T or C “visioning” session produces helpful ideas, complaints, few big proposals

Truth or Consequences City Commissioner Randall Aragon organized an unofficial “visioning” session on June 30, allowing residents to speak for five minutes each on how to improve the town’s quality of life. Rebuilding a sense of community, dealing with water scarcity, derelict housing, trash and other quality of life issues were on the minds of the 25 residents who turned out,

Many of the attendees of the evening meeting, which was held in city commission chambers, encouraged Aragon to follow through with his suggestion that, if productive, envisioning sessions should be held quarterly.  

Because the visioning session was not brought before the city commission for approval, the input gathered can be ignored, unlike at sanctioned public hearings, where it becomes part of the public record. Commissioner Aragon avoided creating a quorum by limiting participation to only one other commissioner: Mayor Sandra Whitehead.

Individual commissioners, including the mayor, have no power to set policy or make decisions unless they are sitting as a body with a quorum present in an open meeting that has been officially noticed in a legal advertisement, according to state laws. The only exception to this rule is in the case of an emergency, when notification of a hearing or special meeting in the newspaper of record is not required and only notices posted at city hall and city commission chambers 24 hours in advance are mandated.

Aragon said he and Mayor Pro Tem Amanda Forrister came up with the idea of holding visioning sessions after they took their seats as newly elected commissioners in April 2020. The intent, Aragon said, is to allow residents to “brainstorm” and to increase government “transparency.” Forrister could not attend, Aragon said, but she would probably be present for future visioning sessions.

Aragon chose former City Commissioner Rolf Hechler to be the session’s facilitator. Hechler vacated his seat in April 2020 after choosing not to run for a second term.

Hechler “did a good job” as the facilitator for the city commissioners’ “retreat” last August, Aragon claimed. The retreat was the only planning and visioning session held by the city in 2020. Only city commissioners were allowed to speak. Mayor Whitehead forbade members of the public and the press in attendance from asking commissioners questions, even during breaks and even though only three citizens had made the 40-mile trek out to Kingston, where Whitehead had insisted on holding the retreat.

Aragon’s visioning session may be preparation for a similar retreat this year, though nothing has been scheduled yet.  

Like Hechler, the other “personnel” who were present to help “conduct the meeting”—as stated on Aragon’s Facebook-page announcement of the session—were not elected officials. They were given special leadership status by Aragon in a display of favoritism most elected officials avoid, especially close to election time. Three T or C city commission seats are up this November.

Past City Commissioner George Szigeti was among the “personnel” chosen by Aragon, who acknowledged that he and Szigeti were neighbors. Szigeti was appointed by the city commission to take Steve Green’s seat in 2019, after Green resigned mid-term. Szigeti ran for, but was not elected to, the city commission in 2020. Szigeti was a Public Utility Advisory Board member for seven years before he filled in for Green, taking a nearly two-year hiatus to serve as a city commissioner. He was again appointed by the city commission to serve on the PUAB several months ago and is its chairperson.

City Manager Bruce Swingle and community events organizer Denise Addie were also listed on the Facebook announcement as among the “personnel.” Swingle was present, but Addie did not attend.

Resident Sophia Peron questioned why the visioning session wasn’t being held by the city commission, the city’s elected leaders. Hechler assured her public input would be forwarded to the city commission, but the meeting was not recorded, as is the case with public hearings, and only Szigeti and Swingle appeared to take occasional notes.

Aragon asked Eric Stokes, hired as Sierra Vista Hospital’s chief executive officer about nine months ago, to inform the attendees of his plan for the “old hospital.” (A new $30 million wing was added in 2019.) “The hospital is in great shape” with Stokes at the helm, Aragon said.

Stokes said he is proposing that the hospital’s old wing be transformed into a “behavioral health hospital with 30 beds.” The repurposing would create about 75 new jobs, including two psychiatrists and 30 nurses.

The state needs such facilities for “substance abuse, long-term behavioral health and civil commitments,” among other purposes, Stokes said. The facility would serve patients from around the state, not just from Sierra County. So far, his negotiations with state officials have been encouraging.

Stokes said the proposal will be presented at New Mexico’s 2022 legislative session for approval and funding.

A resident who did not give his name asked why Sierra Vista’s operating room wasn’t being used, since it had been upgraded for hundreds of thousands of dollars several years ago. Stokes said the resumption of general surgeries and the operating room’s use are “part of the three-year plan,” with more information to be provided the public when the plan is completed, probably by September.

Resident Audon Trujillo said the city was supposed to update the 2014 comprehensive plan in 2019 and “any suggestions we make today should be in the updated plan.”

Trujillo presented a long list of suggestions. Global warming should be addressed by the city’s private and public sectors through the planting of trees. Access ramps should be built along the Rio Grande. The trail that once led from the Geronimo Springs to “Tank Hill” should be rebuilt. Tank Hill should have an awning under which people could hang out and play checkers. Campsites should be built on Turtleback Mountain. In-fill adobe housing should be built. The “entertainment board,” among other public boards created by the city commission, should be reconvened. The Lee Belle Johnson building should be returned to the people as a community center and no longer used to house the Spaceport America visitors center. The city’s voting system should be changed from five at-large seats to five “districted” seats that correspond to geographic areas, a reform that, Trujillo said, will amplify the voices of residents within districts and improve representation.

June Jewell, introducing herself as a “resident and artist,” said “local water scarcity” and “global warming” are threatening the quality of life here. Slowing water runoff, promoting its absorption into the ground and harvesting rain water in general should be practiced widely in the community. She named Brad Lancaster of Tucson, Arizona, who has a YouTube channel devoted to water harvesting, and Geoff Watson, water and wastewater manager for Sydney, Australia, as good sources of viable techniques.

