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My name is Gilbert Martinez I live at La Quinta Apartments. I am an ex-Union Pacific Rail Road Conductor. I am a disabled veteran.
On Aug. 15, 2008 on the Day of the Assumption of our Mother Mary, I celebrated my twenty-first anniversary as a third order Franciscan.
Approximately two years ago (Nov. 2006), I started to rent at “said” apartments. I soon found out that the apartment where I was living, had several things wrong with it: namely, the A/C was not working at all the electric stove that was provided had four burners of which only one was working!
The toilet that was provided did not flush properly, the water did not come out of the rim as to flush the toilet and completely rinse the bowl. I literally had to stand over the toilet and with the toilet brush; I would push the toilet paper down toward the middle of the toilet to completely rinse the bowl out.
I filed a complaint to Ms. Lupe Flores (the apartment manager) as soon as I found out about the problems. She then waited several months to fix the A/C because Ms. Flores stated that there was a lack of funds to fix everyone’s A/C or to repair any other items broken at this time.
She still has not fixed the other items that I had requested to be fixed and she either forgotten or does not care to fix them. About one year later, the A/C did not work again and I brought it to her attention. It had been hot, so I went to the custodian’s house and asked him if he knew that my A/C was out.
His mother, who lives with him, answered the door. I asked for him and when he came to the door I asked, “Did you know my A/C is not working? He said, “No, I was not told about it and for your information, I can’t look at your A/C until Ms. Flores gives me a work order without it my hands are tied.” Mr. Allen was very polite and I left both of them at the doorway.
The very next day Mr. Allen told Ms. Flores that I had been to his apartment twice, pounding at his door and threatened to call a lawyer and that I was verbally yelling at him. This is not true. This did not happen and is a bunch of lies.
On May 20, 2008, around 9am, I called Southwest Housing Compliance and complained to them that my apartment needed repairs. I talked to Maria Briseno and she told me to call Legal Aid. I went to the nearest Legal Aid office and told them about the conditions here at the apartments.
The Southwest Housing Compliance notified Ms. Flores that I would be filing a complaint. By the time I got home later that day around 6:30pm, inside my apartment on the sofa was an envelope with all the complaints.
On May 21 Ms. Flores said she was angry at me and she had made several complaints, one of which she stated that my apartment did not pass inspection back in April of this year. I’m assuming the reason she waited a month to tell me was that she was angry and wanted a reason to evict me.
On May 27, she inspected only my apartment in retaliation. In the year and a half of renting, I have always passed inspection. I have to hire someone to clean because I cannot do it by myself. That month was the only month I did not pass inspection. I’m assuming the apartment didn’t pass inspection is because she was upset with me.
She sent the custodian to check the A/C unit. Three days later, she had to install a capacitor in the unit, for it to work. I again asked them to fix the problems that had not been fixed since I had started renting. Three days later on May 25, she fixed the burners and the toilet – which was almost two years later!
I asked several tenants if they were being treated as I was or did they have any things that needed to be fixed. After talking to several tenants, they too explained to me that they had several repairs needed in their apartment, but were afraid to ask to get them fixed. They were afraid they would be evicted from their apartments.
After talking to the tenants, I washed my clothes at the laundry mat. To my amazement Ms. Lupe Flores and her two custodians walked in, confronted me, and said, “Why do you hate me so much?” I told her, “I don’t hate you. If you would just fix things in a timely manner, it would be a better place. But you don’t.”
She then told me “If you don’t like it here, there are no locks to exit the apartments.”
I asked her, “Are you asking me to leave?” Her response was, “No”. They left me, but I feel she is using intimidation tactics to try to get rid of me.
On Sept. 14, I paid my neighbors $20 to clean my apartment in preparation for the inspection scheduled for Sept. 16. They set the chairs on top of my kitchen table so they could sweep and mop the floor. Later that evening on the night of the 14th, when the floors were dry I sat the chairs on the floor.
