August 2005 - WHY DON'T SANTA FE RESTAURANTS HAVE GOOD VIEWS'

It's a shame that one of the prettiest towns anywhere does not have restaurants with good views. We have mountain views, city views and sunset views that too many of us take for granted.

Many towns near the water advertise their sunsets far and wide, and yet none can compare with a Western sunset like we had the other night or a sunrise like this morning's.

It's not always easy to find a location with a view, but Santa Fe has lots of hills. It also has some downtown hotels that could have a restaurant on the top floor, instead of the bottom floor. The nicest views are probably from La Fonda's bell tower and from the Raddison, across from the National Cemetery.

Complaints are sometimes heard about having to look past gravestones, but the trees have now grown to the point that it should be less of an issue. Unfortunately the dining experience at the restaurant and bar is not of the quality at this point to attract many customers.

But put both on your list to check out.

Please contribute your comments! and let us know what you think.

July 2005 - COULD IT BE ENVY'

Santa Feans seem to get needlessly upset when they think others are flaunting their wealth. A previous mayor confided that one reason she wanted to ban hot air balloon flights over the city was because most of them were rich Republicans looking down on the poor people.

Then we got upset about people building houses on ridge tops so they could look down on the poor folks. So the city council passed a package of restrictions to kick out Shirley MacLaine and keep anybody else from looking down on us.

Now, they're at it again. Someone is building a too-nice house on a hill that is making many Santa Fe residents call for even more building restrictions to assure that no one can make us feel inferior.

There's the esthetic argument too. Hills with nice houses on them are ugly, in Santa Fe. In many other parts of the world, they are considered pretty -- and tourists like me travel to see them. But Santa Fe is one of the world's art centers, so who can argue'

It is amusing to hear people say no one should have a house bigger than they need. So much for the great American dream. There are countries that have such rules. And I suppose these Santa Feans don't want to move there.

Somehow, seeing a house that is bigger than mine doesn't upset me. I'd suggest that people might be happier if they admired nice houses rather than envied them.

Please contribute your comments! and let us know what you think.

April 29 - BLACK HELICOPTERS

It is amazing that people locate next to an airport and then complain about airport noise, locate next to an Interstate and complain about Interstate noise, etc., etc.

The latest is the project to plant trees along waterways that is opposing the National Guard's effort to bring Blackhawk helicopters to the Santa Fe airport because it will somehow harm the project.

It is difficult to understand how the helicopters will hurt the project and even more difficult to understand why the project was located near an airport if that is so harmful.

Are there other factors operating here that need to be revealed and discussed'

Please contribute your comments! and let us know what you think.

April 19

We're back. Had some technical problems there for awhile. But with a new host, everything seems to be working out. Your comments weren't getting through to me, making it very difficult to carry on the kind of conversations I had envisioned.

We started this Web site after the last city elections when I became concerned about the lack of reasoned discourse about problems facing our city. One of my concerns was that the endorsements of the three major Santa Fe newspapers were all the same and all supported the incumbents.

Santa Fe is a great community and our City Council does a good job in many ways. But there is always room to change for the better. The intent of www.commonsensesantafe.com is to encourage dialogue about how we can make our community the best it possibly can be.

Please contribute your comments! and let us know what you think.

October 17

ST. VINCENT’S FLU SHOTS
Some may jokingly call it St. Victim’s, but our Regional Medical Center put on its usual well-organized Flu Shot Clinic on Saturday, Oct. 16. Volunteers had us high-risk folks moving at fast-forward speed. They also are to be commended for finding enough vaccine to take care of all comers. The 8,000 doses took care of everyone who needed a shot. Our hospital did a good job taking care of us.

YOU COULD HAVE BEEN IN THE KNOW
Subscribers to the PREMIUM CHANNEL insider newsletter learned three months ago that City Manager Jim Romero was about to leave. It was the first item in the first issue of the PREMIUM CHANNEL newsletter back in July.
The prediction scooped the mayor, council and all local media, except for the PREMIUM CHANNEL newsletter. Too bad none of them were subscribers. You can be a subscriber by clicking on "Subscribe to the newsletters" in the blue area above.
Back in July, we also speculated that at least one councilor is looking at the possibility of replacing the city manager post with a CEO, and we told you why.
In the October newsletter, we analyze Romero's reasons for leaving, tell you how we were able to smoke out the news and suggest what to watch for next.
SUBSCRIBE NOW and we'll send you the back issues you've missed

