Cocoposts

Real Estate Proctology

The Albuquerque Journal's Sean Olsen raises the obvious question again about conflict of interest in Albuquerque' sprawl development.  That's a broad sticky-wicket through which our elected officials apparently carve a very narrow path.

Cummins said his development already has water service and major road access through Paseo del Volcan.  "There is absolutely nothing of benefit that the TIDD brings to us," he said.  (...)

Within this old Alibi story from 2004 is an interesting line. 

Cummins has said he will not vote on any plans that would directly affect the value of his property. But, bureaucratically speaking, to get any closer to the deal, he'd have to be the county commission's staff proctologist. (...)

Auntie Climatic

With a Big Duh I greet how the Albuquerque Journal finally notices the obvious ties that Marty Chavez has to Westland. 

So do a lot of people. 

Relative to the pending  TIDDs issue for SunCal - it's rather pointless to bring it up now.  TIDDs won't go to the City.  Marty isn't a player now.   Because all of those so-called greenfields are in the County, not the City. 

And no one pays attention to the County.   It inspires collective somnolescence in the few who recognize it as a government at all. 

It's those eight damn sheep on the county seal.  Their wool feels cozy over my eyes.  Counting them makes ... me ... sleepy... zzzzzz.  I could sleep right through Tuesday's meeting.   

Greenfields and Marty Chavez

Mayor Marty vetos the TIDD amendments that would have restricted the use of tax increment financing.   Tosses away his responsibility and spins it as city-county cooperation.   1st and 10, Developers.   

Marty throws the ball to the Board of County Commissioners - who'll hide it where no one but Geraldine Amato can find it.  Soon will emerge multiple agreements in a  flurry of many-dead-tree- paperwork that no one will want to read before Christmas.  Hurry before the Legislature tries to block Pandora.    

Carter Bundy on Heath Haussamen presented all the reasoning on why Mayor Marty Chavez should not do what he did before he did it.  He is damning greenfields.   Greenwashing that developer touchdown will be playing on astroturf.   

Rural Government?

The Albuquerque Tribune cover story last night was about South Valley residents considering incorporation as a solution to urban encroachment.  Good luck with that. 

The same sprawl we can imagine the city of Albuquerque feeding on like a greedy animal, happens everywhere.   Every local government eats that beast or wishes they could.   Any new municipality is going to long for that first rush of gross receipts taxes from new construction - the warm blood of the building industry.  Local governments feast as the shopping centers and  ranchitos blossom.  Only later, as those fade into suburban corpses, do they become a  burden - draining away funds for maintenance and service.  But that's a future mayorcouncillegislature's  problem.  So the solution is allowing more development to get more gross receipts taxes - a ridiculous cycle that some call  "economic development". 

Sprawl doesn't much care which jurisdiction it is in.  Making the city out to be the bad guy is an old trick that distracts us from the reality of what is being built in the county.  The differences are negligible.   The "raw" land is considered a magnificent holding zone for the urbanization machine and controlling that machine isn't even within the power of local government - but especially multiple local governments.   

Return Perspective

The moon looks full and the cat looks fat.  The City administration looks lame, Eclipse Aviation never was gonna happen and the GOP presidential campaign is a freak show.  Nothing like travel to improve perspective.   

When I got back, there were feathers all over the house.  The cat had set up a future meal with "catch and release" of a sparrow and the bird was up in a skylight.  It had been there for a few days judging by the bird poop on the sofa.  After catching him I narrowly avoided smooshing him in the fall off the ladder.  Bruising took my mind off the jetlag.  This English graffiti was on an Italian wall in Perugia.   I've been made.   

The moon is giving Big Dog better light for his fence-line excavation project.  I thought he might  forget about it after being in dog jail for a week, but no.  The ground is hard so the going is difficult but that appears to strengthen his resolve. 

There is a new puppy in the hood and the other side of the fence is apparently not close enough and he must be with puppy - having decided old Yellow is too grumpy for playtime.  So he whittles away at the wall searching for weak spots in the perimeter - my North Valley equivalent of Perugia's 4th Century travertine walls - the chain link fence.