On the night of the 15th, I was tiding up the table when I noticed dirt on the floor behind the table, I moved the chairs from the table and I saw dirt under the table and chair legs. The next day, a witness told me he saw the maintenance man coming down the ramp from my apartment the day before. I assume someone who has keys went in my apartment and threw dirt in my kitchen so that I would fail the inspection. Just another tactic to make me look like a bad tenant.
On Sept. 19, Mr. Allen left a note in my apartment door while I was in my next-door neighbor’s apartment. When I saw him coming down the ramp I asked him, “Are you looking for me?” He did not talk to me, he just pointed to the door for me to look at the note. On Sept. 22, Mr. Allen gave me another note to see Ms. Flores at the office.
She stated that Mr. Allen had stated that I had asked him, “What the hell are you doing in my apartment?” I told Ms. Flores that statement was not true. She then told me that she had ten or eleven violations against me. I responded, “Put them in writing.”
She responded, “Are you threatening me? When she said that statement, I knew she was up to something. So, I told her again to put them in writing and I walked out of her office. As I was walking out she yelled at me, “Come back here I’m not done talking to you.”
I looked for a friend to come back with me so that we could see all the violations that were against me. Upon our arrival the police were there, taking Ms. Flores reports that I had threatened her. At that point, she told me that she would be giving me an eviction notice and that she would not take my rent money either.
At this time, I have been threatened with many false allegations in an attempt to keep me quiet and out of the way in order to continue to take advantage of people who won’t speak out against their scandalous actions.
I am saying this to seek justice not only on my behalf, but for the other residents of La Quinta Apartments who are afraid to speak up. While I can’t speak for them, I know they have also endured several incidents of negligence similar to my own while living at the apartments.
I will now be looking into contacting the Better Business Bureau, HUD, and any other agency and/or organization that will help me correct this situation.
The residents at the apartments fear they will be evicted if they make waves. I, however, have nothing to lose and I will stand up for what is right against people who would seek to take advantage of those in similar situations.
Gilbert Martinez
Uvalde
To the Editor,
I agree with most of the comments made by Juan Sanchez in the Oct 11 issue of La Voz. I completely agree with his assessment of the job, or the lack of doing the job, by the County Chair. To do absolutely nothing to aid the candidates for all offices on the ballot is inexcusable. Read the rest of this entry »
ANYONE FOR DOMINOES?
If you like playing dominoes, be very careful.
Play the game as simple as possible without WISHING for any special favors. You might get your wish and then wish you had never started the game. Take our present financial fiasco as an example. Read the rest of this entry »
Dear Editor,
Last September 10, 2008 at the Public Hearing on rollback tax election in the Uvalde High School Library. After verifying the amount of $31,232.50 with Dr. Bixler, I questioned the Uvalde CISD administration and the Uvalde School Board as to why the $31,232.50 was not mentioned in the brochure distributed by the Uvalde CISD administration nor was mentioned in the Uvalde Leader-News. I was about to explain to the public as to where the $31,232.50 came from but the President of the Uvalde School Board, Mr. Mize, rudely interrupted me. Read the rest of this entry »
To the editor:
I wish to become a political activist and campaign for Barak Obama, the Democratic nominee for President. My political ad for Uvaldeans For Obama has been designed by high-school student Schaffer Edwards, and was published in the Junior College newspaper, the Southwest Texan. I will ask SWTJC Public Relations Office to send you a copy.
This is a open letter to the judicial System. I am a mother who’s child was violated of her innocence by a pedophile not once but twice at a very young age my daughter out cried to me . I took her to the Uvalde Police Department made a report .the officer and investigators were very understanding to my child’s needs and kept me informed . they questioned and charged this pedophile for indecency with a child .The P.D. did there job and it was now put in the judicial system . after about 10 months this pedophile gets his sentence 5 years probation and had to register as a sex offender. Now 4 yrs. later this pedophile sits in The Uvalde County Jail for the same reason he HURT another child.
