WEDNESDAYFEB. 19, 2020VOL. 113 • NO. 8

BEACONBRIEFS

P. O. Box 817 • 310 Fifth St.Palacios, TX 77465

(361) 972-3009palaciosbeacon@gmail.com

Website: palaciosbeacon.com

The OnlyNewspaper In The

World Published Just For The Palacios Area.

PALACIOS,

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TEXAS

Beacon Deadline 5 p.m. Friday

Except for paid advertising, all articles, photos or other information submitted on Monday will be published on a space available basis only.

thObserving Our

113Year1907-2020

Open 8:30 a.m.-5 p.m.Beacon Closed Wednesday

The calmness of last Saturday evening and early Sun-day morning was twice interrupted by the blaring of fire sirens as the Palacios Volunteer Fire Dept. responded to a call of a building fire on the Transport Boat Works prop-erty in the 1700 block of First St.

The first fire call rang out at 6:21 p.m. on Feb. 15, with firefighters arriving to find thick black smoke pouring from the fabrication shop at the rear of the property.

A witness at the scene said he’d stopped to look at one of the boats on the lot, when he noticed smoke beginning to emit from the metal building and contacted his father in law to notify authorities.

Palacios Beacon• A Member Of •

Texas Press AssociationSouth Texas Press Association

Texas Gulf Coast Press Association

(See FIRE, Page 3)

• Deadline for Articles, Classified & Display Ads 4:30 p.m. Friday•

Palacios PD made 25% fewer stops in ‘19

BY ALAN C. SCHULMANPalacios Beacon - Reporter

BY RYAN WESTPalacios Beacon-Publisher

PISD Trustees call for $83-million in bonds in May elections

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PALACIOSBEACON$30 A YEARIN COUNTY$40 A YEAR

OUT-OF COUNTY

Kelly Siegler headlines CofC Banquet Thurs.

Palacios ISD Seeks Nominations For

Distinguished AlumniSee Page 8 See Page 12

Sharks Net Sweep Of

TigersSee Page 2

African American

Heritage Day

Man, Woman & Business of the Year presented

BY RYAN WESTPalacios Beacon-Publisher

Filing frenzy at deadline for City, PISD

(See FILING, Page 3)

Proudly Serving The City By The Sea Since 1907USPS 418460 1 SectiON, 12 PAGES

PalaciosPalaciosBEACONBEACON$1.00

Palacios Pride

Pick it uP

(See CofC, Page 2)

■ 4th BirdFestParade of Birds Workshop Sat.

The 4th annual Matagorda Bay Bird-fest is just around the corner and now is the time for you to get your bird ready.A Parade of Birds Workshop will be held on Saturday, Feb. 22, 29 and March 21 from 1:30 p.m.- 4 p.m. at 454 B Main Street in Palacios. The first 30 individuals, 4th grade and up, including adults, are invited to bring along a baseball cap to transform into a bird head.This is a free workshop and opportu-nity for the community to get involved early in this years Matagorda Bay Birdfest.

FRESH from the pew at Mass, Palacios Volunteer Fire Dept. firefighter Michael Weaver hopped aboard a forklift and wheeled out a flaming boat for fellow Palacios Volutneer Firefighters to extinguish at Transport Boat Work’s fabrication shop which caught fire last Saturday. (Beacon Photo by Ryan West)

Palacios PD 2019 Traffic Stops By Ethnicity

Palacios PD 2018 Traffic Stops By EthnicityRace/EthnicityAfrican AmericanAsianCaucasianHispanicMiddle EasternNative AmericanTOTALS

STOPS427038354700

1,042

STOPS863279590601

1,390

Race/EthnicityAfrican AmericanAsianCaucasianHispanicMiddle EasternNative AmericanTOTALS

The Palacios Chamber of Commerce Annual Awards Banquet, scheduled for Thurs. (Feb. 20) at the Pala-cios Recreation Center.

This years’s will fea-tured guest speaker will be Matagorda County native, Kelly Siegler of the hit tele-vision show, Cold Justice on TNT.

Aside from Siegler, the main event of the evening will be the announcement of the Palacios Man, Woman, and Business of the year. Nominees were contributed

Last Thursday’s Regular Board Meeting of the Board of Trustees of Palacios ISD held the promise of greater efficiency as the move to Thursday meetings from the traditional Monday creates additional time for board members to study agenda items, which are posted the previous Friday, prior to the meetings. However, Thursday’s meet-ing did nothing to validate that theory.

