By Brian D. Haines
I am flattered that Dr. Jim Kadlecek, in his Dec. 11 column on this site, is willing to give me sole credit for the 2003 lease (not sale) of Memorial Medical Center and the introduction of tax-increment development districts (TIDDs) into the New Mexico political landscape. He obviously thinks I wield a lot of clout. He’s wrong, of course.
I’ll address the two issues in turn.
In late 2002, Memorial Medical Center started terminating services critical to the community’s health. Elected officials on the Doña Ana County Board of Commissioners and the Las Cruces City Council saw their jointly owned hospital was in serious trouble, and they began the process of identifying solutions that would pull the hospital out of its financial tailspin. The resulting public process unfolded during 2003 with multiple public presentations aimed at ensuring MMC’s survival as a full-service hospital committed to its employees and all its patients, regardless of their ability to pay.
The process and its results are testament to the leadership of the elected officials in the county and city who took charge of what could have been a train wreck and instead navigated a lease, the up-front proceeds from which continue to accumulate significant interest for annual improvements to the local health-care safety net. Although he is intimately acquainted with the particulars of the lease, Dr. Kadlecek continues to characterize it as a “sale” of the hospital.
Let’s be clear. MMC is the property of the taxpayers of Doña Ana County and the City of Las Cruces. The lease of the building and equipment is a carefully crafted document that guarantees an uninterrupted, full range of services for all patients, regardless of ability to pay. Period. The sky is not falling at MMC as Dr. Kadlecek would have his readers believe. In fact, as the national upheaval in health care continues to dominate the political landscape, MMC is uniquely positioned to weather the storm and survive.
Regarding TIDDs, Dr. Kadlecek similarly misinforms your readers. The New Mexico Legislature – not me or the Doña Ana County Board of Commissioners – approved this system of infrastructure development of which developers statewide are taking advantage. To date, Doña Ana County is one of only a few entities in the state to craft a strong local ordinance that fixes what we believed were gaping holes in the state law governing TIDDs. As a result, TIDD applications that come before the Doña Ana County Board of Commissioners must undergo an extreme degree of scrutiny designed to guarantee that Dr. Kadlecek’s vision of pocket-lining developers is eliminated.
In fact, because Doña Ana County negotiated with the taxpayers in mind, the Verde Group opted two weeks ago to walk away from its TIDD applications for at least a year.
Dr. Kadlecek says you can’t make a silk purse out of a sow’s ear. He’s right. Fortunately, the work of Doña Ana County is more substantive than weaving silk or rendering pigs. Our work is public policy that is long-range in its approach, conservative in its fiscal application and heavy on returns to the taxpaying public. I’m proud to be associated with the elected officials who set the policy, and I’ll continue to implement those policies in ways that create a bright future for all Doña Ana County residents.
Haines is the Doña Ana County manager.
By Brian D. Haines 
In late 2002,