Job Seekers, Taxes, Rates

On the Q.T.

Tips for Job Seekers

Apparently, rumors of radon (call it a toxic audit) at Crab Hall have prompted a recent spate of resignations at TMS Central Administration. If you have a friend or family member with accounting, software, and bookkeeping experience, contact El Weston. TMS needs personnel—especially a CPA. (Teachers are strictly hired based on La Familial relationships, according to the HR department.) Wear a Hazmat suit if you visit CRAB Hall. Oh, visit your hairdresser first and get a new tint.

Read Those Lips

 

 

Boston Tea Party 1773

 

A Citizens Group “No New Taxes” is forming to fight the Town’s proposed GRT increase. Though we supported the GRT increase for the new county complex, a work in progress, and a GRT for TMS renovations during the last few years, we don’t see the need for an increase to support the Town’s projects. We understand the taxes will be used primarily for building new soccer fields and we support the concept. But we think the timing is unfortunate—a poor economy. Plus, the Town already suffers from an extraordinarily high GRT. Merchants will surely oppose the plan.

During recent months we have been disappointed by the tone of the Cordova administration. First, the Town Council gave executives extraordinary raises at a time when most governments are cutting back. Two, the Mayor and Council have been playing fast and loose with parciantes on the Spring Ditch and Malaria Ditch. The town’s encroachment on historic acequias needs to be addressed—especially given the slogan, “Return to Sacred Places,” a notion founded on the return of Blue Lake to Taos Pueblo. (Read Sylvia Rodriguez’s fine book on “Acequia: Water Sharing, Sanctity, and Place.”) Third, the Mayor’s obsession with Jumpin’ Jeff Northup is undignified and destructive—unless he’s trying to jump-start the private picketer’s campaign for Mayor in 2014.

No New Rates Without Representation

A new energy group–“The Old Ways are Best”—has met to resist KCEC rate increases, political gerrymandering, and the high costs of trustee travel. Cheap Biofuels and Inexpensive Batteries will be made available to the public, according to a spokesman. “We’re fighting back,” said Flavio. “Let the Moly Mine pay. We can’t take no more electricity spikes, and propane hikes.” The viejo said he is composing a new corrido, called “No Mas, No Mas, No Masa, Cabron.”

While KCEC trustees and their CEO, Luis Reyes, are calling for rate hikes, members hasten to remind the board of  the millions of dollars lost in propane and telecom adventurism during the last decade. Now they have appointed a second board of five trustees to oversee Propane—at $150 a pop per trustee per meeting. The Kit Carson Internet is an on and off enterprise, according to its users. We appreciate Reyes’ meeting with concerned members but find little in the way of reassurance from trustees.

The Trustees refused to offer the membership an opportunity to redistrict and/or reduce the number of trustees on the board at the annual meeting. In turn, the members ignored the trustees’ annual shindig. The board has yet to promote participation and transparency by allowing mail-in ballots during Coop elections. A small cadre of trustees—the officers– from the outlying villages, represent about 6000 meters and manage the board’s business, while ignoring 12,000 members, including commercial and municipal interests from Taos. In other words, the minority rules over the majority in this very unAmerican-like enterprise.

Policitcally speaking,  Art Rodarte, long-time Espanola pol from Ojo Caliente, is the swing vote. He is the man behind policy decisions. We have nothing against Art: He’s a man of his times. But Trustee Manuel Medina from Canon—who has sold out his constituency and voted with outsiders to disenfranchise Taoseños–dismays us. Apparently, our other three trustees have turned into shrinking violets.  We can’t wait for the Man from Cerro–Virgil Martinez– to speak up for the poor people.

We think the Coop needs a vision that is defined by modest, conservative, and realistic approach to a future of diminished expectations—not more dough for raises, more trustees, more vacation travel.

Conclusion

Certainly, Mayor Cordova and CEO Reyes represent a new generation of leadership in the community—much of it good. But their reliance on spinning the news is getting tiresome. And we think they have misjudged the tenor of the times. If you ask citizens to sacrifice and support new taxes or higher rates, then you, too, must make sacrifices. The future has already been mortgaged. Enough already.

Letter to the Editor

New Taxes from Town of Taos Times are tough, financially… Frankly I don’t believe the Town’s Administration has done enough scrubbing of their expenditures to justify a tax increase, much less a tax rate increase. 

If the administration believes the economy will improve but needs a short term infusion of cash, there are many ways to realized this… including the sale of some assets.  That’s what everyone else does when times are hard… they either economize or sell assets or find a second job or some other innovative solution.  As it currently stands, the Town of Taos already has one of the highest GRT rates in the state and might consider benchmarking their expenditures against other comparable towns to see how the others survive, even thrive, with lower GRT rates before jumping to the “easy way out” with a GRT rate increase that will most likely be permanent.  More negative “buzz” for Taos…