City still determining where to put restrooms near San Jacinto

The El Paso City Council is still grappling with ideas on where to install restrooms near the delayed San Jacinto Plaza.

Council has considered installing restrooms at San Jacinto twice before. Both times it concluded it was too expensive, with estimates running in the hundreds of thousands of dollars. Currently, the city is looking for nearby options.

On Tuesday, City staff presented two options to council: one at Cleveland Square in front of the downtown library. The other one at Aztec Park a few blocks away from San Jacinto. The City had strategically chosen those spots because the city owns the land so it’d be more affordable to build there.

To install two fully functioning, stainless steel restrooms, it’d cost the city about $180,000. City Rep Lily Limon said having restrooms a few blocks away from the park was not good enough.

“We have a splash park there. We have all of these amenities geared for children and we needed to have something there on the site. Two blocks, three blocks away is not really going to address the concern.”

City Manager Tommy Gonzalez was quick to point out that it was the council who had chosen not to include restrooms in the San Jacinto renovation. City Rep. Cortney Niland said it came down to funds. “It’s not cost effective to put anymore into the project at San Jacinto Plaza. We are already in a difficult position to try to finish that project and hopefully we’ll get it done before Christmas.”

The City is fining the contractor $1,000 per day until the park is finished and is no longer committing to a completion date. Council took no action on Tuesday, saying it wants more options.