The first study of the costs associated with the City's plan to annex 1o,000 acres and 14,000 people was issued to the City Council last week. Among the troubling findings that he Santa Fe New Mexican reported today are: that the Fire Department will need more fire inspectors and that the City is already short of inspectors; 2 new fire station are needed, along with equipment and personnel; new tanker trucks are needed for areas that do not have water; and many homes cannot be accessed because of bad roads. See the full article here.
Not to mention that the new personal would not be familiar with the new areas they would respond to!
Last week, the City announced cuts in City services would be required for the new budget.
In fact, at the time Councilor Ron Trujillo said he questioned "cuts to public safety programs in light of the city's plans to annex thousands of additional acres over the next five years."
Meanwhile, perhaps from an alternate universe: "Cutting spending while adding new city customers will be a challenge, but City Manager Galen Buller believes it can be done." THE FIRE DEPARTMENT ALONE NEEDS $14 MILLION but the City belives it can CUT SPENDING AND ADD NEW CUSTOMERS. How?
DO YOU REALLY BELIEVE YOU WILL BE SAFE AND PROTECTED BY THE CITY? THE FULL IMPLICATIONS OF CITY ANNEXATION ARE JUST BECOMING KNOWN. THE FACT IS THERE ARE NO CONCRETE PLANS BY THE CITY TO SERVE AND PROTECT THE ANNEXED AREAS. ZONING AND DENSITIES ARE CHANGING, TAXES WILL INCREASE, AND WHAT ELSE?
"Would it help us to have more money to address those annexation questions? Sure," he said. "The annexation is a policy issue that has been decided, and we will make it work within our budget. That's our job."
REALLY?
please, get informed. Get involved.
savesantafe@cybermesa.com
During the last city elections fire union leaders and the chiefs were complaining that they were covering these areas for the county and not getting paid for it. Now these areas are slated to become part of the city and fire officials claim they need 7 million to cover the areas that almost 3/4 of which they were already covering.
ReplyDeleteAfter the last city elections the county agreed to pay all the costs of the emergency dispatch center in order to cover costs of fire fighting the city was doing in the county. This amounted to millions of dollars, I think it was about 4 million. So the city saved millions from the dispatch center which they had been paying yearly and they already cover most of the annexed area. The current fire chief is just using annexation to get more people and money.
Just wait until the city police report comes out. They will do the same thing. Last year they wanted 44 officers to cover the annexed areas of the county. How could this be when the Sheriff's Office has only around 80 officers for the whole county? The City is not annexing half the county, In fact population wise it is probably less than 10% and square miles it is a drop in the bucket for Santa Fe County's 2000 square miles.
These areas belong in the city and it makes sense in so many ways. The city police and fire are just inflating the numbers to take advantage of the fears over annexation. Never let a good crisis go to waste.
It is truly an alternate universe. The Fire Department alone needs $7M (according to their estimates) before a square foot is annexed. Which means that existing taxpayers will pay that cost without any revenue from the annexed areas.
ReplyDeleteI suspect that the estimates were based on agreed-upon rural zoning. The higher density so quickly and cavalierly adopted will result in additional costs.
And we should not forgot the tax increases and service cuts required as Mayor and Council pay the bills on their other rash projects.
Clearly, the Mayor and Council have decided to ignore reality and pretend all is well until after the elections. The City Manager goes along. He seems to think that is his job, but at some point, he should resign in protest.
The county has taken care of these areas because they were part of the county. With the annexation the county will lose tax revenue and will have to cut back. I sincerely hope the county will cut back in those areas that are no longer part of the county and preserve its level of service to its taxpayers.
ReplyDeleteAnd the city has the wrong type of truck for areas without hydrants. Or do you think she is lying about this and the city has stealth trucks that are unknown to us?
Sorry, whatever her degrees, I admire Salas' honesty at a time when the city manager is doing an Alfred E. Neuman.