Josie Arellano es enlace para víctimas de delitos en el Departamento de Desarrollo Policial de Pharr. Arellano conversó a fondo con la presentadora del Rio Grande Guardian, Mari Regalado, para hablar sobre su trabajo. Regalado comentó que es importante que las víctimas de delitos se presenten y denuncien, sin importar su estatus legal. Añadió que el Departamento de Policía de Pharr puede ayudar.

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Josie Arellano is crime victims liaison for Pharr Police Development. Arellano sat down for an in-depth interview with Rio Grande Guardian anchor Mari Regalado to discuss her work. She said it is important for the victims of crime to come forward and report a crime, no matter what their legal status. She said Pharr Police Department can help. Here is the interview.

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PHARR, Texas - Mario Guerrero, CEO of the South Texas Builders Association, says the region’s banks are also being impacted ICE’s raids on construction sites in the Rio Grande Valley.

Guerrero called a meeting recently with U.S. Rep. Henry Cuellar to discuss the economic impact the raids are having on the building industry. More than 20 construction company owners attended.

The building industry representatives said jobs are being delayed because workers, undocumented or otherwise, are not showing up at the construction sites. He said ICE (Immigration and Customs Enforcement) officers are rounding up all the workers, whether they are undocumented or not.

“We're getting attacked from two different directions. One is interest rates. The other is the immigration crisis. They (ICE) are not making it easy for construction companies to go ahead and build these homes. It's taking longer,” Guerrero told the Rio Grande Guardian.

“People need to realize that a lot of this construction is happening off of bank loans, right? So, if a construction company is building out of a loan, now you're faced with paying higher interest, because you're not finishing your project at a certain time.

Guerrero continued: “So, now we have banks that are extremely, extremely worried, because now they're seeing delays in the projects. It is taking so long that they're afraid that construction companies are going to start defaulting on loans.”

Asked if his comment about banks being worried was purely anecdotal, Guerrero said: “No, this is coming directly from presidents and vice presidents of these banks. They're extremely worried. You have to understand that the cycle, the wheel, is not moving. And if the wheel is not moving, that's an economic issue that we are facing. And it's not moving because people are afraid to work. Both illegal and American citizens are afraid to work because they (ICE) are taking everybody.”

Guerrero said he hopes house prices in the Valley do not start to rise because housing projects are being stalled.

The members of the South Texas Builders Association that were present for the meeting with Cuellar, which was held at Pappadeaux Seafood Kitchen in Pharr, said they would take up the congressman’s offer to go to Washington for a meeting with officials with the Department of Homeland Security.

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BROWNSVILLE, Texas - Former state Sen. Eddie Lucioo, Jr., has not been able to give away as many turkeys to the less fortunate this year, in part because federal funding to the food banks has been cut.

Normally, Lucio would purchase the turkeys at a competitive price from local food banks and distribute them to those in need in Cameron, Willacy, and Hidalgo counties. This year, however, the 25th year he has been doing it, he has had to pay for them from the large distributors at the normal price.

And so, he has had to shrink the program to just giving away 400 turkeys and all within Cameron County alone.

In an interview with Ron Whitlock Reports, Lucio explained how his Thanksgiving Turkey Day first started.

“This is the 25th annual giveaway. We started off with with 10 or 20 turkeys and they mostly to the ladies that kind of hung around my campaign. Those that were really interested in community development. They were activists. And I told Brenda, my dear assistant who has actually worked for me for 36 years, to go out and buy some turkeys to give them.

“And it started like that. But we continued to make it bigger and bigger until it got to hundreds of families that we were able to help.”

Back then Lucio had campaign contributions to draw on to purchase the turkeys. But when he retired in 2023, the campaign contributions, naturally, dried up.

“Back in the day I had money that was contributed to me, and I was glad to share it with the less fortunate that needed our help and support. But after January of 2023 I was no longer in public public service. But, fortunately, I still had some anonymous donors that that wanted to help, one in particular that I care not to mention. I said I would not divulge his name because he wanted to keep it private.”

Lucio said he gave away one thousand turkeys last year. This year, he has had to shrink it to 400.

“These big, multi-billion dollar corporations, they don’t give you any discounts. They're there to make money. That’s the name of the game for them. I don't want to be too critical but when it comes to helping the less fortunate and those that that need help, I think all of us should dig in a little bit and share a little bit of the wealth and share a little bit of our resources so that they, too, can have a sit down dinner with with their families, and enjoy the day and thank God for all the blessings.”

Lucio said he is particularly disappointed he could give out turkeys in Willacy and Hidalgo counties, as in previous years.

“I used to do the three counties because I had enough turkeys. Hidalgo, Willacy and Cameron. But this year, there are very few turkeys, 600 less. It means I couldn't cross the county line to Hidalgo and Willacy, and it hurts me. It pains my heart not to be able to help because of lack of funds and the lack of resources that we need.”

Lucio says he has a plan to arrest the slide, to give away more turkeys next year.

“I have a plan. I want to make sure we have the funds necessary. So I'm going to do a big (golf) tournament and call it a Turkey Tournament. Sometime in May or June of next year. And then build on that from personal contributions from anybody that wants to give to a worthy cause like ours.”

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MCALLEN, Texas - Ralph Garcia, interim chief operating officer for McAllen Economic Development Corporation, has given a brief update on the various projects the group is working on.

