Ty Johnson | The Brownsville Herald

 

Kyle City Manager Lanny Lambert had just spoken to Mayor Lucy Johnson hours before he got the news.

 

“I told my mayor today that she was the second best I ever had,” he said.

 

Lambert was unaware then that the woman he was referring to — the one he claimed was the best mayor he had ever worked for — had been found dead in her home Wednesday morning.

 

Blanca Sanchez Vela, Brownsville’s first and only female mayor and matriarch of one of the city’s best-known families, was 78.

 

Rep. Filemon Vela confirmed the news Wednesday. The family said she died of natural causes.

 

“Today, I am saddened that my mother, Blanca Sanchez Vela, passed away at her home in Brownsville, Texas. My mother provided a loving home and a strong upbringing for her three children: Sylvia, Ralph and myself,” the congressman said in an emailed statement. “She deeply loved my father, the late Filemon Vela, and supported him during his career as an attorney and a federal judge. Later in life, she was blessed by six grandchildren each of whom she loved dearly.”

 

Officials from across Brownsville and Texas noted Vela’s death as the passing of a true giant among Brownsville’s benefactors, who prioritized literacy and worked for progress within the city she loved.

 

“She’s the finest mayor I ever worked for,” said Lambert, who has served 14 mayors during his career and was Brownsville’s city manager until his retirement in January 2004. “She did the right thing no matter what the political cost was. She was a decent, moral, upright lady and she always did the right thing. Always.”

 

Lambert said he had often wondered what had set Vela apart from others and said he believed it came down to her family’s deep faith. He said that she and her husband, the late U.S. District Judge Filemon Vela, were always intent on serving the public and were not concerned with wealth.

 

“He and her answered to no one but God,” he said. “No one owned them.”

 

Former Brownsville Mayor Eddie Treviño also spoke of the example Vela and her husband, who died in 2004, set for the community.

 

“She was a trailblazer,” he said. “She was always out setting the bar and setting the example. That was something her and her husband did for many, many years.”

 

Treviño served on the Brownsville City Commission while Vela was mayor and said she was one of the reasons he decided to run for office when she began waffling in regard to a possible re-election bid.

 

“In all honesty, it was because of her that I ran for the position of mayor,” he said, adding that she always made herself available to public officials as a sounding board.

 

As mayor, Vela was instrumental in swapping land where the current federal courthouse is for the Old Federal Building on Elizabeth Street — now city hall.

 

The exchange meant that Mayor Vela oversaw the commission while seated in the same room that her husband once held court. The new courthouse was eventually named for the judge, as well.

 

However, Treviño stressed that Vela’s importance to the community extended far from city hall.

 

“The impact she and her family have had on our community is immeasurable,” he said, noting that she was a big part of the city’s literacy outreach and that she pioneered a progressive approach to city government in Brownsville. “She was always looking toward tomorrow.”

 

Her three children are testaments to her emphasis on education, as her youngest son, Rep. Filemon B.Vela represents Brownsville in Congress, and her older son Rafael worked in the pharmaceutical industry. Her daughter, Sylvia, has her doctorate and worked as a physical therapist in San Antonio.

 

“My mother not only loved her family,” said Rep. Vela, “she loved the Brownsville community and worked to make Brownsville and the Rio Grande Valley a much better place. She served on the Brownsville Public Utilities Board and co-founded the Brownsville Public Library Foundation. She became the first female mayor of Brownsville, when she was elected in 1999. My parents’ commitment to public service encouraged me to run for elected office. I am blessed to have had her in my life for 51 years.”

 

As a long-standing member of the Brownsville Public Utilities Board before she ran for mayor, she was an important part of the utility’s modernization, according to a statement from BPUB Chairman Oscar D. Garcia.

 

“She was instrumental in the modernization of BPUB, the revitalization of the Southmost Regional Water Authority and improvements in colonias. These are all projects from which Brownsville is still benefiting, and we are grateful for her service to the city,” he said.

 

District 3 Commissioner Deborah Portillo said Vela’s legacy — both as a woman and as a leader — had an impact on her perspective of public service.

 

“Growing up, I didn’t really think about those things,” Portillo said, admitting that the importance of having the city’s first female mayor while she was in high school was something that didn’t dawn on her until later in life.

 

More than remembering her only as the city’s female mayor, however, Portillo said the projects that she championed helped to draw her into public service.

 

“It had a profound affect on me and my career,” the first-term commissioner said.

 

From an emphasis on libraries to her spearheading of renovations at Dean Porter Park, Vela’s list of accomplishments during her career of public service is remarkable, but those who knew her best suggest her impact can’t be measured solely by her achievements in the public sector.

 

Mayor Tony Martinez said his family grew up alongside the Vela family and suggested her leadership served as the foundation for Brownsville’s growth.

 

“Blanca Vela was a real pillar for our community,” he said, noting her emphasis on education both in the public sphere and within her own family. “That was the key out of poverty — the key to enriching everybody’s life.”

 

Martinez also spoke about how she redefined what it meant to be a woman in politics in many ways, suggesting her leadership moved feminism forward in the area as she became living proof that women are just as capable as men.

 

“She showed that women have as much to offer as anybody else and they should go for it,” he said. “And she did.”

 

And although he said the loss to the community will be deeply felt now that Vela has gone, Treviño provided perspective on her death that is sure to bring comfort to many.

 

“It’s a loss for our community, but I’m sure that Judge Vela was ready to welcome her with open arms,” he said. “I’m happy that they’re both together again.”

 

Former Brownsville Mayor, Feminist ‘trailblazer’ Blanca Vela Dies at 78