In a marathon three-plus hour open ses-sion, which included a second executive session, the trustees were tasked with pro-cessing information from several presenters and making possibly the largest financial decision they will ever make as PISD board

members.At the last meeting, options ranging from

upgrades to existing facilities to all new buildings, were presented to the board. At Thursday’s meeting the board approved an order calling for a bond election consisting of Proposition A, in the amount of $72- mil-lion, and Proposition B, in the amount of $11-million, with a tax rate to be determined at a later meeting.

The PISD School Board, during the March school board meeting, will be establishing a tax rate increase threshold to ensure a bur-den is not placed on tax payers should the bonds be approved.

PresentationsJill Hearne, CEO of Boys & Girls Club,

thanked Dr. Glenn and the board for the use of the Annex Building and gave an update on activities.

ABM reps face the musicAfter spending several million dollars on

climate control, the PISD board heard from two representatives from ABM, the compa-ny that performed the work. Trustee Bran-don Bowers stated to them, “We just got an audit, and we were told that none of the en-velopes are fixed. If you fix the humidity, then the buildings last forever, almost. Four million dollars later we have the same cam-pus, but now we want to rip it down.”

Bowers also challenged the reps on the number of thermostats installed, which was agreed to be one for each a/c unit, for a total

of 138. Dr. Bryan Williams reported finding only

108 thermostats. No resolution was agreed upon.

Public CommentsKaren Botbyl and David Glenn addressed

the board regarding the millions of dollars in bonds proposed, each asking for more discussion and consideration before com-mitting to such a large expenditure.

Approved ItemsAn agreement with Hellas Contracting for

parking lot repair was approved. Also ap-proved was an increase in Adult Staff Lunch price to $4.00, a contract with DeWitt Poth & Son for Toshiba copiers, and an update to FM (LOCAL) on Extracurricular Activity

(See PISD, Page 3)

Stops by Palacios Police were down roughly 25-per-cent in 2019 compared to 2018, continuing a down-ward trend over the past sev-eral years..

Palacios Police Chief Da-vid Miles was on hand at last week’s Palacios City Council meeting and pre-sented the 2019 Racial Pro-filing Audit, which showed a total of 2,395 contacts over the course of the year and 1,042 traffic stops in, on and around roadways across town, down from the 1,930 made in 2018.

In 2002, the Palacios Po-lice Department adopted the policy in accordance with Texas Law on Racial Pro-filing, banishing racial pro-filing practices among all

Palacios Police Department officers.

Of the total number of mo-tor vehicle stops by the PPD noted on Tier 1 of the Report, 952 incidents resulted in a ci-tation only, 75 resulted in an arrest and 15 resulted in both a citation and arrest.

Broken down by race/ethnicity, Hispanics were stopped 547 times, Cauca-sians 383, Asian 70 and Af-rican American 42. In 18 of the 1,042 stops the ethnicity was known prior to the stop.

A vehicle search was con-ducted on 212 stops, with 84 being consented to.

Tier 2 of the Racial Profil-ing Report noted the 2,395 total contacts made by the PPD in 2019.

Men led the way by over a 2-1 margin over women with 1,613 contacts to 782.

A total of 2,300 warnings

and/or citations resulted from the 2,395 contacts.

Broken down by race/eth-nicity, Hispanic led all con-tacts with 1,167, followed by 936 Caucasian, 184 Asian, 107 African, and one Native American.

Prior to the contact ethnic-ity was known just 29 times.

Moving traffic violations were the cause of 1,526 con-tacts, followed by vehicle traffic violation (equipment, inspection, registration) with 645. Violation of law other than traffic was the reason for 140 stops and 84 instanc-es were due to pre-existing knowledge (i.e. warrant.)

Of the 2,395 total contacts, a search was performed 275 times. Of the 275 searches, 132 were done with consent, 55 were result of inventory search performed as result of towing, 41 for probable

cause/reasonable suspicion, (See CITY, Page 3)

TranSport fab-shop goes up in flames...

The saying of ‘deadlines spur action’ is infamous and it rang true in the City by the Sea as last Friday’s deadline to file for a place on the City of Palacios and Palacios ISD finished with a frenzy.

Let’s begin on the City side of the ticket where the seats for Mayor and Council Pos. 1, 2, and 6 are bound for May’s ballot.

