State delegation: Teamwork still visible
El Paso Times Editorial Board

Prior to the recently concluded state legislative sessions in Austin, members of our state delegation maintained they would work as a team while representing El Paso.

That included the lone Republican amid the six, Dee Margo. And from what we see, they did.

Now it's good to see the group has remained true to that vow, even after business has been settled and a budget finalized during both regular and special sessions.

Margo certainly didn't change his political stripes; he's still our Republican. The other four state reps, along with our senator, José Rodríguez, by no means budged any distance toward the right.

On Wednesday, all members except the out-of-town Joe Pickett, accepted the El Paso Democratic Party's invitation to speak at a public forum. Besides Rodríguez, Margo was joined by fellow House members Chente Quintanilla, Marisa Marquez and Naomi Gonzalez.

The estimated 100 people in attendance didn't hear breaking news from the group, except maybe a tidbit from Margo. He explained why the Republican-dominated Legislature didn't use "Rainy Day Fund" money to help balance the budget.

We didn't know back then, but now we may know, and that's why such public forums can be valuable to the citizenry.

Margo said the $7.2 billion in the fund was not used to balance this budget because it's to be used toward the anticipated Medicaid shortfall when the Legislature next convenes in January 2013. Democrats in Texas are heavily pro-Medicaid.

We thought, as did the Democrats in our delegation, that using part of that fund would at least assuage the hurt El Paso felt when $113 million fewer dollars were sent to UTEP, $24 million fewer to our county's public schools and $20 million fewer to University Medical Center.

It's good to see our delegation, for the first time in several sessions, standing together as one, and still facing one public between sessions.