New Mexico State Senator Dede Feldman's Blog

River Field Trip: Stories of Drought, Competing Uses, and the Never-ending Battle against Silt

May 28 - Every two years New Mexico Tech. organizes a Field Conference for legislators, agency staffers and other policy makers on a topic like hard mock mining, oil and gas exploration or water use. As arcane and technical as these topics sound, I've come to look forward to these outdoor, moveable feasts of knowledge more than almost anything else in public service (although throwing out the first pitch at the North Valley Little League is a tough one to beat, even if I did have to practice).

The two-day conferences are for non-scientists like me who have to help decide, for example, how to balance the uses of water in the Middle Rio Grande between agriculture, drinking water, endangered species, delivery of water to Texas as per our contract obligations, and municipal development. The days went like this: after a hearty breakfast in Socorro, we travel by bus to various stops along the middle-reach of the Rio Grande where geologists, scientists, water officials, farmers, biologists and others each give their five-minute pitch on what's happening. No long speeches. Sometimes great maps and other visual aids that blow away in the wind. Questions and answers. Boat rides. Stops along the bank. One-on-one discussions among river managers, camaraderie on the bus.

This year's keynote was given by naturalist and historian, Bill DeBuys, one of my all-time New Mexico heroes. The author of River of Traps, Enchantment and Exploitation (a History of the Sangre de Cristos) and now The Walk (see below), Bill made us think about whether the river's current troubles result from over engineering since the 1930s, and whether the natural ebb and flow might not have been better for bosque and fish. He, like many others, worries about global warming and drought. We've just left one of the wettest twenty-year periods in New Mexico, he says, and we're headed for prolonged drought. One casualty may be rainbow trout-which probably won't exist in these waters by the end of this century, disappearing like scores of other fish species.

Another may be the river itself. With demands for agriculture, downstream deliveries and swimming pools taking precedence in other Southwestern states, rivers through cities have been replaced by pipelines and dry ditches. Just look for the river Phoenix or Tuscon. There's nothing there. That could be us in seventy years, unless we put on our thinking caps and collaborate. That's what this event was all about.

One of my buddies on this trip, and in the NM Senate, is Sen. Carlos Cisneros, from Questa. ( See photo) Together, we've pushed for alternative car fuels, solar energy and protection for aceqias, to name a few of our more successful causes. In 1998, Carlos and I asked the Attorney General for an opinion on whether "instream flow" constitutes beneficial use of water in New Mexico. In other words, is there any intrinsic, legal value to the river just continuing to flow to provide for the riparian environment, recreation and uses other than compact delivery, irrigation, etc. The opinion, out of now - Rep. Tom Udall's shop, was yes, a verdict we'd hoped for but one that didn't make us especially popular with anti-environmentalists and many other users.

Caption- Up in the Air Junior Birdmen :Sen. Dede Feldman and Sen. Carlos Cisneros, all suited up, tour the upper part of Elephant Butte Reservoir and the channel that allows the Rio Grande to flow into it, despite a never ending battle against silt. The Bureau of Reclamation-along with their Cajun allies who man the amphibian dredging equipment as well as a fleet of air boats that usually ply the bayous-continually clear the channel as it dries, silts up, and floods each season.

Summer Reading Recommendations from the Senator
My ideal summer day is to get up early, take a hike in a beautiful setting, then, with a feeling that I've accomplished something, come home and read for a few hours, with a cool drink at my side. Oh come on, I can dream, can't I? Two of the books that I'm currently reading are about New Mexico themes. They are purchases I made after meeting the authors at book signings, and falling in love, so to speak. Yellowcake is a novel by Ann Cummings about two families, one Navajo and one Anglo, who worked in the uranium mines and mills in the Shiprock area, when there was little protection against what we now know was deadly. Another is The Walk, by Bill DeBuys, which is about familiar natural landscapes and how they interact with one's personal history. His own walk on land that he has irrigated for 25 years near Las Trampas is the case in point.

More On Health Care Reform

I've had a lot of response to my last blog entry on health care reform, which I also sent directly to many of my constituents. Since the responses were sent directly to me, you didn't see them, so I thought I'd share a sampling with you here. What do you think? Sen. Dede Feldman

Constituents write:

"Some observations on Health Care Reform.
1)You cannot approach it as "let's somehow insure those not covered now." Health Care needs reform.
2)The biggest problems with Health Care is Insurance. a) The health care INDUSTRY is a major portion of the cost of health care, paying MBA's to sit on top of health care is as disastrous as electing an MBA President (ooops, I made a funny, Bush was an MBA. Case made!). b) Insurance keeps health care from being subject to Supply and Demand. That is, in the rush to avoid Socialist Medicine, the INDUSTRY has figured out a way to subvert Capitalistic controls too. Health Care costs MUST be regulated, and rolled back from current rates"….
--- DS, semi retired doctor in the North Valley

"I agree with you that there are a lot of problems in our whole health care system. I had such high hopes years ago when Hillary Clinton was working with that committee to recommend some common sense approach to the whole health care system, and I hoped that they would come up with a much simpler way to do things. I was terribly disappointed when in the end they recommended more and more government bureaucracy, which is just what we don't need more of.

I have spent about 25 years doing extensive research for my own survival in the natural health field, and I feel strongly that the number one issue in health care is prevention. It is a longer term project, but working to teach people how to eat and live to preserve good health has far greater returns in the long run than repairing them with high tech expensive methods after their health crashes because of a life of inattention to their own well being.