Sharon Trainor recently filed for a run at Pos. 2, but that was before incumbent Donna Schulman filed for a run at second term. Prior to last Friday’s deadline, Train-or withdrew her application for a run at Pos. 2, and then re-filed for a run at Pos. 1,

BY RYAN WESTPalacios Beacon-Publisher

DEADLINE 4:30 P.M. FRIDAYPage 2 - Palacios Beacon - Wed., February 19, 2020

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•The Palacios Beacon • Serving the City by the Sea since 1907

Education next for hemp ventureROCKDALE: The previously announced hemp ven-

ture, which would make Rockdale a hub for growing, manufacturing and distributing the newly-legal product, is still headed to town with meetings to educate poten-tial growers, set for the first quarter of 2020. Jerry Wal-ters II, chief executive officer of Oppidan, said the com-pany is looking at scheduling the meetings as guidelines over hemp businesses come into sharper focus. Hemp has been recently legalized by the Texas Legislature but rules for approval and licensing by industrial hemp growers aren’t expected to go into effect before early 2020. According to the Texas Dept. of Agriculture, the U.S. Dept. of Agriculture must first adopt the state’s rules for the new industry. - The Rockdale Reporter

PALACIOS BEACON

Area Briefs

“I BELIEVE IN YOU - BELIEVE IN ME”

I BELIEVE in our Community; the good and not so perfect. I BELIEVE in who we are and having the resolve to solve our commu-nity issues. I BELIEVE it is up to you and I to make our Community much better, as there is no one else who will

care as much as I do.

I BELIEVE we are a Community of respect,energy, tolerance, and open-mindness.

I BELIEVE we can become a better Precinct 3 by overcoming obstacles, and with determination

and hard work we can do justice to Precinct 3. I BELIEVE in lifting the American Spirit high!

*VOTE * DENNIS SMITH YOUR CONSERVATIVE REPUBLICAN

Pd Pol Ad by Dennis Smith, Treasurer,

104 Main St. Palacios,

Tx 77465

Suspected illegal cash seized at U.S. 59 stops

Most Dearest Mother & Grandmother

Happy 100th Birthday!Love,

Dennis Sr, Denise, Patrick, Waterford, Mark Dennis Jr, Kerry, Jude, Grace

Our Sign of Christ’s Love and Nearness

* March 7 * Broken Spokes

* March 28 * Tremeloco

* April 25 * Linda Gail Lewis

THE OUTR IGGEREvent Center

6thStreet & Commerce

outriggereventcenter.comFor Tickets or Reservations

361-920-6513

Dear Editor, After much soul searching, I have decided not to seek re-

election to the Palacios School Board after serving on the board of trustees for the past 15 years. There are many people who have supported and encouraged me throughout my time on the board. For that, I am forever grateful.

I have enjoyed my time serving Palacios ISD, but it is time to hand my position to someone new. I have known Marcus Aparicio for many years. He is a good man. Therefore, I sup-port him for position number 7.

Please support Marcus and the rest of the School Board through good times and bad. Keep in mind that the Board often has to make difficult decisions based on more informa-tion than available to the general public. The Board does its best to do what is right for the district and always tries to keep students first.

As for me, the decisions I had to make while on the School Board were some of the most difficult of my life.

I want to thank my wife and children for always supporting me no matter what. This change will let me spend more time with my family and focus on my business responsibilities in Colorado, Pennsylvania, and West Virginia.

I wish PISD good luck in the future. May God bless the board and Palacios ISD.

Peter W. Zamarripa

100th Mom!

You are, have been and always will be our gift from

God!!!We love you!Lillian,Harvey Jennifer,

Stefan Jillian, Julia, Jakob, Brent, Stephanie,

Brendan and Nolan

With several new bulkhead projects scheduled, it was announced by Charles Rhoades that the Gower/Doughty bulk-head project, which had been hampered by weather delays, etc., has finally been completed.

At last Wednesday’s Meeting of the Commissioners of the Matagorda County - Palacios Seawall Commission, Rhoades was also awarded a contract as the low bidder for various FEMA Hur-ricane Harvey projects and repairs. Due to the heavy volume of work Rhoades will be undertaking in the next several months with repairs, Chairman Craig Wallis asked that the remaining bulk-head work be given to Gary Hickl.

Matt Glaze, from Urban Engineering,

noted the lack of availability locally of a certain species of turf grass to be used in repair projects, which led to a discus-sion of grass seed and the germination of those seeds.

Inspector’s ReportInspector Larry Lanfear reported the

following: South Bay Boat Ramp: Rhoades Land

Leveling has ordered the material to re-place the missing fender board.

