

“The bad things. One is House Bill 325, which limits the expenditures counties can have. Okay, listen to the logic of this. If we spent $100 last year, we can only spend 100 times whatever percentage of inflation was in the previous year, plus the growth. What does that have to do with the need for us to spend money? But that’s what that bill does.”

“The other bill that’s concerning to us is House Bill 1683. This is basically a bill pretty much targeted at Hidalgo  County. It defines Hidalgo County. And that is the consolidation of roads and bridges. After speaking to all our commissioners here, we think that that’s not in the best interest of the 22 cities, the mayors from the 22 cities here in Hidalgo County. I think we can better serve you better than that.

“Also a very concerning one is the bill trying to limit Medicaid and CHIP programs. As you know, we just finished building this beautiful Driscoll Hospital here, and immediately it was full. We have so many of our children needing services. Apparently, and I have somebody here that may know more than I do about this, they (the hospital) don’t qualify to be reimbursed on some programs. That will have a devastating effect on their ability and our ability to serve the children that we have.”

Cortez added: “So all these bills are very concerning to us. We’re going to pay attention to it and fight them as best as we can. We ask all of our legislators from this area to help us put together a well thought out plan as to really what helps us. But those were the positive bills and the negative bills that we’ve seen so far.” 

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