Santolina Developments’ Ducks Aren’t in a Row and They Have No Water to Swim In
By Gwynne Ann Unruh, The Paper.
El Agua No Se Vende, El Agua Se Defiende. Water is Not for Sale; We Will Always Rise to Defend Our Precious Water. New Mexicans are passionate about their water, and with good reason. Water can be here today and gone tomorrow in a high mountain desert climate where, during a drought, monsoons can go MIA and rivers can run dry for years. Many elected officials have begun taking into account the conditions of climate change and being in a long-term, 20-year megadrought and how that will affect decisions they make.
Santolina, a community development located on Bernalillo County’s southwest mesa, is essentially a city about the size of Rio Rancho that will be located on land the British Barclays Bank received through a foreclosure. Western Albuquerque Land Holdings (WALH) is developing the project for Barclays. The local community, with support from the New Mexico Environmental Law Center, has locked horns in advance of the development’s passing in 2015 by the Bernalillo County Commissioners and has been able to delay the project for eight years.