Bay Front Walkway: AEP has not been able to repair the three lights not burning or replace the missing pole due to the wet weather. Rhoades Land Lev-eling has ordered the materials to repair the two damaged access steps.

First Street Pier: There is one area light not burning.

Fourth Street

Pier: The west parking lot light is not burning.

Gower/Doughty Bulkhead: The work has been completed.

Beachside Property: The bridge to Turtle Point was discovered to be dam-aged during the FEMA Project Pre-Bid site visit.

Approved ItemsThe minutes of the Jan. 8 meeting

were approved, along with Payment of Bills, and the Financial Reports from Ellen Dodd and Investment Reports from County Treasurer, Loretta Griffin, were accepted.

Next MeetingThe next meeting of the Commission-

ers of the Matagorda County - Palacios Seawall Commission will be on Mar. 11 at 6 p.m.

by the public earlier this year, and selections made from those nominated.

Festivities begin at 6 p.m. with a meet & greet, the ban-quet dinner will be served at 7 p.m. followed by Siegler at 7:30 p.m.

A list of past CofC Award recipients may be found on Page 4.

CofC(Continued From Page 1)

BY ALAN C. SCHULMANPalacios Beacon - Reporter

Seawall wraps up Bayshore bulkhead work

Letter ToThe Editor

Change of heart...

African American heritage celebrated at City by the Sea Museum...ANGELA Fletcher (center) welcomes the audience to last Saturday’s annual African American Heritage Day at the City by the Sea Museum. A presentation ‘Celebrating Our Youth’ highlighted Palacios natives June Deadrick, Tiffany Johnson, Camilla Hubbard, Ronnie Heard, Grant Heard and Franchelle Lucas. Janice Young led a ‘Re-membering Gloria Dean King Watson’, followed by Erica Collins’ Grandmother Poem. (Beacon Photo by Ryan West)

Palacios Beacon - Wed., February 19, 2020 - Page 3DEADLINE 4:30 P.M. FRIDAY

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TO SEE WHO WAS ARREST-ED & FOR

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Individuals listed have been arrested and/or charged with an offense. Inclusion in this report does not imply that the person is guilty of any crime. The following are offense and arrest reports submitted by the Palacios Police Dept. to the Palacios Beacon as of noon Friday.

• Palacios Police Reports •

From the Police ChiefBy Police Chief

David MilesThere are

people that are not pay-ing attention to the one-way streets in the school zones. Please pay at-tention and drive safely.

CITY (Continued From Page 1)

The Palacios Beacon - where YOU get the news, sports and more YOU want

FILING (Continued From Page 1)

St. Anthony of Padua Catholic ChurchAnnual Fish & Shrimp Fry

Serving 4pm - Sold Out

Family Center /1004 Magnusson

DINE-IN or TAKE OUT/Drive Thru Available

$10.00 PER PLATE Menu includes:

Fish, Shrimp, French Fries, Coleslaw & Hushpuppies,

Dessert & Tea.

FRIDAY, Feb. 28th

Carancahua Community Volunteer Fire Department's Lucas Haynes and Michele

Haile have both passed their State and National Certifica-tion exams for Emergency

Medical Technician (B) and will join the existing EMT-B staff in provid-ing quality emergency medical care across our 81 square mile response area, and all the areas we cover by mutual aid. Both have spent hun-dreds of hours in class-room, online, and hands-on training to reach this point and are looking forward to putting their knowledge and ability to use helping our residents and visitors. Both live in Cape Carancahua; Lucas

is an Industrial Firefighter for Formosa Plastics and Michele is a Registered Nurse.

Pair of CCVFD firefighters pass EMT-B exams

28 were due to incident ar-rest/warrant, and 19 were due to contraband/evidence in plain sight.

Contraband was discov-ered on 57 of the searches, resulting in: 39 for illegal drugs/paraphernalia; 12 with alcohol; 65 with weapons; 1 with stolen property.

A total of 90 of the con-tacts resulted in arrest. Vio-lation of the of traffic law netted 54 arrests, violation of Penal Code resulted in 38 ar-rests, and 13 arrests were due to outstanding warrant.

The Racial Profiling Re-port is required by the Texas Commission on Law En-forcement Standards and Education to be submitted to City Council by March 1. The law can be found in the Texas Code of Criminal Procedure, beginning with article 2.131; Racial Profil-ing Prohibited. This collec-tion of data of both vehicu-lar and pedestrian stops is to determine if a local law enforcement agency is vio-lating the state law against racial profiling. Each agency is also required to have writ-ten policy prohibiting its of-ficers from engaging in such profiling.

