Healthy soil and sustainable growing

["TradingPostPaul" <tradingpost@riseup.net>]

New Mexico is certainly not the only place where crop water is threatened
by development, but this outlines what is being lost forever. It comes down
to protecting local growers and traditional ways of life from corporate
profit.  Lynn Montgomery is a friend and published this letter in a local
paper here in NM. FYI, acequias are traditional irrigation ditches leading
from rivers and maintained for generations by farmers. This practice was
adapted here by settlers who brought it from Spain in the 1600's.

paul tradingpost@lobo.net
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Open letter to Governor Richardson about water rights
http://www.sandovalsignpost.com/html/the_gauntlet.html

Dear Governor Richardson,

Thank you for this opportunity to comment on this issue. Many holders of
senior water rights, especially those used for agriculture, have expressed
concern at the vulnerability of our rights. If a farmer loses his or her
water rights to condemnation, not only does he or she lose the rights, with
only a monetary compensation, but his or her business and way of life is
also lost. The economic, environmental, and esoteric benefits that are so
beneficial to society and the security of that society are also lost,
forever. As imported foodstuffs become more and more expensive and scarce
with the rising price of oil, it is imperative that we, as a people,
strongly protect our local agriculture, as it will be of the utmost
importance in the near future, as is pointed out by the recent OSE report
on climate change, commissioned by yourself. Homeland security depends on
the independence of the populace and their ability to provide for
themselves much more than a teeter-tottery economy that can crash at any
moment. Short-term economic gain is not reason enough to allow our
agricultural people and lands to be arbitrarily condemned. Retaining our
surface rights retains surface flows. Most often, these rights are used to
mine groundwater, which threatens all of our springs, streams, and rivers
with total loss of flows, as has happened to all the rivers in Arizona
already. Allowing counties, municipalities, and water authorities to
ruthlessly condemn our rights to support rampant sprawl development in
order to mindlessly expand their tax bases and allow huge profits for
private developers is fundamentally wrong and totally against what this
country and state stand for. Construction jobs are nomadic and temporary by
nature. Just ask any old carpenter. These cannot, reasonably, be used to
justify this kind of oppression.

Ancestors of parciantes of la Rosa de Castilla, (Inc.), were present and
utilizing the waters of Las Huertas Creek and Ojo la Rosa de Castilla in
1661, and were one of the families that were granted the San Antonio de las
Huertas Grant in 1778. I, as mayordomo and charged by our bylaws to protect
our acequia and the rights associated with it, have been extremely
concerned about all the residential housing going in around us, and the
groundwater mining associated with it. The state engineer, who, along with
his predecessors, has refused to file an adjudication to determine our
rights and, along with the legislature, which passed the domestic well
statute, has allowed unrestricted granting of groundwater pumping permits
without paying any attention to the threats to our sources. In order to
wake them up, I protested a transfer of senior surface rights all the way
down in Valencia County up here for a large, for Placitas, nearby
subdivision. I have also protested similar transfers for other subdivisions
and a gravel pit. This particular one has made it to the NM Supreme Court,
and I have been waiting almost a year after hearing for a decision. This
case established before the state engineer and the court that local
groundwater pumping is permanently depleting our spring. The state engineer
determined the depletions were “de minimus,” without determining the
effects of all local appropriations in order to determine impairment, as is
called for by law.

The sword cuts both ways, and if I do not receive satisfaction from the
court, I intend to ask my commissioners to start condemning rights to
surrounding wells in order to protect our acequia. The courts have clearly
held that acequia associations hold the right of eminent domain. The
legislature needs to rescind the clause, a la Tejano law, that domestic
well permits cannot be regulated or protested, appropriate reasonable funds
for the state engineer to carry out his duties, especially Middle Rio
Grande adjudication, fund public water planning groups created by the
Interstate Stream Commission, not allow condemnation of water rights, and
start to do things to rein in the uncontrolled development that is
destroying our resources, landscapes, watersheds, cultures, agriculture,
and all the enchantment claimed on our license plates. Is all this
“growth” worth all these?

The confrontational tone of the above is deliberate. I make no apology as I
am attempting to make a point, that is: The present course we are on will
inevitably result in intense conflict among all sectors of our population
and governments, and among entities within these sectors. Some kind of
peace must be realized before such a caustic war breaks out, or the future
of our state will not be very positive. A concept of the water as a
community resource, similar to the philosophy of the acequias, needs to be
promoted to give us a sense of “our” water. The “Year of the Water”
must be something beyond obtaining federal funds for settlement projects.
It is revealing that acequias were not even mentioned in this initiative.
Our leaders must get above the standard political assumption that one only
has to take care of the economy and everything else will follow behind, and
get above the fray to institute a spirit of reconciliation and community.
It might be the more difficult path, but the legacy of doing so will give
our people and state a reputation for foresight and compassion. The
groundwork to such a legacy has already been laid by such things as the
aforementioned Climate Change Report, attempts to establish an alternative
energy industry, and the recognition that we have to get our water resource
house in order. We have the resources and good leadership necessary to
accomplish this. It would be a great tragedy if the opportunities presented
us were not taken.

    Sincerely,
    —LYNN DANIEL MONTGOMERY, Placitas NM