Road projects
Activity included a permit to El Rio Sol to utilize county roads and annual requests to the state to provide funds for maintenance projects
El Rio Sol is building a 520 mile long high voltage transmission line across parts of New Mexico and Arizona. The project will include about 71 miles through Sierra County. Transmission lines will convey up to 1,500 megawatts of solar and wind generated energy to places in the southwest United States. The county commission signed a resolution that will give El Rio Sol permission to utilize county roads for planning, construction and maintenance of the transmission lines. The commission also signed a benefits agreement with El Rio Sol that will eventually provide the county with funds of approximate $1,420,000.
Resolution 110-227 allows El Rio Sol permission to utilize some county roads during planning, construction and maintenance of the transmission lines. According to the resolution El Rio Sol will provide the county with a pre-construction assessment of roads and description of work needed to handle equipment used during construction. El Rio Sol will perform upgrades and repairs at their own cost.
El Rio Sol has also agreed to pay the county $20,000 per linear mile of transmission lines that will cross Sierra county. This will provide the county with approximately $1,420,000 upon completion of the transmission line project. El Rio Sol will provide those funds in 6 tranches. The first tranche, $35,000, will be contributed by the end of March this year. That will be followed by $71,000 tranches each on December 15th of 2024, 2025 and 2026.
The county will receive 30% of the remaining contribution after El Rio Sol receives full notice to proceed with the project. The final 70% will reach the county coffers after the transmission line is “first transmitting commercial quantities of electricity for sale”. According to county attorney Dave Pato, the first four tranches are “free money” for the county. The additional funds will only come to the county if the project is completely permitted then functioning. If plans are altered to increase or decrease mileage through the county, the actual monies given to the county will be different.
The county, in exchange, agrees to use the monies provided by El Rio Sol to support health, safety and welfare projects. These are defined as “county expenditures that protect county residents, promote the physical and emotional health of county residents, or that enable equitable access to services and opportunities, encourage social interaction, or benefit the environment”.
The county also requested funds from the state to pay for road improvements. The total requests are for $503,466 which is 75% of the estimate needs. Roads to be improved are 6.4 miles of Animas Creek (B050), 1.2 miles of E Grand Percha (B041), 3.4 miles of Rancho del Chiz (C005), 10.9 miles of Calle del Norte (C033), 2.1 miles of Chili Plant (B042) and 8.9 miles of Harding (A032). All roads except Harding are currently paved and in need of resealing and pothole and shoulder repairs. Harding needs culvert replacement. Maps of the designated roads can be found starting on page 115 of the meeting packet.
Flood commission report
County flood commissioner since 2022, Sandy Jones, provided a report of his department’s activities for the year 2023. The report included his department’s efforts to collect $400,000 in reimbursements for projects that Jones said spanned “about 2 years” and were performed “5-6 years ago”.
Reimbursement for county work on repairing flood damage has been an ongoing problem. In October 2021 then flood commissioner Travis Atwell told the commission that the county had finally received $350,000 for Animas Creek water crossing repairs. Atwell also stated that they were still waiting on reimbursement for some hydroseeding from 2014. The flood commission had resubmitted that work “6 times” for reimbursement.
Jones’ flood commission contracted with King Industries to perform an audit of the FEMA work in question. With the records the flood commission had access to, Jones said that the county had been overpaid “about $150,000”. He advised the county to perform an audit since he didn’t know that the state wouldn’t be able to “clawback” that money.
Commissioner Jim Paxon, spoke several times about the problems the county had had being reimbursed for flood damage repairs. Some applications had been filed “six times” and the “federal government had lost applications”. Paxon also told Jones “those expenses incurred with invoices attached were supplied to you both in paper documents and electronic file” and that the county only has the electronic file.
Jones countered by explaining that they “did not get a number of records from the county” and “King had a problem that invoices citing a check, the amounts did not correlate”. He volunteered to attend a sit down meeting with county representatives to rebuild the records. That way, they could define and have someone retrieve the records needed. Both commissioners Travis Day and Hank Hopkins agreed that it would be worth the effort to have such a meeting.
The second item that the flood commission worked on last year was an attempt to renew county-wide permits for maintenance. The previous permit had been allowed to expire and no one was able to locate that permit. Paxon said that he had confirmed with county manager Vaughn that the expired permit was given to the flood commission. If found, “it would have been possible to extend it” said Jones.
However, the permit may be a moot subject given the recent Supreme Court ruling, Sackett vs EPA which has changed the working definition of the “Waters of the United States”.
Projects in water courses may no longer need federal permits. Instead individual states may step up and do their own permitting. Jones recommended to the county commission that they work closely with the Association of Counties when/if New Mexico designs its permitting process. “The state will be easier to work with”, said Jones, when the rules are made.
The flood commission report indicated that no capital or maintenance projects had been performed last year. The future goal of the department is to work with local governments to identify capital improvement projects that can be afforded with the flood commission budget.
Resolution to oppose Mimbres Peaks National Monument
A community driven campaign to increase protection of about 245,000 acres of BLM lands in Luna county is opposed by the Sierra county commission. That campaign is to bundle the Florida Mountains, Tres Hermanas, Good Sight Mountains and Cookes Range into a new national monument called “Mimbres Peaks”.
Sierra county commissioners cited their support of Luna county local governments that will not support the national monument designation. They also cited their opposition to the federal government’s “30/30 land grab”.