The Truth or Consequences city chamber was packed at the Feb. 25 city commission meeting. None of the 20 or so people who went to the mic during public comment were in favor of the city becoming a member of an organization that gave non-elected business people a say so over the area’s future that uses public money.
Patrick Pharris, executor director of corporate communications for PreReal, gave a similar presentation he gave to county commissioners the week before. The Sierra County Commission, the T or C City Commission, the Elephant Butte City Council and the Village of Williamsburg Trustees should form the Sierra Gateway Alliance with businesses, he said.
The goal? A unified voice to lobby for state and federal money to put in place needed infrastructure for growth, to also lobby for state and federal grants for projects that will increase the tourist trade so that it is year-round, and more generally to seek grants for projects that will help capture and prepare for the area’s share of inevitable economic development, Pharris said.
“This is not build it and they will come, they will come,” Pharris said, warning that area infrastructure will be overwhelmed and economic-growth opportunities missed if planning isn’t done now, if grant funding isn’t sought now.
Pharris’ presentation claimed 61,200 to 112,500 jobs will be coming to Southern New Mexico and West Texas between now and 2031, generated by the Borderplex, Project Jupiter, Copper Flat Mine and a new oil discovery in the Permian Basin.
Tourism will grow from these jobs, Pharris said.
New employees and their families at Borderplex and Project Jupiter are projected to increase area “leisure trips” by 15,000 to 70,000 a year over the next five years, Pharris’ presentation stated.
The Permian Basin jobs will add 50,000 to 100,000 visitors to Sierra County a year over the next five years, he said.
Virgin Galactic’s one-per-week flights will generate the need for 41,500 hotel rooms a year, beginning 2027 through 2031, Pharris claimed.
Pharris didn’t give sources, but said the same information could be found “online.”
So far, the businesses that have committed to joining the business/government Sierra Gateway Alliance are Copper Flat, PreReal, Dam Site Marina, “Turner” and Virgin Galactic, Pharris said. Whether local governments join or not, an alliance board consisting of these business members will be formed “next week,” he said.
Local governments don’t have the expertise, time or staff to handle the needed planning, strategy, lobbying, monitoring, communication and hand-holding needed to get state and federal funding, which the business alliance members do have, Pharris said. And a business/government alliance would garner much bigger federal and state grant amounts–many millions versus a few million or thousands.
Pharris proposed two alliance structures.
The first structure would be for the local governments to form a joint powers agreement with elected officials from each governmental entity that decides what projects to pursue. This JPA would be separate and “at arms length” from the “Sierra Gateway Alliance,” which would be a 501(c)(6) organization, a not-for-profit business league. This body would “execute” the JPA chosen projects from grant writing to completion, the grant and any other monies being deposited in the Sierra Gateway Alliance’s 501(c)(6) fund.
The second structure would consist of the Sierra Gateway Alliance 501(c)(6) organization, with the governments and the businesses being members, each paying a yearly membership fee, each having one vote in deciding what projects to pursue. Fees and grant monies would go into one fund, projects and expenditures decided by a majority vote of board members. The cities or county could pursue other grants and projects separately, but only if they don’t compete or duplicate the alliance’s goals and projects.
Pharris said a JPA structure would slow any project’s timeline down by six months or more.
City commission’s reaction
Newly-elected Commissioner Chaz Glines had, by far, done the most research and evidence gathering on the proposed alliance, which Pharris tried to diminish by suggesting it was generated by AI.
Glines said Pharris’ presentation gave no references, therefore making the business projections “questionable.” The presentation gave little detail and was “incomplete,” he said.
A 501(c)(6), unlike other nonprofits, is “designed not for public service but more like a business,” Glines said.
If the second structure were formed, Glines said, the city would have little policy or financial control. “Why would T or C partner with no control?” he asked, adding that if T or C didn’t join the alliance and other governments did, then T or C would be “in conflict and competition with other governments.”
