I thought Juarez was our sister city

There were several people that showed up to the El Paso City Council meeting on Tuesday to support a move to make several streets around bars like Wet and Three Legged Monkey no-parking zones. You see, rowdy bar patrons have taken to park along the quiet streets, leave their beer bottles and make loud noise late into the night. A palm tree was set on fire one night, and neighbors complained that they often see people urinate and even pass out drunk in their front yards. Of course, council agreed to do something about it. (Read story here.)

Several neighbors told council horror stories about the often-drunk patrons. One woman, for example, said people leaving the clubs one night pulled out the irrigation system out of her front lawn. These comments were very compelling, and I'm sure council took those stories into consideration when they made the decision to restrict parking in the area.

One of the residents, though, made a comment in public forum that made several of us in the "media corner" of the council chambers gasp. I don't have an exact quote, but she basically said that the noise, trash and drunken behavior have become so bad, that her street is "starting to look like Juarez."

Several of the people around me said they were offended by the comment, but no one said anything about it. The only thing I said was that at least she kept her trashy comments to entities across the border. It could have been worse. She could have compared the rowdy behavior to a specific neighborhood or part of the city. Then the city representative from that area would have been forced to say something.

Comments

[Jeremy Huggins]

You thought wrong...the truth hurts.

[Dax]

Who should be offended? Juarez or El Paso?

[Orly]

why were people offended? have they not been to juarez? have they not seen how dirty the strip can be. i dont see why a few people can be offended by this statement and its headline news for elpasotimes.com

[Andee]

People arent getting shot here like in Juarez, so why get all upset about it?

[Milton Duran]

Exactly was part was NOT true !

[Pedro Esteban]

If she would have said "we are starting to look like Detroit" would you have been offended? Probably not. This is why things don't change for the better. It's hard to move forward with a gigantic chip on your shoulder. 400 plus young women slain. Twenty-five dead last week..I think our "sister" needs some serious rehab.

[Luis F. Carrasco]

I know it's hard to walk with that gigantic chip on your shoulder, but you should have gone up to this woman and said "You know what's starting to look like Juárez, ma'am? Your face... which is quite lovely."