September 2

POST OFFICE PRIORITIES
The annual grumbling about the U.S. Postal Service can be heard all over Santa Fe again this year. The trigger for this complaining every year is the Tour de France bicycle race, in which the USPS fields a team at the cost of many millions of dollars.
Yes, we are proud that American Lance Armstrong has won it the past five years, but every year that victory seems to be accompanied by an increase in postal rates or a decrease in service. This year, it was a cut of 80 employees in Santa Fe and a resultant decrease in the quality of service.
Santa Feans needn’t feel badly about being singled out. Nationwide, 100,000 postal employees received pink slips at about the same time as Armstrong hoisted his trophy in Paris.
Isn’t it about time for the USPS to change its priorities to delivering mail rather than racing victories'

September 1

WHEN WILL SANTA FE CELEBRATE ITS 400TH'
For the past 10 years, Museum of New Mexico officials have been telling us that newly-uncovered evidence indicates Santa Fe was settled earlier than 1610, probably 1607 or 1608 and maybe as early as 1605.
Have city officials discussed this' Do they have a plan' We’ve been behind the curve planning some of our other recent observances, such as1492 and 1692. Will we fiddle around on this one too'

August 28

OPERA AT THE BALLPARK
What an experience to sit in the grass at Fort Marcy, on a perfect evening, with an almost-full moon in the sky and enjoy grand opera. I like opera, but I must admit I enjoyed watching opera in the park even better. I was comfortable. I could drink and snack while watching. I could share impressions with my family and friends and I could stroll to a concession stand.
We were sitting well out into right field but could see the 20x20-foot screen nearest us, along the 3rd base line, better than we could see the stage in the opera theater. And the close-ups were better than any opera glasses could provide. I had to move up to about the batter’s circle to see the subtitles, but decided they weren’t really that necessary.
We could have gone early and staked out a front-row seat, but were fortunate enough to have had a dinner invitation from friends in the house closest to the ballpark. That also provided us with great parking, which was at a premium because Old Taos Highway and Bishops Lodge Road were closed off by orange barrels.
The city’s answer to parking was to provide shuttles from the Cathedral parking lot downtown. It worked. The buses ran often, parked near the gate and were ready to take people back as soon as a bus was full, even if the opera wasn’t over. They thought of everything.
My compliments to the person who designed the program. Instead of a scene from the opera on the cover, there was a line of baseball players with the names of the cast on their backs.
The mood was nice and easy, quite unlike the raucous Zozobra scene. But just in case, experienced volunteers from the Kiwanis club were on hand for crowd control. Alcohol was not allowed, but the spirit of the evening was captured by a city security employee I spoke with at the park that afternoon who said if he caught anyone with alcohol, it was his and he’d already arranged for padded garbage cans in which to place confiscated alcohol so it wouldn’t break on the way to his house afterwards.
Credit for the hugely successful evening goes to many people. Most of all, Richard Gaddes, who became general director of the opera in the fall of 2000, must be commended for his commitment to bringing the opera to the community. In the past few years, we’ve been treated to productions such as The Beggar’s Opera, H.M.S. Pinafore and The Pirates of Penzance. And now this simulcast of Sonnambula reaches a new height.
Many Santa Feans were able to see their first grand opera in a comfortable atmosphere, FOR FREE. Some may have gained a little appreciation for opera. Some may have gained an appreciation for the Santa Fe Opera and what it does for our community.
This was a great Santa Fe experience, made possible by people like Bob Wickham of AV Systems, Inc., who served as general contractor for the event. Project Coordinator Sue Ann Snyder also did a great job. Thanks also go to Michael Cerletti and the Department of Tourism and to the singers and musicians unions who needed to agree to some new contract terms in order to make this happen.
None of this could have happened without the very close cooperation of the City of Santa Fe. Many departments had to cooperate to make the event the great success it was. Many businesses, especially First State Bank, provided financial support and in-kind services to make this an event that we should all hope can happen again often.
This sort of cooperation is what makes Santa Fe a real community.

August 23

WHAT ABOUT THROWING MONEY'
Exercising the over-caution popularized by the City of Santa Fe, the Fiesta Council has announced an absolute ban on candy throwing from parade floats. The problem is that some of the candy lands in the street instead of in the crowd and children could go scurrying under the tires of trucks to retrieve it. No one has ever been hurt, but one can’t be too careful.
When I mentioned this to my old friend, Ted Miller, who was in town for Indian Market, he let loose with one of his big laughs and said, “Do you remember the time I threw dollar bills from our Hysterical float' They floated all over the street and it wasn’t just children crawling around, picking them up. Now that was dangerous!”
I had forgotten. And so, obviously, has the Fiesta Council or else we would definitely have a rule about that.

