SFR chats with Jenny Parks, New Mexico State Director of TPL.
SFR: The Trust for Public Land manages projects all over the country; how many in New Mexico?
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JP:
We are a national land conservation organization, with 41 offices throughout the United States. From the Santa Fe office we do all of our work in Arizona, Utah and New Mexico. I am the new New Mexico state director focusing on all of our projects within the state. We help local communities with financing for conservation and have done everything from working with Bureau of Land Management on the Taos Valley Overlook Project to preserving the potreros behind the Santuario de Chimayó and working along the Santa Fe River. Federally we're working with the farm and ranch protection program and we do quite a bit with Forest Service, but all of it is to help preserve land and get it into public ownership and public development.
How did TPL become so large?
There's a real need. We are the only national conservation group that not only works with wilderness and natural areas but also with environments and parks for people. We're very interested in human habitat, so we do a lot of urban work, we do work in fringe communities at the edge of city and wilderness. We believe the human habitat is as important as the animal habitat and, especially as the growth in the West has skyrocketed, there's a great need for management and conservation and communities are recognizing that and trying to do something about it.
You have a direct approach of acquiring land rather than lobbying for its preservation.
We are not an advocacy organization and we work with every political party that's out there because we believe in the value of land conservation in and of itself. We don't carry our own agenda but really are driven by the agendas of the communities we work with and the agencies that we work with.
It's hard to figure out Santa Fe's agenda. We have sprawl, yet keep annexing land for large developments on the south side and resisting high-density and infill in the town center. Is there a better way for us to grow?
I think cities like Santa Fe really need to be thinking about how they're growing and where they're growing. In a city like Santa Fe that is a popular place to move to, we need to be having these conversations now. Growth is going to happen and I don't think it's something we can prevent. I think the kind of growth that's being contemplated on the Railyard, which is more of a dense, urban growth, is a better mechanism, but it's a balance just like everything else.
TPL has a major project right now that is shaping the future of Santa Fe.
Currently the Santa Fe Railyard Park and Plaza is happening. We've made a lot of progress, we've raised $6.4 million to date toward a budget of $10.5 million. Half of that is private and half is public. We plan to break ground in fall of 2006, but there's a lot going on between now and then. Our goal is to have it completed in the fall of 2007.
There's been some resistance to the park's proposed design and some feeling that it's not being created by locals who are sensitive to both the terrain and the community's needs.
We did have a design competition that was juried by citizens of Santa Fe; it was a very public process and there were some local architects and designers who entered the competition. They didn't win. We do have a local advisory committee that helps us with all aspects of the design-the goal is for it to be beautiful but very respectful in terms of native topography and landscape. We also are hoping to make it very sustainable from a water standpoint. The current plan proposes that two-thirds of the park's water needs will be provided by rain catchment.
TPL was instrumental in helping Santa Fe purchase the Railyard property. Since then we've had several false starts and management snafus. Have we been good stewards of that gift?
Ah, yes. I think the problem that people have is that they think nothing's happening, that it's taking too long, it's been too slow, the Railyard is an eyesore and it's never going to happen. We were asked in 2001 by the city to come back into the process in the role of helping to create the park because public/private partnerships have worked really well in other cities. These kinds of projects are really complicated, so my message to the public is that this park at least is happening, we are making progress, we're quite far along the way but we do need help, we still have $4 million to raise. I think there's some misconception that the city is building this park, but they're not. It will ultimately be a city park, maintained by the city with enhanced care by some sort of stewardship group.
Isn't your ability to build the park, in terms of infrastructure, dependent on the Railyard Community Corporation's ability to manage and develop the rest of the Railyard property?
Right. And we work closely with them because we do see our success as interdependent. However, if they get held up, we're still building the park. My hope is that they are working things out and that they'll go forward and what's really going to be sort of a new city center for Santa Fe will be completed as planned and be a great amenity for everyone.
You have an office in New Orleans, a place many people argue would have been better off if wetlands between the city and the gulf had been conserved.
We had an office in New Orleans. I have read recently that the wetlands which provide a natural buffer to the coastline had been destroyed and developed, but I don't really know anything about it and those theories may not be true-I can't say saving that land would have meant saving that city.
