Adrian Pedroza

Santolina becomes ‘main issue’ in BernCo commission race

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A political action committee’s support of Steven Michael Quezada for Bernalillo County Commission is leading to questions because of the donors behind it—including from Quezada himself. Last month, the New Mexicans for New Mexico PAC paid for billboards that reference the actor and comedian’s most well-known credential—his supporting role as DEA Agent Steven Gomez in the cable TV drama “Breaking Bad.”

“Elect Breaking Bad’s good guy,” read the billboards, which also feature a picture of smiling Quezada and his name written in a font reminiscent of the opening credits of the popular TV series. The funders behind New Mexicans for New Mexico PAC, which is independent of Quezada’s campaign, are developers and lawyers with ties to Santolina, a controversial planned development of residences that the county commission approved zoning changes for last year. Santolina’s backers say the planned development could be home to as many as 90,000 people over the next 40 to 50 years. But the issue has sparked outrage from critics who call it sprawl development and point to British-based multinational bank Barclays, which owns the land Santolina is set to be built on, as the corporate driver behind it.

Albuquerque Newsdesk

Santolina moves closer to approval as opponents shout ‘Shame!’

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Dozens of protesters shouted, “Shame!” as Bernalillo County commissioners voted against three appeals of a planned community on Albuquerque’s Westside. The votes to reject the appeals all came on 3-2 votes as protesters, including those from the Contra Santolina Working Group, chanted to show their displeasure on Thursday night. Commissioners Art De La Cruz, Lonnie Talbert and Wayne Johnson voted to reject the appeals while commissioners Debbie O’Malley and Maggie Hart Stebbins voted for the appeals. The appeals heard at the meeting were filed by the South Valley Coalition of Neighborhood Associations, the South Valley Regional Association of Acequias and the New Mexico Environmental Law Center. Each appeal protested the Bernalillo County Planning Commission’s recommendation to approve the Santolina master plan for a variety of reasons, including a lack of transparency with how Santolina will use water resources, disagreements over Santolina’s job promises, a perceived inconsistency with the Mid-Region Council of Governments’ future transportation plans and more.

Albuquerque Newsdesk

Another look at tax dollars for Santolina

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This week, New Mexico Political Report takes an in-depth look at commercial development plans west of the Rio Grande, which include the controversial Santolina master plan. Toward the end of the story, we mention the potential use of tax dollars to pay for development, specifically through what are called Tax Increment Development Districts (TIDDs) and Property Improvement Districts (PIDs). Santolina, a 13,700-acre planned community that plans to house nearly 93,000 people is seeking both TIDDs and PIDs to pay for its development. It’s an idea that Juan Reynosa, a field organizer for Southwest Organizing Project, is quoted as criticizing in today’s story:
“They want to use taxpayer dollars to develop that land and sell it,” Reynosa said. This morning, the Albuquerque Journal takes a further look into how Santolina is planning to use these tax mechanisms, which reporter Dan McKay describes as “esoteric:”

Here’s how they work:
• Whatever tax revenue the land is generating now is considered the “base” and isn’t part of the tax increment.

Featured

Water, ‘systems thinking’ and Santolina’s tangled history

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[box]© New Mexico Political Report, 2015. Contact editor@nmpoliticalreport.com for info on republishing.[/box]Deliberations are on hold until May over a proposal to transform a huge swath of desert southwest of Albuquerque into a booming planned community named Santolina. As the process lumbers forward, it’s helpful to contemplate a concept raised by one of the representatives for the controversial development. Jim Strozier, president of Consensus Planning, said last week during a special meeting of the Bernalillo County Commission that Santolina is the result of meticulous “systems thinking.” He was referring in part to his firm’s planning process, which he described as the merging of a range of considerations into a unified and ambitious vision: steady, multi-use development for the next 50 years on nearly 14,000 acres of what is today stark desert sloped against the Rio Grande Valley. Strozier said he and his team, hired by Santolina landowners, have looked at how “to prepare for and respond positively” to inevitable changes in population growth in the Albuquerque metro area.