One of the most important political issues to me is in creating and maintaining freedom in medical treatment for both MDs, and also various kinds of natural health practitioners, who use natural health techniques as opposed to allopathic medicine to both treat illness and sustain good health. Some 12 or so states have a freedom of medical treatment act which helps to create less persecution from the establishment on natural health practitioners. I have only lived here for 16 months now, and have not had time to learn how things are here in NM with regard to this issue. I want to have the freedom to choose my own health care treatments, and I usually will choose some alternative treatment as opposed to the AMA way. Do you know if we have some kind of a freedom of medical treatment act in NM?"….
--- DM, retired electrical engineer in the North Valley

"I think universal health care is one of the 2 or 3 most pressing needs people and businesses have in this country. Businesses need it, in a way that they don't fund it directly, to stay competitive with the rest of the developed world.

So please, please, please get the insurance companies out of it. Keep them from getting any of that presently uninsured group. Don't let New Mexico make the monumental mistake that Massachusetts and California have made by giving the insurance companies a monumental gift.

I myself am a beneficiary of "socialized medicine"--I get the excellent, patient-sensitive care that the VA gives to the limited number of veterans who are allowed in. Everybody ought to get that, without the big financial and bureaucratic overhead that insurance adds to health cost."
--- RB in the North Valley

---

Health Care Reform, Intern Wanted,The Sawmill is Gone

Now that the dust has really settled on the 2007 legislative session….  It’s back to the neighborhood, my usual day job as a PR consultant  (anyone need any help in this regard?) and the prospect of an intense interim session focused on health care, ethics, and campaign finance reform (that’s right--it just won’t go away).

Health Care Reform

The Health and Human Services Committee, which I will chair, will be pouring over various proposals for universal health coverage, and I’ve spent the past several weeks attending meetings about this, including the NM First Town Hall on Health Care and the Health Care Coverage Task force, which has been meeting since last summer.  The Task Force is getting the results of the independent study of three different models for health care coverage on May 16^th at CNM’s Workforce Development Center near the corner of I-25 and Alameda.  The final results will be presented at the state Capitol on June 21. Come if you can. There’s always a public comment period.

The results of the study will show the costs of covering the uninsured in New Mexico (over 400, 000 of ‘em) through various mechanisms ranging from giving them vouchers and requiring them to buy their own insurance on the open market to expanding state programs to include new groups of uninsured, to creating a large risk pool with a single benefit package and sliding scale premiums.

In spite of a front page article in the Journal today (5/7/07) entitled  “Slow Progress on Statewide Health Care” I feel much more hopeful about the prospect s of reform than I have in a long time.  And, in dealing with such a complex subject, it’s important to keep the faith that things can get better.  Inaction has its costs, too—which the study will estimate.  Recently, at the NM First Town Hall and elsewhere, we’ve been given plenty of reasons to leave things alone—i.e. increasing the number of people in New Mexico with insurance will exacerbate the shortage of health care providers in rural areas, coverage for everyone will mean that some people will have to pay more, and…. there’s no guarantee that costs will decrease. 

Yep…. That’s all possible… but not a reason to do nothing.  Health care premiums are eating up a larger and larger share of middle class income (not to mention the disproportionately large share low-income workers pay), heath care clinics and emergency rooms are strained to the max, and health care disparities between ethnic and income groups are increasing.  That’s why we need comprehensive reform.   And this is our window of opportunity.

"Health care premiums are eating up a larger and larger share of middle class income ..., heath care clinics and emergency rooms are strained to the max, and health care disparities between ethnic and income groups are increasing.  That’s why we need comprehensive reform.  And this is our window of opportunity."

The Health and Human Services Committee, which I chair this year, will be dealing with all this through the summer and fall, so stay tuned.  You can get the schedule for this and other interim legislative committees at www.legis.state.nm.us, once we get rolling – sometime in June.

Meanwhile, if you want good snapshot of NM’s health situation and its prospects for reform, go to the New Mexico First web site at www.nmfirst.org. Then click on the box about the recent town hall,  “Strengthening New Mexico Health Care.” There’s a button called “report,” which will allows you to read and print out the issue guide.  It’s the clearest, shortest, most objective report I’ve seen on the health care situation here in a while.

Intern Wanted

Here’s a plea from an unstaffed, volunteer legislator who takes her responsibility to deal with the substantive issues (like health care reform, campaign finance, the environment) seriously.  I need help to do what I do.  Sometimes it’s volunteers to help me file, stuff envelopes  (you wouldn’t believe the information I have to deal with—it can be daunting), or answer the phone when constituents call.  For the past two years I’ve had great interns from the NMSU School of Social Work, but this year, I’m coming up empty.  So, if any of you know of someone who’s not afraid of politics, can deal with computers and data bases, likes to solve problems for people and wants to learn from the likes of me—please send em my way.  E-mail me at dedefeld@comcast.net or call 242-1997.

The Sawmill is Gone…. Long Live the Sawmill Land Trust

 

Talk about the dust settling.  Last week the old Ponderosa Products Plant was demolished to make way for a mixed-use retail/residential development spearheaded by the Sawmill Land Trust.  These guys are my heroes. Especially Max Ramirez, an old style neighborhood leader who just didn’t give up when faced with serious air pollution, groundwater contamination, and a deteriorating neighborhood all around him and his family. Long before the words “environmental  justice” became politically correct, he was holding enchilada dinners and, along with other neighbors like present City Councilor Debbie O’Malley, and current director Connie Chavez, organizing the Sawmill Advisory Council.  The fruits of his labors are the energy-efficient, stylish and affordable housing, lofts and workspaces, now dotting the landscape near I 40 and Rio Grande.   Viva the Sawmill Land Trust. (more coverage of the demolition and the day honoring Max Ramirez at http://prognewmexico.typepad.com/nmleftnright/2007/05/a_sawmill_commu.html .)