{"id":28262,"date":"2011-04-13T08:09:54","date_gmt":"2011-04-13T14:09:54","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.nmpolitics.net\/index\/?p=28262"},"modified":"2011-04-13T23:19:27","modified_gmt":"2011-04-14T05:19:27","slug":"save-our-city-but-from-what","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/2011\/04\/save-our-city-but-from-what\/","title":{"rendered":"Save our city! (But from what?)"},"content":{"rendered":"
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The Organ Mountains (Photo by Heath Haussamen)<\/p><\/div>\n

<\/strong>A recent e-mail<\/a> distributed by the Las Cruces TEA Party<\/a> raised the call to \u201cSave Our City,\u201d as though Las Cruces teeters on the brink of moral and financial collapse.<\/p>\n

My personal experience directly contradicts this. In the last few weeks, I\u2019ve hiked the Pine Tree trail on the backside of the Organs; eaten breakfast with my wife on the lovely patio at La Iguana\u2019s as friends walked by, stopping to chat as they enjoyed the farmer\u2019s market; pushed our new blue recycling bin, full of recyclables, out to the curb; and won (and lost) several tennis matches \u2014 despite the blustery spring winds \u2014 at the well-maintained tennis courts at Lyon\u2019s park.<\/p>\n

This is the short list of good things. So, I wonder what the TEA party thinks we need to save our city from?<\/p>\n

What they say<\/strong><\/h3>\n

This Las Cruces TEA party group (there are two in town since, rumor has it, they couldn\u2019t get along) has formed a Save Our City coalition because \u201cthe Las Cruces City Council is completely controlled by a group of Progressive Democrats that are owned and operated by an organization called the Progressive Voter Alliance.\u201d The Save Our City coalition\u2019s stated goal is \u201cremoving the Progressives and their toxic doctrines.\u201d<\/p>\n

But I still am not sure what exactly<\/strong><\/em> the problem is. As a matter of fact, it\u2019s not just me who thinks things are going good here in Las Cruces. According to both local and national experts, Las Cruces is doing quite well<\/strong>.<\/p>\n

Our economy is strong<\/strong><\/h3>\n

In an economy like this, many people suffer, and that\u2019s been true in Las Cruces as well. Still, most of us have fared better than other people in neighboring cities and states.<\/strong> For example \u2014 for the second year in a row \u2014 the Milken Institute<\/a>, a national, nonpartisan economic think tank, named Las Cruces one of the top 10 performing small cities in the nation, based on job growth, wages and salaries, GDP growth, and other measures.<\/p>\n

And local economist Chris Erickson agrees. In a recent Las Cruces Bulletin article<\/a>, Erickson, citing a report by the Bureau of Economic Analysis, points out that Las Cruces has outperformed both Albuquerque and Santa Fe over the last decade. As he says in the article, \u201cHowever you slice it, the gains are impressive.\u201d You can get more information \u2014 including cool powerpoint graphs \u2014 that quanitifes how Las Cruces has weathered the recession by watching this Greater Las Cruces Chamber of Commerce forum.<\/a><\/p>\n

Crime is down<\/strong><\/h3>\n

A March 5\u00a0Las Cruces Sun-News article by Ashley Meeks outlines how crime has dropped significantly in the last two years:<\/p>\n

“Between 2009 and 2010, violent crime went down11 percent in Las Cruces and 68 percent of those crimes were solved, compared with a nationwide reduction of 5 percent with 47 percent of such crimes solved. A second classification of crime \u2013 which includes assaults, credit card fraud, bad checks, vandalism, drunken driving, runaways and trespassing \u2013 went down 6 percent, with 23 percent of such crimes solved, compared with a nationwide reduction of 4 percent with only 18 percent solved.”<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Traditionally, people get upset when the economy is bad or crime is bad. But the Las Cruces economy is holding steady in tough times and crime rates are dropping, so that\u2019s not what is upsetting the Las Cruces TEA Party.<\/p>\n

Planning, sustainability and social justice<\/strong><\/h3>\n

If their beef isn\u2019t about the economy or crime, it must be something else.<\/p>\n

A former city council candidate, Jim Harbison, in a video on the Las Cruces TEA party homepage<\/a>, says his primary complaint is that the city’s advocacy for better planning and more efficient delivery of city services, an emphasis on sustainable best practices, and valuing social justice, by increasing access to opportunity, choices, and freedom for all city residents, rather than just the special interests, is all part of a global plot to destroy private property. Here’s how he puts it:<\/p>\n

“Sustainablists have imposed ‘green’ positions in their business policies and government officials at all levels are merging the power of the economy with the force of government in public\/private partnerships at the local, state and federal levels. Its real objective is to redistribute American manufacturing, wealth, and jobs out of our borders and to lock away American natural resources.”<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

He claims that the people who believe in sustainability, public\/private partnerships, and social justice are part of a global conspiracy to ruin America.<\/p>\n

But I hold these values and am not a part of that conspiracy, so it\u2019s hard for me to take that claim very seriously.<\/p>\n

For those of us who don\u2019t have an ideological opposition to all government, Mr. Harbison’s global conspiracy theory is baffling. It’s worth listening to how some of the Las Cruces city councilors\u00a0\u2014\u00a0especially Councilor Thomas \u2014\u00a0responded to Mr. Harbison’s concerns when he expressed them at the April 4 City Council meeting, during public participation (the discussion begins at about 49 minutes in this video<\/a>).<\/p>\n

Why I\u2019m a progressive<\/strong><\/h3>\n

Finally, the Las Cruces TEA Party\u2019s stated mission in their \u201cSave Our City\u201d e-mail is to remove the \u201cprogressives and their toxic doctrines.\u201d I certainly don\u2019t speak for all progressives, but here are some of the things that I stand for:<\/p>\n