{"id":39045,"date":"2012-04-19T05:58:13","date_gmt":"2012-04-19T11:58:13","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.nmpolitics.net\/index\/?p=39045"},"modified":"2012-04-20T05:34:19","modified_gmt":"2012-04-20T11:34:19","slug":"sunland-park-gets-a-new-mayor","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/2012\/04\/sunland-park-gets-a-new-mayor\/","title":{"rendered":"Sunland Park gets a new mayor"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"Javier<\/a>

Javier Perea talking with reporters after being appointed mayor. (Screen shot from KFOX-TV\u2019s website)<\/p><\/div>\n

The selection of 24-year-old Javier Perea came after others couldn\u2019t ask the council to appoint them because police blocked the entrance when the meeting room filled to capacity.<\/h4>\n

The Sunland Park City Council chose Javier Perea, a 24-year-old graduate of New Mexico State University, to be its new mayor on Wednesday.<\/p>\n

From the Las Cruces Sun-News<\/a>:<\/p>\n

\u201cPerea, a Sunland Park resident, showed up at the meeting with r\u00e9sum\u00e9s in hand and made a pitch to city councilors during the introductory public comment period. He cited his experience in business, work in broadcasting at KRWG-TV and a degree from New Mexico State University as credentials. And he pledged to change the city government’s direction, starting with its hiring practices.<\/p>\n

\u201c\u2026Perea said he worked as a jewelry salesman at Helzberg Diamonds in the Sunland Park Mall up until late January, when he quit because he was considering a job at the University of Texas at El Paso. He said he\u2019d thought about running for a city council position down the road. But, when the turmoil erupted in Sunland Park and the mayor\u2019s position became vacant, he decided to put his name in the hat.\u201d<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

<\/p>\n

The 3-2 vote to appoint Perea \u2013 with one abstention \u2013 came after the council voted 4-2 against appointing Gerardo Hernandez, the man who lost to the indicted Daniel Salinas in the March 6 election. Salinas forfeited the seat<\/a> because his conditions of release from jail kept him from being sworn in.<\/p>\n

Perea\u2019s appointment wasn\u2019t without an open-meetings controversy. From the Sun-News:<\/p>\n

\u201cTwo other men who had hoped to be considered for mayor didn\u2019t make it into the meeting hall because police blocked entrance after it had reached capacity.\u201d<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

And from KFOX-TV<\/a> in El Paso:<\/p>\n

\u201cOthers, including Jesse Grajeda, said they never got the chance to make their bids to City Council because they were stuck outside.<\/p>\n

\u201c\u2018What about our r\u00e9sum\u00e9s?\u2019 Grajeda said. \u2018What about our information? That wasn\u2019t taken into consideration and it\u2019s just unjust.\u2019\u201d<\/p><\/blockquote>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The selection of 24-year-old Javier Perea came after others couldn\u2019t ask to be appointed because police blocked the entrance when the room filled to capacity.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11],"tags":[111,167],"class_list":["post-39045","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news-and-analysis","tag-open-government","tag-sunland-park"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/39045","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=39045"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/39045\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=39045"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=39045"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=39045"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}