One of Hizzoners' pet projects, since he rode his four-vote landslide into office, has been to make certain that no one confuses our village with our neighbor to the south. And given the 'querquesque plethora of auto-parts stores, vacant buildings, re-born head shops and check-cashing joints here in good old LR, one could be forgiven for not realizing that they were in fact in another "municpality".
But instead of doing the hard work necessary to make LR a truly unique place, Larry has gone mainly for ultimately trivial actions. Like badgering everyone to change their addresses from "Albuquerque" to "Los Ranchos" (even though the village does not have its own post office or zip, and therefore all mail has been delivered, since the village's inception in 1958, with "Albuquerque" listed as the city). He even went so far as to chide and downright threaten LR businesses for their reluctance to re-print business cards, checks and phone book entries. Of course, it was just too bad if the change lost the businesses customers or cost them for printing and the like. Now all the developers know that anything goes, as long as it says "Los Ranchos" somewhere on the sign.
So imagine El Picador's surprise to see an official, government-issued sign telling us to "Slow down, ALBUQUERQUE" smack-dab in the heart of Los Ranchos (on Bledsoe, just west of 4th, to be exact). And posted on an official traffic sign, the placing and maintenance of which is specifically a responsibility of the Los Ranchos village government, no less!
Saturday, May 26, 2007
Wednesday, May 23, 2007
MRGCD Election--Who Cares?
MRGCOG, AMAFCA, MRGCD---what do these mysterious acronyms mean? What have they to do with us? Why should we even care? Never fear, El Picador will enlighten you
Let's start with the MRGCD, since they are having an election soon---June 5, to be exact. The Middle Rio Grande Conservancy District, or MRGCD, sounds arcane , bureaucratic and therefore boring to most of us. Probably only a few hundred people will even bother to vote in the election out of the many thousands of eligible voters, and even fewer will know anything at all about the candidates. (Most will probably vote for Agusta Myers, because of name recognition, even though she has zero qualifications for the job). But the wrong people on the MRGCD board can mean real trouble for our way of life in the valley. Just check out the antics of Mr. Turner!
The MRGCD was formed to maintain an manage the irrigation system from Cochiti to Belen, more or less. So if you are one of the few who irrigate, they are the ones who make it happen or not. But many more people enjoy the ditchbanks, using them as trails and occasionally as concealed drinking and huffing spots. Others relish the bucolic ambiance that the ditches make possible. Still others appreciate the convince of a dumping ground close at hand. But I digress.
To run the system, the MRGCD gets a good chunk of your property taxes if you live in the valley. Four-point-six mills, to be exact, which translates into $460 per year of net taxable value (which in turn in one third of the assessed value). That is more than the state takes, more than TVI and over four times what LR is now taking after all of the recent fuss. So you really ought to care who is getting to spend your money and how they are spending it. For example, there have been proposals considered by the board recently to completely pave the system with concrete to eliminate water seepage (thereby wiping out shallow aquifer recharge and killing off the last of the cottonwoods and driving out wildlife), to meter each turn out (at property owner expense), and even to close ditches entirely. And then some of the real crazies on the board have resorted to threatening their colleagues with whom they disagree with violence, and worse, lawyers! All going on under the radar, spending millions with essentially no scrutiny whatsoever.
Furthermore, lots of the board members are big irrigators or ranchers with a vested interest in protecting their kindred, often at the expense of smaller irrigators and therefore those many fold others who wander the semi-urban ditches that supply them. With water becoming a scarce commodity, these guys would like nothing better than to shut the LR system down.
Even better, if you do vote, its like voting hundreds of times in most other elections!! So get informed, pick your candidate and vote June 5!!
Of course, EL Picador has a recommendation. Check it out at www.protectthevalley.com.
Later columns--MRGCOG and AMAFCA.
Let's start with the MRGCD, since they are having an election soon---June 5, to be exact. The Middle Rio Grande Conservancy District, or MRGCD, sounds arcane , bureaucratic and therefore boring to most of us. Probably only a few hundred people will even bother to vote in the election out of the many thousands of eligible voters, and even fewer will know anything at all about the candidates. (Most will probably vote for Agusta Myers, because of name recognition, even though she has zero qualifications for the job). But the wrong people on the MRGCD board can mean real trouble for our way of life in the valley. Just check out the antics of Mr. Turner!
The MRGCD was formed to maintain an manage the irrigation system from Cochiti to Belen, more or less. So if you are one of the few who irrigate, they are the ones who make it happen or not. But many more people enjoy the ditchbanks, using them as trails and occasionally as concealed drinking and huffing spots. Others relish the bucolic ambiance that the ditches make possible. Still others appreciate the convince of a dumping ground close at hand. But I digress.
To run the system, the MRGCD gets a good chunk of your property taxes if you live in the valley. Four-point-six mills, to be exact, which translates into $460 per year of net taxable value (which in turn in one third of the assessed value). That is more than the state takes, more than TVI and over four times what LR is now taking after all of the recent fuss. So you really ought to care who is getting to spend your money and how they are spending it. For example, there have been proposals considered by the board recently to completely pave the system with concrete to eliminate water seepage (thereby wiping out shallow aquifer recharge and killing off the last of the cottonwoods and driving out wildlife), to meter each turn out (at property owner expense), and even to close ditches entirely. And then some of the real crazies on the board have resorted to threatening their colleagues with whom they disagree with violence, and worse, lawyers! All going on under the radar, spending millions with essentially no scrutiny whatsoever.
Furthermore, lots of the board members are big irrigators or ranchers with a vested interest in protecting their kindred, often at the expense of smaller irrigators and therefore those many fold others who wander the semi-urban ditches that supply them. With water becoming a scarce commodity, these guys would like nothing better than to shut the LR system down.
Even better, if you do vote, its like voting hundreds of times in most other elections!! So get informed, pick your candidate and vote June 5!!
Of course, EL Picador has a recommendation. Check it out at www.protectthevalley.com.
Later columns--MRGCOG and AMAFCA.
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