SOURCE: Santa Fe County
Area 1B consists of about 1,100 acres of land mostly governed by Santa Fe County, including the Coyote Ridge subdivision. Homewise owns a little more than 200 acres of that land, in some instances under a different business name. The company’s executive director says it one day intends to build housing there. The State of New Mexico owns about 120 acres and a company called Sunspear owns about 70 acres.
News, May 3: “Cluster-Snuck”
Best-laid plots?
Apparently, Area 1B’s residents’ legitimate and legal effort to join the Agua Fria Traditional Historic Community has inadvertently upset some secret plans the city has with Homewise.
To be clear, as was stated repeatedly throughout the May 1 meeting by Area 1B residents, no one is advocating for “one unit per acre” as [Chief Executive Officer Mike] Loftin is quoted. And his insinuation that there is something nefarious about Commissioner Hansen being responsive to her constituents is absurd. Commissioner [Anna] Hansen is our elected representative.
The county released the communications Mr. Loftin demanded expediently. We have requested records of communications between The city, Mayor [Alan] Webber, certain city councilors, city Land Use and Homewise and its shell LLC companies regarding Area 1B—and have heard nothing.
We sincerely hope the Santa Fe Reporter and all local media will continue to investigate this story.
Sid Monroe, Area 1B Resident
Quad-can’t
Years ago the city tried to sell the Northwest Quadrant, and just recently it tried to develop it, and both times because of the broken terrain it was going to be too expensive to develop. The land that Homewise owns in Area 1B has the same terrain, plus it is landlocked.
The Agua Fria Village Association asked Homewise if they could be our fiscal agent for an affordable housing project and they declined. Little did we know the mayor was conspiring with them to do a development in secret.
Millennials like the Reporter, but the image portrayed by the paper of the affordable housing program since 2016 is false. They are being taken advantage of, giving testimonials of the AH need, then the city delivers 185 units out of 6,126 since 2019. All anyone ever sees is a smiling mayor and nothing gets done for the people.
William Mee, Agua Fría