My daughter experienced this again and she kept it to herself until it slipped out. and what really angers me is that when I asked why she didn`t tell me she say “ mom what for they let them go and they do it again to some one else, they tell me to tell them what happened so he cant do it to anybody else Yea right mom “ When your 10 year old daughter tells you this it really makes you look harder at things we hear of people being sentenced to jail for writing a “bad check“ because its stealing from a company . what about these pedophiles are they not stealing our children’s innocence from them?
Name Withheld by Request
Hispanics have an innate affinity for patterning. Mathematics, which is centered around patterning, should be a subject area that Hispanics are leaders in, yet they are not. Why?
When race is the definition of a group, both the variable of culture (environment) and the variable of genetic makeup must be explored.
If you look at even the poorest of schools in which everyone is economically disadvantaged, Caucasians rank higher in testing than Hispanics or African Americans.
There is a scientific data that explains why. Caucasians as a group are left brain dominant. Hispanics and African Americans are right brain dominant. Because our educational systems and testing assessments are designed by left brain dominant educators in a left brain dominant format, it is only logical that we get the results we do. There is no underlying sinister objective in the design, it is the way the educational system has be structured for decades.
The solution is to train teachers and students in brain or mental efficiency. Teaching all individuals of all races, genders, ages to develop the brain so that it can easily switch from one hemisphere to the other is the answer.
After 12 years of research, four case studies were taken to the National Conference for Teaching Hispanic Students. These four students of Hispanic heritage topped out the math scores in the nation. One young Hispanic student completed 5-1/2 years of mathematics in 12 months! They tested in the top percentages on a national norm-referenced test.
Suggestion: Quit keeping score. Empower students to become self-directed, responsible and aware of self-efficacy. Inform all students on how to develop mental efficiency. Reward effort.
It is an approach called No Excuses-No Limitations. It works for any student of any race, creed or gender who has the desire to learn.
Jeanine McGregor
To whom it may concern:
An article in La Voz recently advocated city council districts in place of at-large elections. The line of the story was that districts would force election of city councilmen from the west side and bring attention to the west side. This may be true, I’m not arguing against it.
The reasoning given is that almost all of the city council persons elected in the last 30 years lived on the east side of Uvalde so the west side was ignored for curbs, etc. And the focus was on getting the city to build utilities and curbed streets.
I want to suggest that this isn’t the answer. The city has been paving streets on the south and west side of town. Most, if not all, of the capital improvements like utilities and curb construction have been on the south and west side of town. This is work the City of Uvalde has paid for.
If one looks at who has paid for various developments in Uvalde over the last 30 or even 50 years, I believe it will be found that most of the developments on the east side of town were paid by private funds. The City had a hand in review and authorization of the projects, but the projects were not funded by the city. Almost everything constructed around Wal-Mart was private funds.
Look at the subdivisions built in Uvalde since 1990.They were mostly on the east side of Uvalde and have curb and gutter. They were paid for by private funds.
If the goal is better streets and services on the west side of town, some way has to be found to promote private development. I think all of Uvalde would like to see that.
Ken Dirksen
Uvalde
Teachers can’t hold each hand and perform a little one on one so perhaps each student could learn more.
It’s a class, a small group to where it’s up to each student to grasp what the teacher presents.
Education doesn’t stop once you leave the classroom and/or campus. Education is with you when you arrive home and say hello to your other teachers. Perhaps, and with all do [sic] respect, the more important teachers.
Obviously, failure is caused by insufficient studying. The teachers did their jobs, you didn’t do yours.
The policy for the TAKS tests is clear. The key word is all. Today’s students represent the future. If you can’t abide by rules, policies, etc., then the future doesn’t look all that bright, does it.
Protesting is not the answer. Pay more attention when in class. Read more often.
All you have is time.
Richard E. Van Fossan
Uvalde
Dear Editor,
Immigrants are the ones who built this country. Immigrants are the ones who will destroy it.
