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Published - Brownsville Herald October 22, 2006 

October 11, I witnessed the best of America in action. The South Texans for Good Government provided a forum for six candidates who want to work hard and incur personal abuse to help guide the Brownsville Independent School District.
I believe that candidates are community heroes for serving the community either for identifying ideas that need to be heard or for securing the confidence of the electorate and allowed to serve the community in the public position, often at very low or non-existent remuneration and nearly always criticized by all sides of an issue. Five heroes were there to face the scrutiny of their neighbors.
The incumbent Dr. Enrique Escobedo was present and was challenged by Moises Gonzalez and Michael Rodriguez for place 1.
Dr. Escobedo defended his position very well in face of a number of very pointed questions relating to long held criticisms of the BISD Board, on the part of several very passionate constituents.
Michael Rodriguez, an attorney with the United States attorney’s office and Moises Gonzalez a Special Agent with Immigration and Customs Enforcement brought freshness to the fray with a perspective from outside “in crowd politics” and with the studied observation only learned in a law enforcement atmosphere. All three of the presentations demonstrated very competent folks that would be an asset to the community however Mr. Gonzalez expressed an interest in reviewing the Strayhorn Report in the context of the changes that have taken place. 
To date the only apparent action taken was that a committee of very competent community leaders was convened; no report was ever allowed to reach the real bosses (the public). The issue should be dealt with to substantiate or discredit issues raised.                              Read the rest of this entry »