August 1

JUMBO JETS IN SANTA FE'
City leaders are considering moving up to bigger commercial planes at the Santa Fe airport. And of course, that has brought out the “aginers.” Airport manager Jim Montman says the move would allow us to graduate from 19-passenger “puddle jumpers” to 60-passenger regional carriers, such as American Eagle, United Express and Delta Connection.
But critics fear this means we can expect jumbo jets sooner or later. That is about as ridiculous as it gets. Albuquerque doesn’t have jumbo jets yet, even though its runways can handle them. The problem is that Albuquerque doesn’t have enough boardings to justify jumbo jets. Santa Fe should have enough boardings when we reach a capacity of, say, a million. How soon do you figure that will happen' Especially with this city council.
Short-timers in Santa Fe don’t realize that we had service from American, TWA and the larger carriers until 1971, when voters defeated a bond issue for runway maintenance. So this move would be only a return to where we were 35 years ago.
But that is scary to many people, who would like to keep Santa Fe to themselves. And there also is the problem of people who bought homes near the airport because the prices there were better and who now are upset that it is sometimes noisy. But what really may spell the death of any expansion is that the sizeable prairie dog population near the runways and taxiways will have to be relocated. Heavens, we can’t have that in Santa Fe!

July 30

CLOUD SEEDING -- JUNK SCIENCE'
City councilors are looking at cloud seeding to combat our water shortage. It is nice to see them thinking about the problem even though this may not be a very good way to address it. Cloud seeding never has been proven successful. Maybe it’s because that is a difficult thing to prove. But most experts put cloud seeding in the category of junk science – right up there with polygraphs.
I’d rather see consideration of something more concrete to solve our long-range water problem. No serious consideration has been given to the proposal to bring brackish water from the Estancia Basin and desalinate it along the way. Former state engineer, Eluid Martinez, is part of the group proposing to deliver the water at a reasonable price. New Mexico is far behind the rest of the nation and world in desalinization. Santa Fe would be a great place to get it started in New Mexico.

DOWNTOWN PARKING
Parking seems worse than ever downtown. The "public lot" next to City Hall seems to be always full. Are those all city employee cars' City mothers and fathers still are in denial about parking problems and don't like the idea of more parking garages.

The last public official to recognize downtown parking problems was former Municipal Judge Tom Fiorina, who refused to enforce downtown parking fines until the city did something about its problem.

Go to "Inside the Capitol" for daily updates on state news.

July 14

PLAZA GRASS
Numerous suggestions have been made in reply to my observation that grass doesn't work well on our heavily-used plaza. One suggestion was for small, colored gravel. Another was for cement slabs, either colored or a light, neutral color, suitable for sidewalk chalk artists. Tell us your ideas.

LIVING WAGE
Sunday's Wall Street Journal took note of our living wage ordinance with an editorial saying, "Many American cities have learned the hard way that the only way to grow and prosper in today's competitive world is to create a better business climate. Then there's Santa Fe."

According to the Wal Streeters, Big Labor targeted Santa Fe as ripe for a living wage fight, and it chose well. WSJ predicts the consequences will not be what the law's proponents expect.

Santa Fe is a fortunate community. Quality of life is high and unemployment is low. This enables the city to look for industry that is clean, high-tech, high-salaried and thought-intensive. It also allows them to stall building permits for two years and still attract some new businesses.

As a columnist who covers the entire state, it is bothersome to see Santa Fe, with its arrogant attitude, do so well, while most of the rest of the state is so desperate, it will take anything. Southeastern New Mexico courts nuclear production facilities, nuclear waste and maximum-security prisons that Santa Fe would never consider.

July 12
From Councillor David Pfeffer:

Very ugly and accusatory letters concerning my performance as a councilor are on their way to the papers. Folks upset with my endorsement of
President Bush are attacking me as "hypocritical" for arguing that
international affairs are not city business and then holding a press
conference to endorse a presidential candidate.
Yet I was not the councilor who brought antiwar and anti-homeland
security resolutions to the table. Other councilors made these issues city
business. Why should I be silenced while other councilors make speeches at
rallies, see to it that city fees and insurance requirements are waived for
the peace demonstrations at Cerrillos and St. Francis, wear Kerry buttons,
attend candidate fund raisers and hang President Bush in effigy on a
Democratic Party float in the Fiesta Parade'
I am also being accused of not listening to and betraying my
constituents by standing in the way of all those progressive good causes.
Yet I always stated I was a fiscal conservative and that growth was a
natural and healthy phenomenon. I stated I was a community progressive and
always explained that meant I would not pull the rug out from under La
Familia Medical Center or the bus system or other such social services the
city provides. I followed through in making growth and water align by
supporting the water budget which prohibits new demand on the water system
for new growth, by the toilet retrofit program. It just wasn't some other
councilors' idea of a water budget.
Had anybody asked during the campaign if I supported putting people out
of work for a building moratorium, I would have said no. But the issue
never arose. They did ask if we supported the "living wage" and 13 of the
16 candidates said they did not, yet they all voted for it in the end.
I was lambasted and ridiculed for supporting the candidates I felt best
in the last city election, yet all the other sitting councilors did exactly
the same without a single word spoken against them.
I just voted to increase the notice for Early Neighborhood Notification
from ten to fourteen days, making it easier for neighbors to respond to
development issues. I am cosponsoring a resolution calling for permanent
water flow in the Santa Fe River and another resolution calling for
cooperative work with the county on river restoration. I have voted in
favor of every piece of legislation supporting bike use and the building of
trails. I voted for funding of all our social programs. But the Bush
bashers want to paint me as a traitor.
I cannot stand out here alone and win this battle. Either I speak for
thousands of Santa Feans who see things the way I have been seeing them or I don't. Either people begin to speak up and show support for what we believe is best for Santa Fe or we lose and Santa Fe loses. Either folks come to my
defense or I and what I have been fighting for become indefensible.
PLEASE write the papers soon and ask your friends to do the same. Here are
the email addresses for letters:
letters@sfnewmexican.com jnorth@abqjournal.com
David Pfeffer
Council District 1

