He is a white male much beloved by the MAGA billionaires, millionaires, and elected MAGAs. Pobra Lina is a young Latina woman despised by the same people who tend to love Whitmire.
Where are the MAGA outcries for what is occurring at Metro? Whitmire controls that board and appointed the current Metro Chair.
Mayor Whitmire to Appoint Elizabeth Gonzalez Brock as Chair of METRO
February 13, 2024 — Houston Mayor John Whitmire announced today his appointment of Elizabeth Gonzalez Brock as Board Chair of the Metropolitan Transit Authority of Harris County (Houston METRO), pending City Council and board approval. She would be the first Hispanic woman to Chair the state’s largest transit authority, which has a 1,309-square-mile service area and an annual budget of $ 1.6 billion.
“Elizabeth is the leader we need for METRO today. She brings a ‘customer first’ mindset, which is exactly the thinking our community deserves,” Mayor Whitmire said. “Safety and reliability are key for all who depend on or commute alongside public transportation. I am confident that Elizabeth will use her results-driven expertise to drive METRO to deliver a user-friendly and fiscally responsible transit system to all. She understands that my priority is providing mobility options for all Houstonians.”
I need to give credit to the Houston Chronicle for running this and another story about Metro contracts and the Metro Chair. The other major media outlets in Houston do not seem to care about what Whitmire does regarding contracts and possible corruption. If they only treated Blacks and Hispanics the same way.
The Recall Whitmire did not go anywhere, but it did raise several salient points.
Brock and Evolve Houston/CenterPoint
Whitmire’s appointment of Elizabeth Brock as METRO board chair is one of the most disastrous examples of cronyism in his administration. Brock is the Vice President of CenterPoint, one of Whitmire’s biggest donors. Whitmire appointed her to bring a “customer-first” mindset to METRO. However, not too long after her appointment she, along with the METRO board, turned down almost $1 billion in federal funding for the University Corridor. She did not consult the public on this before axing the project; during a meeting where there was overwhelming opposition to turning down funding for the University Corridor, she only acknowledged one person who was against the University Corridor. Out of all the native Houstonians clamoring for that project, she called the single one against it an “actual resident” of the city. This does not put customers first, as she’s sidelined anyone who disagrees with her, a play commonly used by Whitmire. Recently, METRO has been increasing funding for their rideshare programs, starting a pilot partner project with Evolve Houston, an organization Brock founded. It’s clear that Brock’s appointment is a favor to a longtime donor with a total disregard for running our public transit effectively.
METRO Contracts
Houston Metro rebid a contract after the chair’s husband expressed interest. Was it favoritism?
Metro canceled and restarted a competitive bidding process last year after Chairperson Elizabeth Gonzalez Brock’s husband expressed interest in doing the work.
Andy Brock did not win the second round of bidding for courier services, and had first met with Metro to discuss the topic in 2023, months before Mayor John Whitmire was elected and named Elizabeth Brock Metro chair.
But a flurry of internal emails shows Metro executives and procurement staff closely tracked Andy Brock’s interactions with the transit agency last year, and that some officials were on edge about his involvement.
After the initial round of bidding had closed, emails show, Metro leaders directed procurement officials to contact Brock, who “indicated his interest in the courier contract and didn’t know if it would be resolicited.”
“If every bid that the organization did, any vendor was able to come along after the bid had closed and say, ‘I want in, re-do it,’ that’d be an awful precedent,” said Mike Mucha, deputy executive director of the Government Finance Officers Association.
Elizabeth Brock already faces questions over Metro’s embrace of a microtransit vendor she formerly led. That vendor, the nonprofit Evolve Houston, was given a multi-million-dollar role without competitive bidding and was not subject to Metro’s typical approach to measuring performance — though its work for Metro may now be ending.
So, when is John Whitmire going to do something about what is happening at Metro?