Aragon suggested that Jewell confer with Travis Day, natural resource director at Sierra Soil & Water Conservation District.

Resident Rick Dumiak has often come before the city commission to request better monitoring of T or C’s Rotary Park for trash removal and vagrants who violate prohibitions against spending the night in the park. Dumiak has also often asked the city commission to clean up various properties left derelict and trash-strewn for years. He did so again.

As if a floodgate had been opened, several people echoed Dumiak’s statements about derelict, abandoned and trash-filled properties.

The legal process that allows the city to condemn and tear down buildings is complicated, Hechler responded. He also said the city cannot clean up a property without first attaining a lien on it, since the trash removal would violate the state’s anti-donation clause, which prohibits municipalities from donating goods or services to private entities.

“Molly,” who did not give her last name, suggested volunteers join to help clean up properties for those owners who are physically unable to do it themselves. She also suggested the city offer free trash collection days to encourage clean-up efforts.

Resident Pinky Langham said she has lived in T or C for 16 years and has observed each successive city commission’s “promising to clean up the city,” but never doing so.

Mayor Whitehead took exception to the rebuke, insisting the city commission “has tried” to clean up T or C. She noted that city has had free trash days in the past, but residents did not take advantage of them.

Whitehead also minimized the importance of the input provided by those attending the session, claiming “these are the same people who always show up.”

Hechler quickly interceded, thanking all who came out and assuring them “we appreciate your input.”

Resident Ariel Dougherty pointed out the city commission “should listen to its citizens.” Instead, it has allowed several citizen advisory boards to become inactive, which limits residents’ input. Those appointed to still-active citizen advisory boards are often automatically reappointed with no outreach to invite others to apply, are often male and/or past city employees—practices that further muffle residents’ voices.

Dougherty suggested that the parking lot and buildings at the city’s electric yard be converted to a community center. As the yard is across the street from Ralph Edwards Park, the repurposing would make it possible to remove the parking lot recently constructed at Ralph Edwards along the river’s edge, preventing further runoff from polluting the river. Updating the comprehensive plan should be done soon, Dougherty said, this time with the aid of a company prepared to listen to community, “which was a problem with the 2014 comprehensive plan.”

“The city should improve the quality of life for those here,” Dougherty concluded. “Community development will foster tourism.”

Resident Susan Todd asked that the city library serve as the community “information center” for the ideas that emerged from the visioning session, as well as for general information. The library also needs “better computers,” she said, and more staff. The free shuttle bus that used to travel in the summer from downtown to Walmart and Elephant Butte Lake State Park, among other locations, should be reactivated, Todd said. Concrete planters “with red geraniums” should be placed around town.

“Make it [T or C] right for us and tourists will come,” Todd said. “You lose the soul of the town if you go exclusively for tourist dollars.”

Myra and David Vandy, who said they have 20 years’ experience with Silver City’s food cooperative, are encouraging people to support the start-up of the T or C Food Co-op. The interruption of food supply chains during the pandemic is further reason to organize and promote local food sources through such means as a community buying club, they said. The food cooperative will promote “a sense of community; taking care of each other.”

Linda DeMarino, director of MainStreet Truth or Consequences, said the city is “fractured” and polarized. It “needs to be healed” through increased community communication. She said the youth and elderly of the town are divided, as are political parties. The community “needs to come back together.”

Kate Hall agreed with other speakers that the state of some houses and lots and areas of the city are “embarrassing.” She invited attendees to join the “T or C Litter Pickers” volunteer group that communicates about its activities on a Facebook page of the same name. Her neighborhood has monthly potlucks, which have resulted in integration of disparate social groups. She recommended that other neighborhoods hold similar gatherings.

There are known drug houses in her area, Hall said, with slow police response times making calls to the dispatcher meaningless. She asked for better policing. Hall also warned that the recently walled-in wastewater treatment plant near Rotary Park smells bad. The smell is wafting into the Hot Springs Historic District and downtown and is especially noticeable in the morning around 9 a.m.

“Mark,” who purposely did not give his last name, thanked PUAB Chairperson Szigeti for pointing out at a recent meeting of that advisory board the illegality of the city ordinance placing restrictions on the capacity of the solar installations of private citizens and businesses. He asked the city to halt the ordinance’s enforcement. Mark also asked for more information on recently hired Chief of Police Victor Rodriguez. “Why was he not rehired by Belen?” Mark wanted to know. “Why was he investigated [by the City of Belen]?” The Lee Belle Johnson community center should be returned to the people, Mark said, stating all Spaceport America tourism is going through Las Cruces and not T or C.

Concerned about the state of the city’s wells, Mark asked for a detailed report on each of the eight wells in the city’s only wellfield off South Broadway Street. Citing a leak on Veater Street that has going unrepaired for more a month, he said water is being wasted.

City Manager Swingle addressed the water issue. “I was shocked when I came on board—the city has 15 to 20 water leaks a week,” he said. Because the water department’s maintenance staff is limited, the larger leaks are attended to first, delaying the repair of smaller leaks. “Wastewater is no better,” Swingle said.

Aragon prompted Swingle to explain “why this is going on.”

The city’s General Fund has operated on about $4 million a year, Swingle said, which pays for “streets, Sierra County Regional Dispatch Authority, administrative clerks, the library. . . .” To make ends meet, the city has transferred money from its utility funds, resulting in the neglect of infrastructure maintenance and replacement “for decades.”

Given the relative modesty of the proposals put forth by the attendees, near the end of the meeting Hechler asked for “big ideas.” Perhaps too aware of the city’s dire financial straits, no one responded.