Jaime Perez, best known as a political activist who ran for mayor, initiated recall elections, operated political campaigns, and ran an opinion Web site affiliated with an online attack organization, is back in the news. Literally.

Perez is the editor of the Border Observer, a new English-language hard-news weekly published by El Diario de El Paso.

“I’ve always been involved politically in the community,” Perez said, calling the new position a natural extension of his interest in politics, policy and analysis. However, he said, “It's going to be different in the sense that I won’t be involved directly in any political action.”

Perez previously published a Web site called El Paso Metro. “There was no news there except (that) I would take whatever was in the news and comment on it. In this case the Border Observer is a hard news publication that will look at issues, investigate stories and find out what news is happening in the borderland.”

El Diario de El Paso and Observer Publisher Gerardo Rodriguez, describing how Perez came to be editor of the Observer, said, “actually, it started as an experiment. I know he's very knowledgeable about the city, and he showed some interest in participating with El Diario and I gave him the opportunity and I think he's doing a dignified job.”

Rodriguez said the decision was preceded by plenty of discussion. “I talked to him about the ethical policies of El Diario and how I didn’t want his personal perspective or ideals reflected on the magazine, that we need to be very balanced, fair and accurate on issues and be very plural and he agreed to do that. I told him if he wanted to have an opinion he can do it in his own column but that the magazine should be made from very different perspectives.”

UTEP journalism professor Tom Ruggiero noted the many people who have transitioned from the political world to the media world -- from Bill Moyers, a one-time presidential press secretary, to David Gergen to George Stephanopolous -- “so it's not unusual for someone to make that transition.”

Ruggiero spoke generally, saying he hadn’t followed Perez’s political activities closely.

“Certainly it seems that as the editor of a newspaper he's in a power position ... not everyone reads editorials but strangely enough the people who read editorials are usually people who have some power in the community, and they take those editorials very seriously,” Ruggiero said.

“There are always those people in any community, no matter how large or small, who basically are activists, and sometimes those activists do great things. They keep the status quo from crushing the citizens. But occasionally some of these activists can be tyrants in their own ways too, they can overpower issues and kind of confuse things,” Ruggiero said. “When a community activist becomes the editor of a newspaper that is cause to stand up and take a look. Does that activist take with them their agenda to the newspaper? And that may or may not be a good idea. You don’t expect editors of newspapers to be objective, or editorials to be objective, but there is a standard for editorials to be professional.”

Rodriguez said “Jaime is a graduate from Berkeley with a degree in political science and also holds a master’s degree in this area. That is very professional.”

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Perez’s political history is of direct action. He is a political scientist who taught at El Paso Community College, ran for mayor in the 1980s and in 2003, and worked as a campaign strategist on several campaigns, including helping get Luis Sariñana -- now a county commissioner-elect -- elected to City Council in the 1990s. Perez also worked for former Mayor Larry Francis, who served in the 1990s and ran in a failed 2001 bid against Ray Caballero.

Perez organized anti-Caballero activities almost immediately, through an organization he ran called Citizens for Good Government. When Caballero proposed a master plan for the Thomason-area medical complex that would have included the potential use of eminent domain, Perez was among those who organized residents to show up at City Council meetings to protest.

He also organized a recall effort against then-Councilman Larry Medina, charging Medina was not representing his constituents. It got ugly -- Medina, in a radio interview, said people were spreading misinformation and terrorizing residents. Perez’s group claimed Medina called residents terrorists, and printed up t-shirts that they wore to council meetings saying something along the lines of, “Mr. Medina, we are not terrorists.” Medina sued Perez over the recall, which was not certified, alleging illegal corporate contributions to Perez; the case did not go to trial.

Perez worked as a research analyst in 2003 in the Wardy administration, falling out over tax increases. [perez commentary]

He attempted another recall, which also failed to be certified, against then-Councilman Paul Escobar in 2004. He explained the effort, and some of his political background, in a two-part interview with Newspaper Tree. [part 1] [part 2]

He also gave advice on the failed recall effort against Councilman Beto O’Rourke, a major promoter of the Downtown plan.

When asked if editing a newspaper would allow him to change his image from that of political operator to a more credible commentator, he said, “I don’t understand the question. From my point of view I’ve never been afraid to speak my mind on any issue, (and) that didn’t change last week. What other people's views are, what other people do, I’m not concerned about.”

Medina said Perez has been “real negative politically in this community, not just for me, but for others. But if Jaime Perez ever comes up with a good idea that benefits this community I’ll be the first one in line congratulating Jaime Perez and supporting his idea.”

