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EDINBURG — Three months after City Attorney Omar Ochoa announced his intention to leave the city, officials here have at last chosen his replacement.
After a lengthy meeting Tuesday evening, the Edinburg City Council unanimously approved hiring Josephine L. “Josie” Ramirez to become Edinburg’s first in-house city attorney.
Ramirez, who currently serves as an assistant city attorney in McAllen, has an extensive history in municipal and local government law, a fact alluded to by Edinburg Mayor Ramiro Garza Jr. after Tuesday’s council meeting.
“She’s worked here in the county. She started the transition there with the county from when they used to contract out (for legal services) kind of like we did (with) a third party law firm,” Garza said.
Ramirez served as the chief of the civil litigation division for the Hidalgo County District Attorney’s Office. She began working for the DA’s office in 2010, according to a publication by the State Bar of Texas.
Ramirez has also previously worked for the McAllen firm Thornton, Biechlin, Reynolds & Guerra.
Earlier this year, Ramirez began serving as an assistant attorney under McAllen City Attorney Isaac Tawil.
Tawil spoke highly of Ramirez and her bonafides.
“Ms. Ramirez is an experienced, talented and practical lawyer who has dedicated much of her professional career to public service,” Tawil said Friday.
“I am sure that she will do well in her new role,” he said.
Over in Edinburg, officials are excited about starting a new chapter in the city’s legal department.
Currently, the county’s second largest city relies on contracting out for legal services.
For the last five years, that responsibility has fallen to prominent Edinburg civil and personal injury attorney, Omar Ochoa.
But as the city continues to experience a development and population boom, Ochoa realized that Edinburg would benefit from an attorney who could devote their full and complete attention to the city’s legal needs.
In early-March, Ochoa announced his intention to resign from the city once his successor could be found. In the meantime, elected officials appeared to concur with Ochoa’s assessment of the city’s need to evolve its legal department.
To that end, the council began exploring the idea of making the office of city attorney a staff position.
A five-member ad hoc charter review committee has also proposed a charter amendment that would codify within the city charter that the city attorney be a full-time city staffer.
Garza, the mayor, said Ramirez’s experience guiding the county through a similar transition will serve her well as Edinburg begins a new chapter of its own.
“(She) has a lot of experience that I think could help us as we do our transition,” Garza said.
Ramirez was one of at least eight people who applied to be the Edinburg city attorney.
The council interviewed her and two other candidates with local government experience two weeks ago.
They included Isaac Sulemana, who currently serves as the La Joya city attorney and as chief of staff for Hidalgo County Judge Richard F. Cortez, and Carlos Y. Benavides IV, who operates his own law firm out of Austin.
All three candidates served stints within the Hidalgo County DA’s office.
And in May, the council interviewed its first round of candidates, former federal prosecutors Robert “Bobby” Wells Jr. and Patricia Rigney.
Rigney — once the Pharr city attorney — was largely thought to be the frontrunner for the position. But shortly after sitting for back-to-back interviews in both Edinburg and Mission, Rigney accepted a $230,000 offer from the west county city dubbed, “The Place to Be.”
It’s unclear when Ramirez’s first day in Edinburg will be, but the mayor said the transition will likely happen in the next month.
Editor’s note: This story was updated with new information and to correct when Ramirez began serving as assistant attorney in McAllen.
