by ES-CA Communication Committee
May 8, 2012
The monthly ES-CA Board of Directors meeting was held on May 7, 2012. The evening meeting was dominated by extensive discussions about the La Farge gravel mining operations.
Apparently, over some period of time the previous La Farge management made written promises to nearby Placitas communities about ceasing their operations. People living in those communities have therefore assumed that the operations would cease fairly soon. However the current management has said that they were not even aware of the existence of these letters. The present La Farge lease with Mt. Adams Holding Company, who owns the land, is due to expire in 2015.
The ES-CA board approved sending a letter to Mt. Adams asking for direct discussions with them about the community concerns. ES-CA will also send a letter with a personal appeal to Mr. Bill Gates of Microsoft fame, who is a major stock holder of Mt. Adams, to use his influence in this matter. In addition, Tony Hull and Tom Ashe will continue direct discussions with the local La Farge management about the various issues.
ES-CA’s Legal Committee will review all documents related to the La Farge lease and operations and will report to the Board on their findings.
The other significant item on the agenda was the presentation of a $1,000 donation from the Anasazi Home Owners Association, presented to the Board by AHOA’s President Dick Ulmer.
Members of the ES-CA Legal Committee continue to attend ESCAFCA’s (Eastern Sandoval County Arroyo and Flood Control Authority) Board of Director’s meetings and monitor their actions, since there are serious concerns about compliance with the ESCAFCA Legislation severing Placitas from ESCAFCA, which ES-CA members were instrumental in getting passed.
The Board briefly discussed the proposed Santa Rosa Development, on the north frontage road, which will be considered during the May 8 Bernalillo Planning and Zoning Commission meeting. The present proposal is to place an apartment complex there with over 400 units. All interested ES-CA members are encouraged to attend the P&Z meetings and voice their opinions. Please read more at http://www.es-ca.org/blog/category/land-use/
The Board is awaiting response from Fisher Sand and Gravel regarding their plan to restore the land as required by Sandoval County.
The Board decided to invite all Home Owners Association presidents, plus those representing other resident communities in the ES-CA area, to the regular Board meetings to establish closer relationships and find ways to work together on issues of common interest.
Unfortunately, the ES-CA Membership Committee chair is still vacant. Please contact ES-CA via e-mail at info@es-ca.org if you are interested in volunteering for this or any other committee.
The next ES-CA Board meeting will be on Monday, June 4 2012, 6:30PM at the La Puerta office. All ES-CA members are welcome to attend.
Just a note of thanks for all you do. -Catherine
Good question Chris. This inquiring mind would also like to know.
I have the same questions about LaFarge North America as I do about Nestle North America. LaFarge NA is part of a French multi-national conglomerate (http://www.lafargenorthamerica.com/wps/portal/na/en) that has aggregate, asphalt, mercury emitting cement plants, etc. all over the US. So in other words, they are taking our gravel, our natural resource, turning it into cement while polutting our air(been fined by the EPA a number of times), selling it back to us while th profits go back to the French company. Likewise Nestle North America, a subsidiary of the giant Swiss conglomerate Nestle, owns all the regional bottled water companies across the US, from Poland Springs to Arrowhead. They are taking our water out of out streams and aquifers, bottling it in plastic that doesn’t biodegrade for 600 years and selling it back to us. How did this country put itself in the position to suffer such reverse colonial imperialism?
Feel very sorry for the folks living closer to LaFarge Gravel operations than we do here in Trails because as the hills have been scraped and transformed into denuded ugly geology, we are now hearing the crusher operation as well as beeping trucks all day long. Can only imagine how folks close by must feel. Thirteen years ago when we bought this retirement casita, we were told that the pit would be shut down by now 2013. But somehow some kind of old LaFarge legal mining agreement paperwork stating this fact to developers here has been lost in someone’s archives? No matter, there is no use asking this company to care about what it is doing to the quality of life here in our once pleasant community. Money to be made. But how many of us might not have bought our forever homes here if we’d have known that something as simple as working in a garden would be ruined by the sounds of beeping trucks and the rumbling of a crusher operation. Angry. Legal recourse with LaFarge apparently does nothing. Sad fact of life here.
We haven’t given up! The county’s Planning & Zoning Division is formally raising questions to Lafarge concerning their compliance to the terms established by the 1988 Certificate of Nonconformance under which the operation has been “grandfathered” (such grandfathering allows them to avoid the greater restrictions on gravel mining in current county zoning regulations–but they then must at least conform to the original terms which Lafarge does not seem to want to do). Lafarge’s failure to comply could provide the basis for action by the county.
Our HOA leadership (adjoining the mine) is actively encouraging the county in these actions (and we encourage others do the same) and would like to see Lafarge complete this mining no later than the end of their current lease in August 2015.