April 23, 2007

El Paso Democrat's Top Aide at Capitol
Dies amid Complications from Surgery

State Rep. Paul Moreno's chief of staff died Monday at an El Paso hospital as a result of complications from surgery that he had after being diagnosed with colon cancer.

Mike Lopez - a former hospital administrator who'd been a member of Moreno's staff for the past 12 years - failed to survive a second emergency operation that was needed after an infection developed in the wake of the cancer surgery that he under went on Friday. The preliminary cause of death has been listed as kidney failure.

Lopez, 61, had gone to work for Moreno, an El Paso Democrat, after retiring from his position with the Thomason Hospital, the community-owned public medical facility in El Paso County. Thomason has been serving as a teaching institution as part of the Texas Tech University Medical School's Regional Academic Health Sciences Center until a new $48 million medical school that lawmakers are planning to fund this year is ready for business.

Lopez's nickname was Tuffy - and friends and colleagues often referred to him as "the original Tuffy" who worked at the Capitol before State Rep. Mike "Tuffy" Hamilton arrived for his freshman session four years ago.

Democratic State Rep. Joe Pickett of El Paso announced the news of Lopez's death shortly before the House adjourned late Monday. Pickett indicated that Moreno had missed Monday's meeting because he'd remained in El Paso when his top aide's situation took a turn for the worse over the weekend. Pickett said he'd spoken with Moreno - and he described his fellow El Paso Democrat as being distraught with grief over Lopez's death.

State Rep. Norma Chavez's office was also helping field calls and get the word out about Lopez in Moreno's absence - another sign of the close-knit, family nature of the delegation of lawmakers from a city that's closer to Los Angeles than it is to Austin. Chavez is also a Democrat from El Paso.