Press release 28 January 2020

Nuclear weapons agency cut from possible 'Master Developer' role in major Santa Fe project

Nuclear weapons antithetical to sustainable development, green 'think tank' says

Contact: Lydia Clark, 505-501-2606; Greg Mello, 505-265-1200 office, 505-577-8563 cell

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Santa Fe and Albuquerque -- This morning the City of Santa Fe, NM announced three finalists for the overall "Master Developer" role in the City's Midtown District project, which aims to redevelop a 64+ acre site in south-central Santa Fe.

As reported today by the Santa Fe New Mexican ("City announces three finalists for Midtown Campus master developer role," Teya Vitu), Associated Press ("Santa Fe Chooses Finalists for Midtown Campus Redevelopment") and others, finalists include Central Park Santa Fe, KDC Real Estate Development and Investments with Cienda Partners, and Raffles Education Center.

Eliminated as Master Developer were Santa Fe Innovation Village, the National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA), Zydeco, and Specialized Capital Partners, although these (and other) parties may re-appear in the still-secret development plans of the three finalists.

The City's press release says that

[b]ased on community input, the mixed-use development program will include market rate and affordable housing, higher education, arts and culture, entrepreneurial businesses and innovations in technology, film and digital entertainment, and programmed open space."

The Los Alamos Study Group has expressed grave concern about the prospect of NNSA's possible roles in the project, either as Master Developer or as a tenant -- whether as itself or as the Los Alamos National Laboratory (LANL), which is operated for NNSA by Triad National Security LLC (see: "Citizens Protest Possible Nuclear Weapons Agency Presence in Major Santa Fe Development," 1/14/20).

Study Group Outreach Director Lydia Clark:

"We welcome the city’s decision to exclude NNSA from the list of Master Developer finalists for the Midtown campus. Excluding NNSA seemed a 'no-brainer' -- but we are nonetheless pleased.

"Our concerns do not stop there, however. An innovative, ecologically sustainable, socially conscious and equitable development vision must also exclude LANL from any tenancy in the Midtown project. NNSA and LANL have been poor managers in the past, creating hazardous working conditions and many failed projects and environmental violations, which have led to a permanent legacy of contamination. Any LANL presence in the Mid-Town project will benefit only a small group of people, not the community as a whole. It will create instability and management risk. Even if all the problems that come with LANL were overcome, LANL's presence would only increase inequality in our communities."

The "development types" (e-pages 11-12) and "business types" (e-pages 13-14) shown in the City's Midtown development criteria appear to preclude NNSA or LANL participation, even as a tenant. "Administrative office only" business uses are not allowed. Any LANL prototyping, laboratory, engineering, or manufacturing support functions would require security arrangements that would be functionally incompatible with other project criteria and activities. The City's criteria for businesses include "creat[ing] a town center" (e-page 12); it is difficult to see how the physical security needed by any LANL presence would not preclude any "town center" from developing.

Needless to say, LANL is not an institution of higher education, a housing developer, a provider of arts and culture, an entrepreneurial business, and LANL is not in the business of film and digital entertainment, to quote from the approved activities in today's press release.

The press release repeats the City's vision of the Midtown Campus as

an essential hub of Santa Fe reflecting the city’s heritage and culture where all residents are invited to live, work, play, and learn. We want the Site to become the most creative location in the U.S. where a wide diversity of people interacts and collaborate to find their passions; build their skills for a great career; live in a thriving, vibrant neighborhood and city; and create a great future for our community, region and beyond.

Or, as the Mayor put it (e-page 8):

We have a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to collect great ideas that will create a new urban center of activity and also represent the soul of Santa Fe. We can create a place that is truly Santa Fe: our history, our people, our beauty, and our spirit.

Study Group Director Greg Mello:

"If words mean anything, the City's and the Mayor's visions for this campus, and the criteria set out in the Request for Expressions of Interest, are incompatible with any nuclear weapons laboratory, training, administrative, or recruitment presence.

"LANL represents the antithesis of the political values and priorities which could lift and unite Santa Fe and New Mexico. In too many ways our capital city and State remain stuck in what amounts to a "Cold War world," or even what might be called a "World War II economy," which has served New Mexicans very poorly indeed.

"LANL primarily innovates in narrow fields, nearly all of them classified. The list of LANL spinoffs is short and disappointing. There is very little fully-civilian research at LANL. LANL's mission is not economic development or technology transfer. Its mission is making nuclear bombs.

"Two decades into the 21st century, Santa Fe finds itself without a workable vision for social development, for training of our youth in the skills and character most needed to face the challenges of this century. We have no unifying vision, no sense of common purpose, no real social contract. Hosting a satellite campus of a nuclear weapons laboratory would be a real booby prize for the City Different.

"For more than 400 years, Santa Fe has been identified with Saint Francis. It is the "Royal City of the Holy Faith [Santa Fe] of Saint Francis of Assisi." In testimony of these values, there have been 25 years' worth of formal City resolutions more or less against nuclear weapons passed by successive City councils and mayors. If now for the first time, Santa Fe accepts nuclear weapons in its Midtown proposal by welcoming the agencies which build them, thus weaving these weapons into the fabric and identity of Santa Fe, it will be enormously consequential not just for Santa Fe, but for the entire world.

"Bringing nuclear weapons into Santa Fe would be corrosive of our traditions and culture, our creativity and the spirit of tolerance and openness to the world that are the very soul of Santa Fe. Two competing visions of Santa Fe would contend in two "plazas," one with a beautiful cathedral devoted to a man of peace and the patron saint of ecological harmony, the other supporting weapons of mass destruction in one way or another. This would be an disaster for Santa Fe's reputation, identity, and attractiveness to visitors. It would harm, not help, our youth.

***ENDS***