County Defends, Town Offends, Citizens Lose

Editor’s Note: In the following press release, the Town blames the County for not negotiating a one-sided deal that favors a political solution to an E911-Dispatch public safety issue. In effect, the Town aims to bail out its friends at the Kit Carson Electric Cooperative, Inc. that made an impetuous and unilateral decision to build a Command Center (CC) that serves no purpose.

Meanwhile, the Town has tried to lasso the County into a long-term lease for an inadequate facility and unsafe operation at the KCEC Command Center. Rumor has it that the Mayor and Council are puppets for both the Centinel Bank and KCEC, due to loans and political favors. The community has become witness to the presence of a “good old boys” network embodied by this issue wherein the taxpayers are the losers.

Sadly, the commissioners have been forced to engage in building their own facility, due to the town’s stubborn refusal to acknowledge the reasons why they moved the facility.

The above and below further illustrate why the Town of Taos needs a new mayor and two councilors who are not beholden to the “good old boys.” —B.W.

PRESS RELEASE

Contact – Abigail Adame (575-751-2007)

County Disengages From Negotiations with Town Over Consolidated E911 Services!

At its regular meeting on Tuesday, December 3, 2013, the Taos County Commissioners voted 5-0 to attempt to wrest control of the Emergency Communications Center from the Town of Taos instead of amicably entering into an agreement with the Town for joint control of the center.

A week prior, the Town Council had presented to the Commission two different versions of a Joint Powers Agreement that incorporated all the points the two parties had agreed to in a Memorandum of Understanding that was supposed to guide negotiations leading to a final agreement.

The Commissioners action followed a split vote in a special meeting the previous week where they debated the Town’s proposals and turned down Commissioner Blankenhorn’s motion to send back a counter proposal to the Town Council. Commissioner Barrone seconded the motion, and Commissioners Sanchez and Duran voted against it. Commissioner Romero abstained.

The County’s action effectively ends the attempt by the two parties to enter into an agreement to provide E911 services to their constituents in a collaborative fashion. It comes on the heels of an earlier announcement by the County that it was cutting back its annual contribution to E911 by more than $86,000, putting in jeopardy the viability of the partnership that was formed by Taos County, Town of Taos, Village of Questa, and Village of Taos Ski Valley in 1996 to provide E911 services.

Mayor Darren Cordova stated, “It’s alarming that the County would choose to gamble with such a critical component of public safety.”

The County has proposed to start their own dispatch facility, which would cost taxpayers over $2 million in capital costs and almost double its annual operating costs.

“It simply doesn’t make sense from either a financial or public safety standpoint to have two 911 dispatch centers in this part of the county,” Mayor Darren Cordova added.

A Citizen Responds

What neither the Town nor the news media are telling the public

By Gene Sanchez

1. All studies of the building housing the E-911 and Police Department on Civic Plaza Drive proved the building was clean of asbestos and usable. When the police moved out there was space for expansion.

2. Twenty-five percent (25%) of the proposed KCE building, originally designed, was not constructed.

3. The un-constructed portion of the KCE building was designed to house the E-911 facility.

4. Currently, the town keeps the old E-911 facility on Civic Plaza operational because the new E-911 in the KCE CC building will not work otherwise. Why?

5.The major radio equipment and the tower with the antenna are located at the old building.

6. It was cost prohibitive to relocate this equipment to the new facility.

7. The existing tower and antenna will not work at the new location because
the new KCEC CC location is much lower than the old site and a much stronger, taller antenna would be required.

8. The utilities for the old E-911 location must remain in use. What does this Mean?

9. Tax payers are paying double for utilities (new and old building.)

10. Members of KCE (anyone with a electrical meter) are paying for a substandard building, which would not have been issued a building permit from the State Construction Industries Commission

11. The Taos Planning Dept. either did not know that there is a state law, which limits the amount of heat, a building envelope can lose or the department did not how to calculate the building envelope heat loss.

12. Either way they should not have issued a building permit for KCE building.

13. The architect who designed the KCE building was hired by the town to evaluate the old E-911facility and he assumed the building had everything wrong with it (just as he did at the Mary Medina Building) and he estimated remodel costs for the installation of a new E-911 facility at $1.5 million.

14. The Town Manager agreed with this assessment.

15. But this information is politically biased as the unbiased scientific test report proved.

Conclusion

If you haven’t registered to vote in town, do so today. State statutes permit anyone, who intends to live in New Mexico, to register to vote in their perceived destination. Go see the Taos County Clerk. We’ve got to take back our town and restrict the use of the public purse for the good of the whole community–not just for the private use of a broadcaster, an excavator, a realtor, a window seller, or a former mayor, who would annex El Prado and all the property along Highway 64 all the way to the Airport. Taos needs a new mayor, a man who works with his hands, not his mouth. Viva Taos. —B.W.