April 1, 2021

Thank you for contacting the City of Santa Fe, which last night rejected the revised legal basis for the "Regional Coalition of LANL Communities"

Permalink for this letter. Please forward as desired. Prior letters to this New Mexico oriented list.
Please endorse the Call for Sanity not Nuclear Production!
Do your interested New Mexico friends get these updates? To subscribe, send a blank email here. To unsubscribe, send a blank email here. 
Home page; Press releases; Bulletins
To subscribe to our main listserve (less frequent, more national and international content) send a blank email here. To unsubscribe send a blank email here.
Our blog (little used at present but this may change): Remember your Humanity. Twitter.
Contribute. Volunteer. Contact Greg or Trish.

Dear friends --

We hope you are well.

(In that regard, there are now many opportunities for the exercise of constitutionally-protected freedom of assembly and we intend to use some of them. Some 13 New Mexico counties, including Santa Fe and Los Alamos, are currently under the permissive "turquoise" covid health restrictions while another 10 counties, including Rio Arriba and Taos, are in the "green" category. The remaining 10 counties are "yellow." Stay tuned.)

THANK YOU VERY MUCH for contacting Santa Fe City councilors regarding the City's endorsement of the amended Joint Powers Agreement (JPA) authorizing the Regional Coalition of LANL Communities (RCLC).

The City REJECTED the amended JPA last night. Debate against the amended JPA was carried by Councilor Renee Villarreal and Councilor JoAnne Vigil Coppler. Councilors Signe Lindell, Chris Rivera, Roman Abeyta also voted against the JPA while Councilor Garcia, who represents the City on the RCLC, abstained. Councilor Villarreal's long-term, principled engagement was particularly persuasive.

Those who want to see what happened in detail can view the video of the March 31 Council meeting 3:06 to 4:57. The vote was at 4:52. See also Santa Fe City Council rejects LANL coalition agreement, Santa Fe New Mexican, Mar 31, 2021 and (before the vote but recommended for its authoritative background) Santa Fe City Council To Consider Adopting Amended Regional Coalition Of LANL Communities JPA Today, Los Alamos Reporter, Mar 31, 2021.The vigilant Los Alamos Reporter is likely to publish an after-action account as well in due time.

Words of gratitude would not be misplaced, especially to councilors Villarreal and Vigil Coppler. (Contact information)

Councilor Villareal has also put forward a motion to formally withdraw from the RCLC. This presumably will be placed on a near-term Governing Body meeeting agenda. Regular meetings occur on alternate Wednesdays but no agendas are as yet available.  If you contact her, please encourage her to proceed with this motion. We will let you know when this happens.

The City's rejection of the JPA has legal and political implications which are not yet clear. As we said on March 30, this certainly means the amended JPA cannot be approved by the state or enter into force. RCLC Treasurer David Israelevitz said last night that Jemez Pueblo has also not endorsed the new JPA. Can the RCLC conduct business with its membership split between two slightly different legal authorities? We don't know. Will the Department of Energy (DOE) feel comfortable providing a new $100,000 grant to the RCLC given its history of fiscal malfeasance, the lack of endorsement by the City of Santa Fe and Jemez Pueblo, and therefore with no improved State-approved operating charter? Will Los Alamos County provide its customary $60,000? 

The situation in the two Taos civil governments vis-a-vis RCLC is uncertain and confusing (a hallmark of everything related to the RCLC). Suzie Schwartz (Norteños for a Peaceful and Sustainable Future), with Erich Kuerschner and others, have attended virtually every recent RCLC meeting. Suzie is the go-to RCLC expert in Taos and is in communication with the County and City on the question of whether Taos should remain in the RCLC. Especially now with Santa Fe's rejection of the JPA it is time for everyone to contact leadership of the Town of Taos and of Taos County, urging them to leave the RCLC. Coordinate with Suzie or Erich if you can.

That's it for now. We here are all sick of the RCLC, but it is a serious infection that needs attention in order for healing -- aka decolonization -- in northern New Mexico to proceed.

Thank you so very much for your thoughtful engagement,

Greg and Trish, for the Study Group

PS Trish has updated this RCLC background and talking point page.