{"id":97187,"date":"2015-11-03T21:47:05","date_gmt":"2015-11-04T04:47:05","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.nmpolitics.net\/index\/?p=97187"},"modified":"2015-11-04T15:26:54","modified_gmt":"2015-11-04T22:26:54","slug":"voters-give-miyagishima-a-third-term-as-las-cruces-mayor","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/2015\/11\/voters-give-miyagishima-a-third-term-as-las-cruces-mayor\/","title":{"rendered":"Voters give Miyagishima a third term as Las Cruces mayor"},"content":{"rendered":"

In spite of heavy spending by a super PAC<\/a> that wanted to put an end to his time in office, Ken Miyagishima won\u00a0a third term as Las Cruces’ mayor on Tuesday.<\/p>\n

\"Ken<\/a>

Courtesy photo<\/p>

Ken Miyagishima<\/p><\/div>\n

With all voting centers reporting, Miyagishima had\u00a051\u00a0percent of the vote to 33 percent\u00a0for Miguel Silva, who gave up a city council seat to run for mayor, and 16\u00a0percent for Gina Montoya-Ortega.<\/p>\n

In the final week of the campaign, a well-funded super PAC hammered Miyagishima<\/a> in mailers and robocalls some\u00a0political operatives said\u00a0were among the most harsh they can remember in New Mexico in recent years.<\/p>\n

Miyagishima said he wanted to thank voters for “believing in me and not believing in those vicious attacks.”<\/p>\n

“I’ve never been attacked like that in my life, but again I can’t thank them enough, from the bottom of my heart, for their support and belief in me,” Miyagishima\u00a0said.<\/p>\n

GOAL WestPAC, the group that assaulted Miyagishima, was started in 2013 with the help of U.S. Rep. Steve Pearce, R-N.M. A\u00a0spokesman said last week<\/a>\u00a0the congressman is \u201cnot involved in GOAL\u00a0West\u2019s operations.\u201d Still, there’s a perception that Pearce is involved.\u00a0Miyagishima spoke about that\u00a0after declaring victory.<\/p>\n

“I’d be interested to know why he spent so much money\u00a0coming after me,” Miyagishima said of Pearce. He said the attacks won’t affect\u00a0his ability to work with the congressman. Las Cruces is the largest city in Pearce’s district, and Miyagishima said cooperation is essential.<\/p>\n

“We have to think of our consittuents, their best\u00a0interests, and put aside whatever hard feelings he may have toward me,” Miyagishima said.<\/p>\n

Las Cruces’ recession<\/h3>\n

Miyagishima’s third term will follow\u00a0a period in which Las Cruces has struggled economically. The city\u00a0remains in recession<\/a>, and has been there through most of Miyagishima’s tenure as the city’s leader. Some 23 percent of the city’s residents live in poverty<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Miyagishima acknowledged the “time of exceptional economic challenge” in a commentary<\/a> he authored in August, but wrote that\u00a0the city is on the right path and that “careful financial management allowed us to maintain a high level of service” during the downturn.<\/p>\n

Now, “we are in the midst of a period of exceptional advancement for the city,” Miyagishima wrote. “A new city hall, museum complex and transit center will soon be joined downtown by a major community health facility in the old city office building. Ground has been broken on a medical school on the NMSU campus, and a groundbreaking has just taken place on our new downtown city plaza.”<\/p>\n

“In so many ways, the best is yet to come,” the mayor predicted in that column.<\/p>\n

On Tuesday evening, Miyagishima said he would reach out to some of the groups that worked to defeat him —\u00a0such as\u00a0the Greater Las Cruces Chamber of Commerce and the homebuilders and realtors groups — and ask for their help.<\/p>\n

“I want to listen to what they have to say, and maybe there’s something\u00a0we can do,” Miyagishima said. “If they really have\u00a0the magic formula to increase job creation, I’m open.”<\/p>\n

Miyagishima has been in elected office for\u00a0more than two decades<\/a>. He spent two terms as a Do\u00f1a Ana County commissioner from 1992-2000 before winning a seat on\u00a0the Las Cruces City Council in 2001. He was first elected mayor in 2007.<\/p>\n

Silva not sure what’s next<\/h3>\n

For his part, Silva said he’s going to “sit back and re-evaluate” after losing the mayor’s race. He’ll be leaving a seat on the city council in a few weeks.<\/p>\n

“I really appreciate all the volunteers and supporters throughout\u00a0the campaign and the people that voted for me,” he said.<\/p>\n

“I’ll definitely be involved in community projects in some shape or form,” Silva said. “And I teach at the community college,\u00a0and I look forward to investing\u00a0myself in my teaching duties as well.”<\/p>\n

This article has been updated.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

In spite of heavy spending by a super PAC that wanted to put an end to his time in office, Ken Miyagishima won a third term as Las Cruces’ mayor on Tuesday.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":69273,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11],"tags":[145,214],"class_list":["post-97187","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news-and-analysis","tag-las-cruces","tag-las-cruces-election"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/97187","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=97187"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/97187\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/69273"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=97187"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=97187"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=97187"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}