“Right now, the EDC is working with about 25 active projects. This represents a total of about three million square feet of space. Estimated jobs are about 8,000 and the economic impact of that is roughly about $5 billion dollars,” Garcia said a quarterly stakeholders meeting.

“Primarily, our companies are coming from France, Sweden, Mexico, the US and Japan. Those are the activities that we're seeing right now.”

Garcia said McAllen EDC has secured two new leads during the current quarter, along with 23 existing prospects.

"We also continue to work on state leads. Most of what we're seeing coming through, the focus is on manufacturing and, of course, distribution and logistics. Those are projects that we continue to work with.”

Garcia said the MEDC team working on active projects includes Susie Flores in McAllen and Rafael Angel Ortiz Salazar in Reynosa.

“And, of course, we continue to do BRE (business retention and expansion) visits with a lot of our existing business, both in McAllen and Reynosa. We find that most of the leads that we're generating right now are through a BRE visit, where we're learning of current projects that companies are looking at.”

Garcia said quite a few of those expansion projects involve South America.

“We’re trying to leverage those projects, to look at Texas as an alternative option. One of the advantages that we have is our low cost, so that helps us. But, we're always trying to get in front of those projects, versus them leaving the area completely.”

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MCALLEN, Texas - McAllen International Airport continues to capture the biggest share of the passenger market in the Rio Grande Valley, the city’s director of aviation reports.

Jeremy Santoscoy gave an update on airport activity at a recent McAllen Economic Development Corporation stakeholders meeting.

“Through Quarter 3, we’re at about 863,000 total passengers, which is a slight decrease year-over-year, (a drop of) about two and a half percent,” Santoscoy said.

“We continue to see the majority market share, the value is about 48 percent, with Harlingen following at 40 percent and Brownsville at 12 percent.”

Harlingen is otherwise known as Valley International Airport. Brownsville is otherwise known as Brownsville-South Padre Island International Airport.

“Overall, year-over-year, Harlingen was up just slightly, but Brownsville was still down 11 percent. With all the economic activity over there, you figured there'd be some kind of change. But what I'm hearing is there are still a lot of people choosing to live on this side of the Valley and commute back and forth with those jobs down there, with the SpaceX and LNG.”

Santoscoy said the recent government shutdown did not impact McAllen International Airport very much.

“The government shutdown, the longest government shutdown, had did very little to no effect on McAllen International Airport. Our services kept going,” Santoscoy said. “We have good group of federal partners that we continue to work with through thick and thin. So services did not see any delays when they did turn down the amount of operations working out of the hubs. We did see a couple of them cancelations, but that was the airline's decision.”

Santoscoy said McAllen is continuing to lobby to have its flights to Mexico City restored. They were recently suspended by the federal government.

“We were disappointed with that, with the Mexico City flights being suspended. We continue to work with our congressional delegation to make some noise in D.C. to see how they can support us; to open that route back up due to its importance to the Valley. It's the only Mexico City route out of here.”

Santoscoy said he had read that Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum wants to open up more slots out of Mexico City. “We're trying to look at the validity of that. No orders have been issued by the Mexican government,” he said. “That route is very important to the economy down here.”

Editor's Note: Go to the RGG Business Journal to read the full story.

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MCALLEN, Texas - Ruben Alfaro, development engineer for Hidalgo County Regional Mobility Authority, gave an update on the group’s strategic plan when he spoke at a McAllen Economic Development Corporation stakeholders meeting.

That strategic plan includes the long-awaited Hidalgo County Loop. Alfaro said HCRMA is making good progress.

“The key point I wanted to get across is the progress that we are making in terms of construction and where we are going as an RMA,” Alfaro told the RGG Business Journal, at the end of the meeting.

“We need everyone in the county ti work together to achieve it (the county loop). It is not an easy task but we are working on it and we are working diligently to get there.”

Alfaro also spoke at the governance of the RMA, the 365 Tollway project, the International Bridge Trade Corridor (IBTC), and overweight corridors.

Attached is an audio recording of Alfaro’s remarks to McAllen EDC.

Michael J. Williamson is a director on the HCRMA board. He said the group is keen to give presentations such as the one Alfaro made at the MEDC stakeholders meeting.

“If you have an organization that would like to maybe learn a little bit more about what we're doing, please let us know. It's all about working with our counterparts and our other parties and different cities,” Williamson said.

“Building a house is one thing. Building, maybe, a retail plaza is another. We're building a freeway. It is a really high over and we're dealing with hundreds of millions of dollars, if not billions of dollars, and we need everybody's support, everybody's participation. It really is a community effort to build something like this.”

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PHARR, TEXAS – RioPlex fu eel anfitrion de una ceremonia de colocacion para La Bonanza Avocados, una compañia familiar de aguacates proveniente de Uruapan, Michoacán el 14 de Nov. Invitados de la ceremonia incluyeron mas de 20 lideres de Negocios de Michoacán, que se encontraban en una mission commercial que incluyo una visita a SpaceX en Starbase. La ceremonia de colocacion se llevo a cabo en la Esquina de Las Milpas y Veterans Road en Pharr. La ceremonia incluyo discursos del alcalde the Pharr el Dr. Ambrosio Hernandez, el director de RioPlex, Joaquin Spammer, y el president de La Bonanza, Gabriel Villaseñor. Despues, los VIPs disfrutaron de una cena en el Klub Nautique en Mission. Aquí tenéis una grabación de audio de los comentarios realizados durante la cena.

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