Council approves separation, payout agreement for city attorney

 El Paso City Council approved ratifying the Separation and Release Agreement between former City Attorney Sylvia Borunda Firth and the City.

The vote was 7-1 with El Paso City Representative Peter Svarzbein the lone vote against. Initially, the City announced the vote as unanimous. It later clarified Svarzbein voted against approving the agreement.

Documents obtained by the ABC-7 I-Team reveal Firth will receive more than $251,000 as part of her release agreement.

Monday’s decision came after City Council went into closed-door executive session for more than an hour.

After the vote, city officials listen to public comment. Lisa Turner spoke about what she called the city’s unwillingness to answer questions about the city attorney’s exit.

“There are a lot of things that I have been led to believe, that this is not a retirement, and this is someone who is being forced out,” Turner said.

The City of El Paso announced Borunda Firth retired from her position, effective May 31st. A reasoning for her retirement has not been made available. An initial press release obtained by ABC-7 dated on April 26th, is titled “Sylvia Borunda Firth resigns as City Attorney,” but the word ‘resigns’ is then crossed out in the draft and replaced with ‘retires.’

ABC-7 obtained copies of Borunda Firth’s Separation & Release Agreement with the City of El Paso. The city agreed to pay her the equivalent of six months pay in the amount of $124,379.35 as well as the cash equivalent of any unused accrued sick leave through May 31st. The agreement goes on to state the accrued sick leave through May 17th is $127,115.69 and will be adjusted to add the additional accruals from May 17th-May 31st.

Austin-based attorney Bill Aleshire specializes in government transparency and accountability.

“Someone is covering up what really is going on here,” Aleshire said. “To give her that additional salary if she is simply resigning and leaving voluntarily would violate the Texas constitutuion.”

Borunda Firth will also remain in the City’s health insurance program and the City’s payroll until she exhausts her accrued vacation time, which according to the agreement, is 185.76 hours. That adds up to a little more than $22,484 according to the El Paso Times.

Borunda Firth’s initial city attorney contract was from 2011 to 2014 with an automatic renewal for a one-year term. The contract agreement automatically renewed on a year-to-year basis, unless the city notified 60 days before Borunda Firth’s contract expired.

Her annual base salary was $190,000, according to her initial contract.

City Council also unanimously voted for the HR department to post a notice for the interim city attorney position internally within the city and the public service board.

“Someone needs to be honest with the taxpayers and the media in El Paso and tell them. Is she resigning, is she being terminated, or is she settling claims she has made against the city?” Aleshire said.