Do Two Wrongs Make it Right?

Maybe you’re confused as I am, maybe not.

In a series of emails, expressing his support for the Town’s fiat regarding the Command Center conundrum, Commissioner Tom Blankenhorn suggests the county should join the town and save the taxpayers a projected million dollars by building a second Command Center. Mr. Barbed Wire Blankenhorn has also said the town might violate the “anti-donation clause” and return the $175,000 legislative grant for architecture design fees if it doesn’t move into the KCEC Command Center. According to the paperwork, the grant was allocated for a “Regional Command Center,” not the KCEC Command Center. In a 2009 design review report from the Town of Taos, KCEC said the proposed Command Center was strictly for its own use and the building permit was subsequently approved on that basis for a building in “the flood plain”?

Now come Mayor Darren Cordova and Department of Finance Administration (DFA), who are investing hundreds of thousands of dollars, including some $400,000 aimed at wiring the facility for communication—E911—Dispatch. So it seems as if the “anti-donation” clause has been violated a second time because the Town and the state of New Mexico are investing taxpayer dollars in a private facility, an emergency dispatch center, owned by KCEC, located in “the flood plain”?

Whenever a local entity, say a community center in the county, receives money from the state, the entity has to be deeded over to the county—even if it is owned by a public entity like Taos Municipal Schools, say in Talpa or in Arroyo Seco. Call it SOP: standard operating procedure. They don’t build community centers in “the flood plain.”

Of course we know that Gov. Richardson famously ignored rules and laws when it came to “anti-donation” laws.  Gov. Martinez, allegedly, is following in the footsteps of Mr. quid pro quo, who funded his ambitious campaign for president out of his own “contracts for cuates” program, which kickbacks have been variously characterized in news reports, resulting in scandal, FBI investigations, and highly visible losses to the New Mexico taxpayer. Apparently, Richardson served as a model for local politicos.The grant for design was approved during his administration.

Commissioner Blankenhorn has euphemistically referred to “shenanigans” and private grievances as the basis of the controversy surrounding the E911—Dispatch conundrum. He’s right about “shenanigans” but I’d call it “crooked doings,” involving the Coop, the state, the Town, and specifically Darren “El Cabeza Grande” Cordova and Luis “The Coop Always get what it wants” Reyes. What’s to like?  What does Luis have on Darren? Every mayor and council, prior to the Cordova administration, rejected the KCEC Command Center out of hand—like a majority of today’s county commissioners.

Two wrongs don’t make it “right” anymore than the conundrum facing law enforcement and the Sign Man’s protest. From what I can gather, according to a brief look at various Supreme Court decisions, the Town has the right to regulate the number and types of protest signs as long as the language of the ordinance is “content neutral.” Very often, protesters are required to get permits. The Town cannot stop the protester but they can, if the write the language properly, govern the number of signs, etc.

I don’t know if the Town’s attorney has that ability to write a proper ordinance anymore that he understands legal “standing” in the annexation lawsuit. Jeff says no. He wants a ticket so he can test the ordinance in court. But the town will have to answer for its “arbitrary” and “capricious” enforcement of various laws, governing both commercial and noncommercial signs.

Meanwhile, the Town police allow larcenous counter-protesters to steal the Sign Man’s step stools and signs, willy–nilly, creating an atmosphere of bigotry and lawlessness. They refuse to cite and prosecute well-connected thugs or retrieve stolen property, while redefining property as “litter” or “trash.” The state highway right—of–way has become a kind of lawless “no-man’s land.” Certainly a district attorney, who does not prosecute hometown killers of out-of-town bikers, is not going to prosecute homies opposed to the Sign Man’s message of corruption about local politicos.

You can’t side with critics if you’re an elected local leader, unless, like Commissioners Joe Mike Duran, Larry Sanchez, and Gabe Romero, you understand a crooked “movida” when you see one. Maybe three wrongs make a right? Quien sabe?