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Hinton: Let's Use Common Sense To Revitalize Downtown Las Cruces

Commentary: Hello my name is Robert Hinton. Most people know me as Rob. I am a native New Mexican and have been a proud member of the Las Cruces community for over twenty-five years. However, at this time, I am concerned about various city government actions (past and present, as well as some imminent decisions that will greatly impact our future). Thus, I am compelled to reach out to the City Council with an important message that, hopefully, they will keep in mind (in addition to the myriad of tax-payer funded surveys, studies, special commissions and task forces use for guidance) as decisions are made regarding plans to revitalize our downtown/Main Street area.

The message is: LET’S USE SOME GOOD OLD FASHIONED COMMON SENSE.

As a child, I remember my father saying that the only problem with common sense is that it isn’t common enough. That adage appears to be as true today as it was back in the 1960s when I first heard it; especially when it comes to decisions that our elected local politicians make on our behalf. Let’s take a walk down memory lane and review a few city government actions where common sense appears to have been omitted from the planning and decision making processes.

(1)    When we first moved here from Albuquerque, Las Cruces had a vibrant Antique District on West Picacho Street. But in its infinite wisdom, the city government determined to place a very long median in the middle of the street, complete with landscaping that featured some very expensive palm trees. This lengthy median restricted access to many of the shops because making left turns in either direction became practically impossible. The median killed the charming antique district, and shortly thereafter, the palm trees died too.

(2)    More recently, the city decided to realign the traffic lanes on Solano Street between Lohman and University by reducing the number of traffic lanes in both directions from two lanes to only one each way. The idea being that by doing so it would enable this heavily traveled thoroughfare to accommodate a bicycle lane and promote an image of Las Cruces as “a bike friendly community.” To this day, I’ve never seen a single bicycle traverse the street, and I doubt that any of our esteemed councilors have either. But ask any of the residents who live in the adjacent neighborhoods and use Solano in their daily commutes and they will tell you how traffic is more congested and harder to deal with than ever before.

(3)    Of course, we all remember the North Main Street road construction debacle that took more than double the projected time frame. This delay was said to be caused by the discovery of “unknown” utility lines buried beneath the roadway. How did this happen? Didn’t the city coordinate adequately enough with the state officials undertaking the project to inform them about these lines?

(4)     Then, how about the city declining to take the opportunity to purchase the old Las Cruces Country Club Golf Course and use the property to enhance the entire community’s quality of life. We could have established a major park capable of encompassing not only bike trails, but also walking and jogging paths, playgrounds and picnic areas, and maybe even a municipal zoo. Come on, even the town of Alamogordo has a zoo.  But Las Cruces, the state’s second largest city, would not even consider the possibility of one, even with a readily available property at hand. Instead, we now have a major eyesore that comes complete with law-suits and bankruptcy proceedings.

(5)    Speaking of legal suits, the newly constructed city plaza has a splash-pad fountain that, when it works, is merely a law-suit waiting to happen. What happens when any of the unsupervised children playing in this splash pad area slips, falls, and gets injured? Was that even considered? 

(6)    While the civic plaza is lovely and will surely be a benefit as a centrally located public gathering venue for special events, one should ask why our city officials neglected to install public restroom facilities on the site. Was a splash pad really deemed a greater necessity? Sounds like a case of nonsense taking precedence over common sense.

(7)    The downtown revitalization dream includes plans to convert the current one-way streets of Church and Water, which encircle both the plaza and downtown Main Street, to allow traffic in both directions. Now that that phase of the plan is ready to commence, it is already causing traffic havoc in the area, as evidenced by declining attendance at the weekly Farmer’s & Craft Market. Which, by the way, is still the number one downtown attraction! Will people be more willing to go downtown when the two-way streets inflict greater traffic congestion and there is less accessible free parking? Or is removal of free parking one of the city’s main objectives?

These seven examples merely scratches the surface of how our city officials either do not ask the right questions before taking action, or simply throw common sense out the window when they do take action. Because of this pattern of behavior, I plead for the city council to use a bit of common sense in their efforts to reinvigorate and revitalize the downtown area. I applaud the idea of trying to convert the area into an entertainment district as a good thing. In the area, we already have a good start. It is great that the City’s Museum Complex has been consolidated in downtown. COAS Book Store is a first class establishment in its genre. There are several really nice art galleries also already in place, and we have three excellent live performance venues with The Las Cruces Community Theatre, The Black Box Theatre, and The Rio Grande Theatre.

But we also have some major obstacles to overcome to bring a real entertainment district to fruition. Restaurants and nightclubs need liquor licenses to be profitable. How can we attract them to downtown if they are unable to get a liquor license because the location is too close (300 feet or less) to a church or a school? On Main Street, between Picacho and Amador, there are no less than a half-dozen store-front churches in place. Will the building owners give up the regular rents received from these organizations based on the promises of city officials that, someday, downtown is going to be revitalized as an entertainment district?

But these are the very same city officials that have recently said they are planning on following the model of Detroit, Michigan’s downtown revitalization program. Why study what’s happening in Detroit when there are several other cities that have accomplished the task that are much closer and have more in common with Las Cruces. Albuquerque has done much to revitalize its downtown, and so has Denver. An even better place to use as a model is Fort Collins, Colorado; and it has many similarities to Las Cruces, too. Not only is it home to a state university like us, but has a similar population size. Making trips back and forth to Detroit sounds more like an excuse for taxpayer funded junkets for a city councilor or two, in my opinion.

But what has me most concerned of all is the appalling potential takeover of the Rio Grande Theatre by the city. That is correct, it is a takeover. The city plans to usurp control of the theatre from the Dona Ana Arts Council, taking over the high quality of its operations, and hand the venue’s reins over to one of its own departments, the Convention and Visitors Bureau. But remember, this city department is “so in- tune” with what is going on that its own personnel did not even know that the edifice in which they work had been Okayed to have a mural painted on it by the building’s owner. And when they discovered the finished mural, the CVB attempted to cry foul.

Moreover, has the CVB demonstrated it even has the business acumen to effectively promote the city’s convention center enough for it to at break even, much less show a profit? Live performance theatres, like all entertainment venues, are open during nights and weekends for the benefit of their patrons. Is the CVB going work nights and weekends? Is the city planning on that outcome?

The Dona Ana Arts Council, on the other hand, has shown that it has what it takes to effectively run the Rio Grande Theatre. It has brought major national and international headline artists to our city; acts such as Judy Collins, A.J. Croce, Karla Bonoff, and the Missoula Children’s Theatre Group, as well as many celebrated state and local figures like Robert Mirabal, the internationally renowned Taos Pueblo performer, and local favorite, Irene Oliver Lewis, with her hilarious dichos de mi madre, and of our own local Tony Award winning stage director and producer, Mark Medoff.

What the city is attempting to do really looks like an old fashioned land grab. After the Arts Council has done all the fundraising and hard work to bring the historic Rio Grande Theatre building out of the ruins, getting it operating regularly with constant great programs, and running successfully, the city council is maneuvering to take over the building, its operation, and claim credit for its success. Really!

But unless the city council learns to include MORE COMMON SENSE in its planning and decision making processes, the future fate of the Rio Grande Theatre, and the reality of a thriving downtown entertainment district, will result in being only a small fraction of what the true potential could be.

Transcript of Address to the Las Cruces City Council on March 20, 2017

Regarding Downtown Revitalization & Using Common Sense