The engineering adaptation to his assaults consists of piling broken cinder blocks up against the base of the aging fence - bowing it outward and giving my yard that special white trash touch that neighbors adore.  Along with my dog. 

Election Over

And Thank Goodness.

This parade float entry is children of Ammanford Wales in 1958 dressed as various Albuquerque and Bernalillo County elected officials of the future.  Either that or fairy tale characters.  Hard to tell which.  But I think I'm related to the witch.   

The Trib

I just can't get past the Albuquerque Tribune-for-sale news. I've been unable to write about it and think I need another 3-day weekend.

My afternoon paper routine is sacred. Seeing it in my front yard at the end of the work day is centering. I pick it up first - before the mail. Because what's in the afternoon paper is more important than what's in the mail.

I follow a simple ritual - removing the newspaper's little raincoat or rubber band belt - like undressing barbie. Then unfolding and flattening it on the counter. I rush through my chores of feeding and watering then plop down on the patio and go straight to the inside - puzzles and Doonesbury. They are always the same delicious page - suduko and the humbling NYT crossword.

If there is time I read the rest. Even scanning classifieds. Saving the front page for last. I contemptuously throw bad news and Jeffry Gardner to the floor. Later, Big dog will take away the puzzle section and chew it up. He thinks he's doing me a favor.

Afterwards I collect and pile them for recycling. But now I just can't bring myself to get rid of the Tribunes on garbage day. Knowing that someday there won't be a Trib is making it impossible for me to throw them out.

So they're stacking up and getting on my tidy nerve.

Westside Water

Under category of Giving Away the Farm, our Water Authority has opened multiple new water pressure zones for an unprecedented round of new westside sprawl. Some get this perfectly. From the Albuquerque Journal:

Cadigan said the economic development argument was a thinly veiled plan to provide water service for homes in previously closed water zones. That, he said, violates a yearlong policy of not opening more than one water pressure zone at a time for development.
The approval immediately opens four zones and gives a green light for three more in the future.
"Tesla can open with the water they have now," Cadigan said. "I think the whole Tesla thing is a red herring."
But County Commission chairman and water board member Alan Armijo said Westland had followed proper procedures and was complying with a policy to ensure the water authority pays no net cost for new services.
"We're not breaking any policy, we're following policy," Armijo said Thursday.
Although the councilors had some "valid concerns," Armijo said, it is up to the City Council to address growth, not the water board.

That covers it. Proper procedures were followed. And those procedures were devised to disconnect growth and water so that no one is responsible. Armijo's quote is straight out of the playbook. The Water Authority model was adopted by our legislature and two local governments precisely because it got the utility out from under any planning responsibility. The model was Nevada. Patricia Mulroy, the Water Empress, brags that planning and growth management are not her problem. The authority is simply meeting market demand. Which is why northern rural Nevada groundwater will soon be pumped and piped to southern urban Nevada - to benefit homebuilders.

Electric Car Building Sprawl

The Albuquerque Tribune asks whatever happened to the electric car? Tesla Motors is still designing.

Tim Cummins, a Bernalillo County commissioner and co-owner of the development company, said Rio Real Estate and Tesla have had weekly discussions about the plant.

Plans for a 157,000-square-foot building are "90 percent complete," Cummins said. Tesla in July, however, asked for 30 days to re-evaluate the initial design to see if more space is needed, Cummins said.

Straightforwardly, sin verguenza, the elected official on a board responsible for public infrastructure talks about his development.

Lands in the south valley, some already in industrial use (south Broadway and south Second), don't have public services. But Cordero Mesa does.

Albuquerque Electric Streetcar

In opening scene of Ace in the Hole there is an electric streetcar. I wrote about the movie today in DCF.

I don't recognize the builidng but I do believe the scene was shot in downtown Albuquerque in 1950 at which point the street car did still exist, I think.

Interesting to speculate whether or not inclusion of the streetcar was intended by Wilder to signify Albuquerque as a two-bit town - old fashioned like the slow newsroom he enters. It seems progressive today.