Medina’s company, Pan American Insurance, had full-page ads in the first two issues of Border Observer. Medina said someone from his office bought the ad. Pan American did not have an ad in the third issue.

“I always give people a second chance and a third chance and a fourth chance, but once I feel that enough is enough then there’s nothing in this world that can change my mind,” Medina said. “He’s coming close. I think Jaime Perez has done a lot of harm to this community.

“But I have hope for Jaime Perez that he’ll turn his life around. He is extremely intelligent and articulate in English and Spanish ... I’ll pray for him tonight.”

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Perez worked in City Hall for the last year, on a contract that expired at the end of July. He split his time as a policy aide between the offices of councilmen Eddie Holguin and Alexandro Lozano.

Perez said his political philosophy is that of “a fiscal conservative, no question. That means that in my view the city spends a great deal more then it needs to spend and is not willing to do the hard work of scrutinizing the operations. ... The biggest problem the city has is that it continually takes unspent revenues and hides them away. Over time you have a whole lot of revenue that no one ever sees.”

Perez repeated the idea in his editorial in the most recent issue of Border Observer, which also devoted several stories to detailing city finances and making the point that the city has money available in contingency and other funds.

The stories quoted people on both sides of the issue; Perez’s commentary repeated his ideas about how government entities ought to account for finances. The package of stories also included commentary from Holguin and O’Rourke -- the two sides of the Council divide on the city budget -- and from developer Bobby Bowling, who has been associated politically with Perez, about how property taxes hurt the ability of homeowners, especially first-time buyers in a low-income community like El Paso.

Perez said his governing philosophy at its simplest is “kick open those hidden assets and take care of some of the basic infrastructure needs the city has.”

“All government entities hold back tremendous reserves. It’s not necessarily malicious, it's just that's how it's always been done and nobody ever challenged it,” Perez said.

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The issue also included a section about Juarez city governance, something that the Border Observer plans to expand upon.

“There is an undeniable social and economic interdependence between the cities of El Paso and Ciudad Juarez, and a strong need for the voice of the community to be heard,” Rodriguez wrote in the first issue of the Observer.

Reyes Mata, who provides content to the publication, said the Border Observer can play a key role in establishing a true border presence in the El Paso media.

“I see it as a way to introduce the real border culture, and by real I mean with the inclusion of Juarez as part of this community, to the English readership in El Paso,” Mata said. “It (Juarez) is a community that's actually bigger then El Paso, with issues that are just as complex as El Paso's, but the English readership has been denied the opportunity to understand and try to relate to Juarez as part of the region.”

Mata owns Border Chronicles, a news service that has a contract with El Diario to provide stories for the Border Observer. He called Chronicles “a group of freelancers who have experience writing about the border and who have a love of writing about the border but who are not part of the mainstream press.

“We're using their independence in trying to help them do their trade and write their stories and provide them some income at the same time.”

Freelancers do not get bylines in Border Observer. Mata said one of the reporters he’s working with is Alberto Ponce de Leon, who was fired from El Diario after incorrectly reporting that former El Paso FBI chief Hardrick Crawford Jr. had been acquitted of giving a false statement concealing facts about his relationship with a reputed drug dealer when Crawford actually was convicted of those charges. The story of the acquittal appeared in El Diario one day before the jury convened its deliberations.

“In knowing him I know he's the type who likes to push, he's an aggressive reporter and sometimes when you push as hard as he does, when you're chasing after your story in the way he does, there's always the possibility of a slipup,” Mata said. “What happened to him I think reinforced the understanding that every single detail needs to be checked and verified and I think he's a better reporter now because of what happened then he was previously. I’m willing to invest in Alberto and take advantage of that learning experience he went through.”

Mata said he also knows Perez and his history, and “before I got involved, he and I sat down and spoke at length. I wouldn’t have agreed to become involved with this if I thought it was going to be a political arm of a faction, and we spoke very forthrightly and we both agreed this (Border Chronicles) was going to be a traditional news service and Jaime was going to treat it as such. Jaime has shown that he is showing a real respect for the news, for the traditional news, because we both understand that whether the Border Observer works or not is going to depend on whether El Pasoans can trust what they read and can trust that it's not propaganda, and we're both committed to making sure it's not propaganda.”

Perez said that Rodriguez makes the final decisions on the Border Observer, “the themes, the issues to be covered and so on. Gerardo and I have a great deal of mutual respect. We come to an agreement on how we're going to proceed.”