COMMENT!

July 11
Harvey Schmidlap writes:

The grass on the plaza is pretty now, but after a couple of arts and crafts fairs and Spanish Market, it will look just like it did before. I agree with Ms. Zacher -- lets look after the grass in the parks.

July 11

Catherine Zacher writes:

On Monday evening, the City will begin a series of meetings to discuss the future development/re-development of the city parks. I would offer these ideas for consideration.

I spend quite a bit of time walking in the park at Alto and Camino Alire and I have always felt very safe, something many cities can't say about their parks..

What I would like to see:
1. use of effluent water to restore the green to the parks, even just in some areas of each park. The green areas offer shade and a nice gathering place for Santa Feans. Grass on the Plaza is nice, but our local community parks are enjoyed primarily by local citizens.

2. More encouragement of local artists to have more of our public art in the city parks as well as the downtown area. I continue to be amazed that public art in Santa Fe is almost never damaged in any way. And this way, locals would not necessarily have to go downtown to learn more about the fantastic art community here in Santa Fe.

3. Better lighting in the parks, especially along the walkways to encourage more use into the evenings. Maybe Home Depot, Lowe's and others like that would consider sponsoring the small solar lights that so many people have put around their homes....and having solar lights would not add cost to the City for electricity.

4. Safety emergency phones located in city parks, similar to the phones many college campuses have installed to ensure safety.

5. A kiosk in each city park offering information on events in the community to give more of a sense of community interaction and connection.

6. Perhaps a musical performance regularly in city parks not just on the Plaza. Using local musical groups and performers makes it more of a community effort. I think this would be a great way for local performing arts groups to reach out into the community more - they say they want to, maybe they just need a place.

I applaud the city for seeking ways to improve the parks - they are certainly a major part of our neighborhoods, even the smaller ones.

COMMENT!

July 8

Frank O'Mahony writes:

I'd like to comment on the grass issue on the Plaza. I disagree that
we should emulate Taos' Plaza - I would suggest looking to our
neighbors to the south instead. Albuquerque is awash with fountains
and water sculptures. They have obviously taken the position that
this desert thing is fine but tourists and natives alike enjoy a
little H2O. Why are we to be so puritanical about water (at least
publicly - a walk around many Santa Fe 'hoods reveals lots of
ridiculously green grass Behind Adobe Walls)' Let the Plaza have some
green grass - it's a small cost to provide something soothing for the
eye (and the posterior).

July 6,2004

Welcome back. Thanks for your patience. We may finally have all the bugs worked out, so we’re ready to roll, talking about a changing Santa Fe and how we can make it better.

We shipped out “Premium” newsletter to subscribers this week – if you are interested in getting inside scoop ahead of everyone else, please consider subscribing.

I want to thank Quail Run resident Jack Frazier for the very clever “Death of Common Sense” eulogy he contributed this Web site. Let’s hope it will spark some thinking about what we can do to bring a little common sense to what goes on around town.

LEGISLATIVE CHANGES
While we were away, legislative changes were happening. Peter Wirth replaced Rep. Max Coll, who stepped down from his House District 47 after 24 years of service to our community.
And John Grubesic bested longtime Sen. Roman Maes. Neither of these candidates received much support from Santa Fe’s business community, so we see a continued political change that was signaled earlier by the March city elections.
What does this mean for Santa Fe'

COMMENT!

PLAZA UNVEILING
Santa Feans got to see their newly refurbished Plaza at the July 4th Pancake Breakfast. The Gazebo is great, but the grass is overdone. With all the traffic the Plaza receives, grass is a wasted effort, especially in a city with water restrictions. Take a look at the Taos Plaza, the next time you are up that way. It is nearly all flagstone, with a little grass in a raised area that gets no foot traffic. It is pretty and tidy. People who want grass can walk a block to Cathedral Park.
City committees and the Council apparently had a hard time coming up with creative ideas for alternatives to grass. Let’s help them out.

COMMENT!