El Paso voters reject Climate Charter proposal by wide margin - El Paso Times

Voters reject Prop K El Paso Climate Charter by wide margin

El Paso voters reject Climate Charter proposal by wide margin
Adam Powell

Despite some early momentum on the part of Sunrise El Paso and its army of young, progressive organizers, the ambitious El Paso Climate Charter was roundly defeated.

The proposal was doomed when early voting totals were released after polls closed at 7 p.m. — of the more than 35,000 early ballots cast, over 28,000 voted against the proposal. Even if every vote cast on Election Day had been in favor of the climate charter, there were not enough ballots cast to change the overwhelming defeat.

Shortly after 10 p.m., 38,293 voters had cast ballots against Prop K while 8,553 voters supported the measure. Eighty-two percent of voters were against the climate charter proposition, according to unofficial Election Day results.

There was a somber tone during an Election Night watch party at Hoppy Monk on Mesa Street, but Sunrise El Paso organizers were defiant.

"We're not going anywhere," said Sunrise El Paso organizer Miguel Escoto. "This is an organization, not a campaign, and we're going to keep fighting."

Escoto placed much of the blame for the charter's defeat on the deluge of spending by opponents of the measure, including El Paso Electric, which funneled $200,000 into the El Paso Chamber's political action committee, El Pasoans for Prosperity, to oppose the proposal.

"They wildly outspent us, they lied, and they showed their hand about how much they hate our community," Escoto said. "The highlight though is how our organization forced this conversation to begin with. This is really a celebration of El Paso's youth and El Paso's climate movement. The system's not designed for us to get this far and we did. This is not the last round."

Live election results: May 2023 Uniform Election

Sunrise El Paso and Ground Game Texas activists made history by getting the ambitious climate charter measure on the ballot by collecting over 36,000 petition signatures. They gave the city voters a voice in deciding whether climate change actions should be written into the city's charter.

El Paso does not have a comprehensive climate change action plan.

Global efforts to address climate change have struggled to gain momentum. The El Paso election was viewed as a test to see if progress to reduce carbon emissions could be achieved through local initiatives. El Paso served as proving ground for the new strategy.

But El Paso Chamber President Andrea Hutchins saw the lopsided results as evidence of the unity between El Paso's business community and the rest of the community.

"Most people who are of voting age are employed by or retired from someplace here in El Paso," Hutchins said. "A lot of times, people take the people out of the business community and you just can't do that."

Still, she said the defeat of Proposition K has little to do with people's desire for — or opposition to — climate action.

"Obviously, the business community as a whole has been concerned about the cost of Prop K," she said. "I don't think this had anything to do with the climate from the get-go."

Max Grossman, a local historian and staunch opponent of the climate proposition, on the other hand, believed the climate charter's defeat was evidence that only a small, vocal minority actually supported the measure.

"The results show that only a small fraction of El Pasoans who signed the Sunrise petition actually voted for Proposition K," Grossman said in a text message. "That is because, in the last few weeks, they learned the simple truth: it was poorly written and would have done serious damage to our economy."

More: Early voting totals oppose Prop K climate change measure: live updates

But El Paso County Democratic Party Chair Michael Apodaca felt differently. The local party endorsed Prop K's passage.

"Obviously, these results are disappointing," Apodaca said in a text message, "however, when El Paso Electric and other anti-climate change Republicans spend over $100,000 using Trump-like tactics such as misinformation, lies, fear over job losses, and other negative tactics, it's hard to overcome that."

"And the sad thing is that we, as El Pasoans, will have to pay for it through higher electric fees and for those who want to be environmentally conscious by changing to solar power will still be taxed for doing so," he continued. "The glimmer of hope is that this was a youth-driven initiative and when this comes up again, they will learn and build a better campaign to show that El Paso will be better when the community pushes the city for more climate action and solutions."