City Commissioner Destiny Mitchell said, “The voters elected us to be stewards of public money. We have their trust,” but then switched gears and said, “I don’t see anything wrong with it as long as it is transparent and the public has a say.”
Pharris corrected her. “You and I talked at meetings. . .no one entity will have control.”
Mayor Rolf Hechler, quoted in a Sentinel article the week before, said: “As an alliance, we have more strength and we have one voice,” and “If we get on the same trajectory and we all have one voice, there is nothing we can’t accomplish.”
“I still think we are better together than apart,” Hechler said at the Feb. 25 meeting, “but I will meet with the four [sic] other governments and see what is the consensus.”
“I am leery about being obligated to the alliance,” adding that cities and the county could only pursue other projects and grants not in conflict with the alliance’s.
City Commissioner Ingo Hoeppner said that businesses’ aims are not public service, but “making money for their shareholders.” He hoped that existing “businesses and families will not have to move away because they can’t afford to live here any more.”
Mayor Pro Tem Amanda Forrister said, “We all want growth and we all want to work with community members. Let’s have an alliance, but without the money or finances part.”
Pharris said, “I agree. The attorneys can figure it out.”
Public comment
Alison Rashidi pointed out that PreReal “invests other people’s money,” promising “double-digit returns on investment,” and is “seeking $41.9 million,” according to her online research of the company.
Rick Dumiak said the companies touted as bringing jobs and prosperity to the area, will instead use up scarce water resources. Project Jupiter, he said, will use the equivalent of “10,000 homes a day.”
Gina Kelley responded to Pharris’ statements at the county commission meeting the week before that downtown T or C and the city airport hadn’t even bothered to “put on a coat of paint,” and to his claim minutes before that the city only received $200,000 from the state tourism board last year. The city received $260,000, she said, “because there was no match money,” despite the “$9.75 million in lodgers’ revenue.”
Working at the city’s visitor’s center, Kelley said she hears tourists say “we love this small town,” and return again and again, advising the city “not to sell out,” as have other cities.
Suzanne Carlstedt questioned “the constitutionality of local government turning financial powers over to non-elected [agents].”
Steve Green, former T or C mayor and city commissioner, said that the city had spent “$390,000 with no return” on economic development, perhaps referring to the formation and operation of the defunct Sierra County Economic Development Organization.
“If contractors see a need, let them build,” Green said.
Carling Mars, a teacher at Hot Springs High School, shared some of her students’ comments. Their research showed that about 740 people a year would take Virgin Galactic flights and doubted that this would translate into the need for 41,500 hotel rooms. They estimated Copper Flat’s “cost to mine exceeds the price of copper,” and even if copper prices went up, “interest rates have also gone up.” The mine’s enormous use of water and effect on existing and future water needs wasn’t weighed in Pharris’ prosperity claims, students noted. And the photos in Pharris’ presentation showed saguaro cacti, and none exist in this area.
June Jewell recalled that “PreReal wanted to take over the Healing Waters Trail,” referring to the company’s effort to buy about 10 acres on veterans’ hill owned by the City of T or C about a year and a half ago.
A person whose name I didn’t catch said Pharris’ alliance proposal gives no consideration to the community’s concern over the environmental impacts that will accompany the Jupiter Project, Copper Flat Mine and Permian Basin drilling expansion.
Stacy Blum-Hay pointed out that the Copper Flat Mine only operated eight months and then went bankrupt in the mid-1980s, making it a possibility that if the same happens again that the taxpayers will have to pay the cost of clean up, leaving polluted land that cannot be used or enjoyed in the future. The profits will primarily go to the Australian family that owns it, she said.
Another person whose name I didn’t catch said that the alliance structures proposed by Pharris seemed to “circumvent the checks and values of democracy.”
If I am correct, Christy Naughton spoke next. Pharris had repeatedly said people fear change, while emphasizing it was coming despite resistance. Naughton pointed out that Pharris had tried to incite fear in his presentation. “What we hear is: ‘How can the government pay for infrastructure so we can make the most money?’”