Rodriguez said, "Yes, I had concerns, but after a long talk it was clear to me that Mr. Jaime Perez can be very professional and separate his own ideals ... he's well known for being an activist and I’m not going to change that, but that's part of journalism. I read all the stories before they come out, so I have no concerns there, and if I do I'll talk them over with him. For example, we have given a lot of voice to Beto O’Rourke in our magazine, and I’m sure that that is an example of giving an opportunity to everyone to have a voice.”

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O’Rourke said so far, so good with the news stories in the Observer.

“In the stories they've involved me in they've been fair and allowed me to give my side of the story, so the indications are good,” he said. “Of course I’ve got my concerns. He (Perez) has been involved in things, recall elections, many flare-ups at City Hall. I hope he'll be fair in how they present things. I think he'll certainly come with his slant and his biases. I also think it's in keeping with Diario's editorial focus. I think they've worked really closely with him and the District 3 and 6 offices while he was at the city, and I think he helped inform their editorial and even reporting from City Hall. So that seems to be a consistent move for Diario as they're launching this new product.”

O’Rourke said he had “serious concerns” with some of the articles that have appeared in el Diario; for example, he pointed to a past article on Downtown that took up two pages, and quoted multiple critics of the Downtown Plan. It included one quote from O’Rourke, who said the quote might have been accurately reported from a public meeting, but that the reporter never called him and the article “definitely didn’t allow me to respond to criticisms.”

However, he acknowledged, “So far I’ve been impressed (with the Border Observer) and I’ve dealt mainly with Reyes Mata, who I’m impressed by. Here's something I can say on the positive side -- another news product in the market is good for El Paso. We can always use more out there.”

O’Rourke had experience in journalism before becoming a political figure; he published the short-lived Stanton Street Weekly, and the longer-tenured stantonstreet.com, publications for which the reporter of this article worked.

Holguin said he believes Perez will be a fair editor. When asked if he expected good press, he said, “No, I don’t. Jaime is ethical and stuff like that. I don’t see getting good press because he's there.”

Holguin said he and Perez agreed on many issues, but not all. “Everybody has their own philosophies and whatever way we need to move the city forward. We agree on providing help for the elderly and disabled. And we agree on Oñate.”

The issue over Oñate is whether the city ought to participate in honoring the conquistador, who brutalized natives in the Southwest, by erecting a three-story statue at the airport. Holguin has taken the lead in arguing against the project, which is near completion despite the controversy, which stretches back over several different councils.

“Other things we disagree on: Lee Trevino, for instance,” Holguin said. “He thought it was a good project if it didn’t need eminent domain, I don’t think it's good whether we use eminent domain or not.”

The Lee Trevino project involves extending the major street from Interstate 10 to the border, which would cut through a community that now features open space and rural-style homes on large lots framed with trees.

When asked whether he would miss working with Perez, Holguin said, “Jaime was unique because he would do a lot of research for me. Obviously I do a lot more research myself now. Do I miss him? Yeah, every time you lose help it's more work for you to do.”

Susie Byrd, who represents District 2 on Council and served under the Caballero administration when it was under attack by Perez, said “in general any new addition in terms of news content and even opinion in El Paso is a good thing.”

Byrd said of Mata, “I know his work and trust his work. I have concerns with Jaime Perez being the editor.

“I’ve never been of the opinion journalism could be objective, even if it wanted to be. However, I believe journalists should always strive to challenge their own assumptions about the world and assumptions about what is happening. I don’t think Jaime Perez is somebody who can do that. He has a strong political bent and persuasion and allies and I think he would use the paper to support his allies and political agenda,” Byrd said.

“I have a problem with a political operative running a newspaper,” Byrd said. “And if he’s not going to stop being a political operative that’s fine, as long as he says in his pieces ‘Here’s where I’m coming from and here’s who I support.’”

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Tom Fenton, a longtime veteran of El Paso journalism, first as publisher of the El Paso Times and now the publisher of El Paso Inc., said the final verdict on the product will not belong to those who are in the news, or those who cover it.

Fenton said he knew of Perez only “kind of tangentially. I know he's run for office, I know he's worked for several political candidates. I don’t know what his politics are.

“I think journalism, as much as we like to make it a profession, there's no licensing. Anyone with a computer and a pencil can do it. So like I said, the more the merrier,” Fenton said. “The real test is, will there be a sufficient market for what he's going to produce to make it viable?”

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Sito Negron can be reached at sito@newspapertree.com.