Web site

Mayor’s Report 

April, 2004

Tax time, a time government uses your money attempting to balance the budget, leaving you the impossible task to budget the balance.  This annual All-American sport of creative accounting has become so confusing and perplexing it now requires more intelligence to fill out the tax forms than it does to produce the income.  Anxiety consumes us knowing, should we file our taxes wrong we’ll be fined, and if filed correctly we’ll be taxed into poverty.  Is it any wonder George Washington never told a lie?  He was never burdened with the task of filling out the dreaded Form 1040.  The 1040 will make a liar out of most Americans quicker then selling a blind horse while telling their favorite fishing story or playing a round of golf.  I wonder what Patrick Henry would say if he could see how taxation with representation worked out? 

 

However, January 2005, the state will repeal one tax, the gross receipts tax on groceries.  At first blush it sounds good that we’ll not pay gross receipts on groceries.  Until you realize 86 % of the income to this village rides on the back of gross receipts and part of the 86% is from groceries.  Unless you have absolutely no grasp of reality and live in a cave with a free range chicken you know you’ll be taxed elsewhere to make up for that outpouring of good will by the state.  There’s no free ride and these days the ride’s not even discounted.  We’ll have to see what impact it has on us mountain dwellers south of I-40.  The Trustee’s and I have been discussing alternative income for the village, besides taxes.  I don’t know about you but I’ve about foundered on my tax burden.  The bright side is, if gas hits three bucks a gallon we’ll not need money for roads, we’ll be riding horses.  Maybe OPEC should be on the US terrorist list.      

 

Here’s something to smile about; each year someone from City Hall will pile in a worn out pickup before the sun comes up, drive to Santa Fe to ask for money.  The process would put you in mind of children standing before a department store Santa hoping beyond hope they’ll get that Red Rider BB gun (I just dated myself there).  This year we called upon Bobbi Shearer.  She shines up better than Davis, Martin, Tippin, or I and she is like a hungry shark when it comes to her village, we knew she’d eat them alive.       

 

Bobbi presented our request for money to be used for roads (always on the menu), a community center and a baseball field.  Then our good friends Senator Rod Adair and Representative Dan Foley jumped into the scrap to help us out.  With their help we walked away with $150,000.    

 

The Village and school work together on a number of projects and the baseball field is just one.  Gary Trejembo, School Board President, Dr. Larry Miller, Supt, and Robin Parks with help from Adair and Foley, came back with $182,000, and of that money $25,000 for a ball field and $50,000 for construction.  You’ll see our board and the school board working hand in hand.

 

More good news, we’ve received our CDBG grant for ½ a million dollars for our wetlands project.    If you get a chance and see one of your employees, a Trustee, any of the folks at the school, Rod Adair, or Dan Foley stop and thank them; they’ve all been working overtime for you and Capitan.

 

It’s been well over a year since I told you I had a problem with the manner in which the LCSWA Operational Supervisor was hired.  The board hired one of its own, the chairman of the board, a politician and they hired behind closed doors.  In a letter from the Attorney General (AG), dated March 18, 2004, the AG agreed, ordering LCSWA board to place the “employment position of operational supervisor on an agenda, and take action in an open meeting.”  Reacting to that order, in yet another slick and savvy political move LCSWA added the item to the agenda after they sent the original agendas out.  The agenda item read;   “Discussion and Approval – Re-Affirming Board Recommendation Hiring of Operational Supervisor Effective November 2001”.  With that slick job of word-smithing it made it impossible to do anything but rehire Ms. Ingle.   I know, I made a motion to fill the position in a fair way and re-advertise the job, interview, and hire the most qualified applicant.  I explained to the board I felt the way the position was filled “smacked” of old time politics when they hired an elected official behind closed doors.  For my efforts I was informed I couldn’t make the motion because the agenda did not allow for anything other than the “approval” of Ms. Ingle to that position.  I question, is it just me or is there something very wrong here?  Slick politics is really starting to wear on me.

 

Leo Martinez declared the AG’s order to be “ridiculous”.  He went on to say when the county has been told to do different things by the AG they just “ignore” her.  I listened with disbelief.  You can’t make this up.   

 

But why does this shock me?  Capitan just settled with LCSWA over the closure of our land fill.   After we turned the land fill over to them they continued to dump house-hold waste and Freon in unlined trenches.  LCSWA wanted Capitan to pay for their actions and lied to us about those actions.  Those lies cost Capitan and the citizens of this county thousand’s of dollars in attorney fees.  It wasn’t until Capitan searched the EPA files finding these violations that LCSWA settled and is now forced to monitor Capitan’s ground water.          

 

Bobbi and I have traded off attending these meetings.  After the last meeting I told her I’ve had my fill of that board; in good conscience I can’t serve on this board as it now operates.  Bobbi said she also was done.  I shall take this matter to the Trustee’s on April 13^th for their guidance.