Local news:
Ghosts of Moratorium Haunt County
David Collins photo
Joe Miller examines legal documents from his struggle to develop land along U.S. Hwy. 285 near Eldorado.
Joe Miller won county approval Feb. 9 for plans to build 53 residences and 30 commercial units across the highway from Eldorodo at Santa Fe. His epoch effort to build a shopping center in Santa Fe's largest suburb reflects a decades-long effort among sometimes competing interests to define the character of rural Santa Fe County.
When he approached Santa Fe County Commissioners this week to seek approval for his shopping-center plans, Miller could not have cared less that he had in hand county staff’s recommendation in his favor. He was thinking about the 17 years he spent fighting to win approval, only to be repeatedly turned back.
County staff said in a pre-meeting memo that his Cimarron Village Master Plan complied with county codes. While he waited for county commissioners to once again review his plans, Miller had in hand his own seven-page tale describing the history of his effort.
When the county approved Miller's plan on Tuesday, it wasn't the first time. It started in 1991, when he first won a zoning change to allow commercial development on the prime highway corner.
The county manager in 1994 promised to help get his commercial project approved. County officials at that time mostly wanted to get rid of the feed lot he operated at the entrance into what was once the nation’s largest passive solar community.
Since then, hurdle after regulatory hurdle popped up to block his commercial project. “It was all political,” Miller insisted.
Moratorium Imposed
County commissioners called most south-county development to a halt in 1996, citing an unreliable source of water. Under the moratorium, new developments couldn’t be built on lots smaller than 12.5 acres.
Developers of the Eldorado at Santa Fe subdivision at the time had drilled scores of wells. They relied on state rules that allowed a well on each new residential lot. They announced expansive claims to thousands of acre feet of ground water – enough to support seemingly unlimited residential and commercial development. County commissioners were skeptical.
Rural Santa Fe County then was fast becoming a Mecca for the ultra rich and for a financially secure nationwide middle class, often at the expense of historical Santa Fe County communities. Fearing uncontrolled suburban sprawl, county planners wanted to put in place development policies that would build livable communities and protect remaining open spaces.
Details
Cimarron Village:
A mixed use development consisting of:
- 34 commercial lots:
- 3 single-family residential lots,
- 20 live/work units, and
- 30 townhouse units
Total: 53 dwelling units on 81.69 acres and rezoning of an 8.126 acre parcel to a Neighborhood Mixed Use designation for residential and commercial development.
Location: The property is located east of Eldorado on the east side of US 285, along Colina Drive and Camino Valle.[map]
The 1996 development moratorium included several caveats. Grandfather clauses let some applications already in the works move forward. Development of the Agora Shopping Center across the street continued. The Village at Eldorado opened in 2007 on the southwest corner of the intersection of Avenida Vista Grande and U.S. 285 – across the highway from Miller's planned commercial and residential complex.
Miller said his shopping center should have been grandfathered in too, but political interests prevailed. He said commissioners stopped his development not because he was on one side or the other of a political fence, but because he didn’t take sides. “I’ve always been independent,” Miller said.
New Approach Emerges
Whatever the reason Miller's plans were thwarted for 17 years, several dynamics came into play to let his project inch forward this year. Things have changed since 1996 when the county stopped most rural subdivision development.
New county development codes tied lot sizes to water supplies. A comprehensive development plan called for open spaces interspersed in new developments.
A designated community college district set the stage for clustered residential and commercial centers within walking distance of Santa Fe Community College. The school is less than eight miles from Miller’s U.S. 285 properties as the crow flies – or along a bike bicycle path -- but 15 miles or more through Santa Fe traffic if you drive to the community college. [directions ]
Although the county approved Miller’s master plan in 1993, he was back in the county commission room Tuesday to get new approval because a U.S. 285 corridor plan in 2005 changed the rules. In years since the building moratorium was imposed, the county adopted several initiatives like the corridor plan. County planners say the new rules give local residents more control of development in their neighborhood.
Another Government Created
In the mean time, Eldorado residents took matters into their own hands. They created a public water district, condemned the water utility developers built and, in early 2005, assumed public control of their local water system.
County officials weren’t immediately impressed that Eldorado’s fledgling public utility could keep its word when it promised to supply water to new developments within its boundaries. A range war of sorts erupted between county officials and water district representatives.
County planners demanded a comprehensive engineering study of the piecemeal water system, cobbled together over more than 30 years as Eldorado grew to be the county’s largest rural subdivision.
The water district completed a hydrology study in 2007. The next year, the county lifted the development moratorium. By then, new countywide development rules had made the 1996 restrictions somewhat irrelevant.
Ghosts of the Past
Something in the county’s recent business with Miller put Eldorado water district officials on edge. When County Commission president Harry Montoya asked for public comments, the president of Eldorado’s water district stood up.
“It would appear the county is asking for another engineering study of our entire system,” Eldorado Water and Sanitation District Jim Jenkins told commissioners. “I’m here to assure the commission we do have a water supply.”
It was another ghost of the 11-year moratorium. The water district’s letter promising water for Miller’s development was sufficient assurance that his development would have a water supply, county staff told commissioners in the pre-meeting memo. Nonetheless, Jenkins and water district officials were concerned the county might continue to review in fine detail water-supply provisions of each development application that cites Eldorado’s new public utility as a source of water.
Eldorado water-district officials emphasize that they have established rules to protect their local water supply. The public utility now requires new developments to give the district water rights, wells and connections adequate to serve whatever new construction they ask the district to supply with water.
New Direction Slowly Spreads Roots
Miller doesn’t expect to see shoppers or work-at-home residents flocking to a completed Cimarron Village anytime soon. A historically slow economy now poses as much a barrier as the county’s emerging regulations have for the past 17 years. When the market finally improves – and Miller is confident it will – he plans to be ready.
He’s not the only one looking to the future in the southeast county. County Commissioners on Tuesday also unanimously approved variances to allow a first-of-its-kind conservation-oriented village plan to be built over the ridge and across the tracks south of Eldorado. More than 50 area residents crowded commission chambers, mostly to state their support for a village concept that includes live-work units clustered with retail and civic space.
Review Santa Fe County's Revised Sustainable Land Use Development Plan on the Santa Fe County Web site.During the past decade, Santa Fe County saw a stunning tide of large, ultra-expensive residential development. Mansions valued at several million dollars sprouted in gated communities, all within the narrow scope of ever-more-restrictive building rules. Housing prices soared. Middle-class workers sought homes outside the county in sprawling suburbs north of Albuquerque.
The tide seems to be turning. Not everybody is happy with the new approach. Some Galisteo residents say a new ultra-green development planned near their historic village threatens their water supply and their historically rural neighborhood. Miller is part of a group challenging Santa Fe County requirements that require builders to include lower-priced homes under affordable housing ordinances.
The market has now stopped much of whatever development would otherwise proceed. Whenever that changes, Santa Fe County will find itself on a new footing. A community that has seen and assimilated change for more hundreds, even thousands of years, will once again try on for size a new approach to organizing community life.
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