In the News

Even given their different demographics, six of seven Bexar Metropolitan Water District service areas voted Tuesday to dissolve the utility, most by overwhelming margins.

Dark warnings from some members of the League of United Latin American Citizens, which worked to save BexarMet, that the vote would break along ethnic and class lines simply did not come to pass.

Only District 5, made up of a large swath of southern Bexar County and a smaller, noncontiguous chunk mostly south of Loop 410, voted 53 percent to save the troubled utility.

BexarMet was created 65 years ago to serve areas in southern Bexar County that were unable to get water service from the utility that preceded the San Antonio Water System.

Gina Casteñeda, who headed the effort to keep BexarMet intact, said she believes a lingering resentment by some residents in the area toward SAWS likely accounted for the high number of no votes.

She dismissed the notion that the vote somehow would become a referendum on north vs. south or Anglo vs. Hispanic put forth by LULAC.

“I never believed that this was a racial thing,” she said.

Angie Garcia, a senior state adviser for LULAC, which argued that Hispanic voters would be disenfranchised if BexarMet was dissolved, said last week that low voter turnout would help their cause.

An analysis of the vote, however, found no correlation between turnout and results.

District 6 had the highest percentage of yes votes and the highest voter turnout — almost three times the overall BexarMet turnout of 5.7 percent in the county. But the second highest-voter turnout was in District 5, the only place where the initiative failed.

In part because of their divergent views, Casteñeda said, Save BexarMet and LULAC did not work closely together, even though they shared a common goal.

Board President Guadalupe Lopez, who personally fought to save the utility, could not be reached for comment Wednesday.

District 5 board member Vanessa Ybarra took a different view.

Lopez's “comment to us was this was the fight of our life,” she said. “But I did not get elected by BexarMet. I got elected by the ratepayers.”

Tuesday's vote was the final word, Ybarra said: “I am not going to fight the people on what they want.”

The other board members could not be reached Wednesday.

State Sen. Carlos Uresti, who along with Mayor Julián Castro and Bexar County Judge Nelson Wolff spearheaded the effort to have the utility merged with SAWS, said he was relieved to hear that Gallier “respected the ballot box.”

“I'd be saying the same thing if the vote went the other way,” he said. “The voters have spoken.”

He, too, thought a longstanding resentment toward SAWS by some in District 5 could have accounted for its vote to keep BexarMet.

Before any dismantling occurs, the Justice Department must certify the election. Political consultant Christian Archer, who worked for the dissolution campaign, thinks that given the lopsided vote, the certification will sail through.

“Had we seen a case where only Anglos voted for dissolution, that's the kind of red flag the (Justice Department) is looking for,” he said. In this case, “the voters buried BexarMet.”

Archer said Castro got a lot of congratulations Wednesday morning.

“People are really excited about this,” he said.