Admin ReportsCity Manager David Ko-

curek reported the final lamp post have been installed on Main St. for the Downtown Revitalization Sidwalk Proj-ect, with handrails expected to be installed by the end of this week. A punch list has been given to the project engineer prior to ADA in-

spection and close out of the project.

Progress has been made on the City’s cattle problem on the airport runways after Po-lice Chief David Miles con-tacted the owner and fence repairs were made.

City Secretary Clissa Mills presented the Notice of Elec-tion for the May 2 election and noted the Drawing for a Place on the Ballot - should there be a contested City Race - be held at 4 p.m. on Mon. (Feb. 24).

Approved ItemsCouncil approved the first

reading of Ordinance 2020-O-1 establishing the sal-ary of the Municipal Court Judge and compensation for

Interim/Associate Judge. Also approved was a reso-

lution authorizing the appli-cation to the Office of the Gov. of the State of Texas for a technology grant up-date, which Chief Miles said would be utilized in the pur-chasing of new body and ve-hicle cameras and software for the Police Dept.

Tabled ItemsA lease agreement with

the Palacios Community Co-alition at the City property located at 205 4th St. was tabled .

Next MeetingThe next meeting of the

Palacios City council will be held Tues. (Feb. 25) at 7 p.m.

The Family of

Isabel Sol is -Smit h

Invites you to a come

and go celebration

of their beloved mother’s

100th Birthday!

Sat. Feb. 22 2-4 p.m.

Palacios Recreation Center2401 Perryman Ave.

where Councilman Johnny Tran hit his Char-ter mandated term limit.

That wasn’t all the deadline action in the Council Pos. 1 race as Carol Ferdinand sub-mitted for a place on the ballot, joining Train-or and former Councilman from the early 2000’s Larry Glenn in a three-way race for a seat at the Council table.

In Pos. 6, incumbent Steve McGovern will have to fight to remain on the Council as Mi-chael Dotson filed as a challenger on the bal-lot in May.

With all the hustle and bustle at the dead-line, Schulman is unopposed in her run for reelection to Pos. 2, as is former Municpal Court Judge Linh Chau in his bid for the Mayor’s seat.

Things were only slightly less active on the

PISD Trustee front with a withdrawal of its own from the ballot and a pair of contenders filed at the deadline.

Fifteen-year incumbent Trustee Peter Za-marripa formally withdrew his application filed for a reelection bid and in a letter to the Beacon announcing his withdrawal, threw his support behind Marcos Aparicio.

Aparicio beat the filing deadline and is un-opposed in his bid to claim Zamarripa’s seat at Pos. 7.

Ron Laws tossed his name into the deadline hat for a run at Pos. 5, joining the previously filed Karen Botbyl in the race to replace out-going Trustee Lisa Harrison.

Incumbent Trustee in Pos. 6, Fabian Mar-roquin is unopposed. PISD

(Continued From Page 1)

Absences.Superintendent’s

ReportsDr. Missy Glenn re-

ported an upcoming meeting with SSAC will be in March and thanked everyone for their work on the Valentine’s Pa-rade.

Next MeetingThe next meeting of

the Board of Trustees of Palacios ISD will be on Thursday, March 19.

Once on the scene fire-fighters, opened a door to the building and found it nearly consumed by flames.

Firefighters, Palacios Po-lice officers and bystanders worked to move boats on trailers away from harms way, while PVFD’s Michael Weaver jumped on a forklift, fresh from the pew at Mass.

After a roll-up metal door was opened, an engulfed boat on a trailer was discov-ered. Weaver maneuvered the fork lift into position and wheeled the flaming boat into the open where fellow

firefighters quickly doused the vessel.

After several hours the fire was believed to be extin-guished.

At 4 a.m. on Sun. (Feb. 16), firefighters were called back to the scene after the fire reignited. A short while later it was out for good.

The total scope of the dam-age and its impact on the operations of the local boat manufacturer is still being assessed by Transport Boat Works.

The cause of the fire is still under investigation.

FIRE (Continued From Page 1)

CCVFD’s Michele Haile CCVFD’s Lucas Haynes

DEADLINE 4:30 P.M. FRIDAYPage 4 - Palacios Beacon - Wed., February 19, 2020

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