The Taos News from Taos, New Mexico • Page 4

A4 THE ADS ftfcWS tnurSdfly, JufiP 1881 fa vory contra Cuts hit bone, not fat Cutbacks in federal funds to local governments aren't going to put the fatcats out of jobs. Instead, the cutbacks will limit the services rendered to citizens, fall to meet the basic needs of poor people, and eliminate the jobs of the lowest people on the employment ladder. For example: At the Taos County Courthouse, at least three people have been laid off effective next week. They are a bookkeeper In the sheriff's office and two custodians at the new juvenile detention facility. Others may follow.

Still on the payroll, so far as we can tell, are the well-paid assistant county manager, the new attorney representing only the county and a investigator for the sheriff's office. None of the above, in our considered opinion, were necessary or particularly useful additions to the county payroll. (Some citizens point, also, to a new employee hired to supervise the construction of county recreation facilities as a waste of county money. However, he is not paid out of the county general fund; the feds wrote in a salary with the project.) Two glaring problems have arisen In the light of the layoffs this week: -Deputies at the Sheriff's Office have leveled charges of malfeasance at that office, and the fired bookkeeper has filed an employment grievance appeal. state office of Juvenile Justice Planning it may ask the return of a $250,000 grant used to build the juvenile detention facility if the county can't run It.

The facility housed Juveniles during its inaugural six months of operation. It now is even more important; the new juvenile code took effect last week, with some strict new rules on juvenile Incarceration. Whether the bookkeeper's job falls under the protection of the county's personnel code is a matter for that board to decide. Nevertheless, the charges that have been raised merit a hearing by some qualified and Independent entity other than the personnel board. Among the charges leveled at the sheriff's office: Some employees take patrol cars for personal uses; prisoners get Sunday joy rides; and the office retains a Investigator while deputies are laid off.

(Two of them were laid off earlier this month as a reduction In force.) The citizens of Taos County deserve services, not a system that merely keeps favored county employees on the government gravy train. The charges against the sheriff's office demand investigation. The juvenile facility must be funded. The county can neither afford to give back the $260,000 nor allow juveniles to be housed with adult offenders. Taos County citizens will be watching their elected commissioners Monday (June 29) when they sit down to ink the final budget.

Those commissioners have one more chance to demonstrate that they give more than pre-election lip-service to the idea that the public's money should be spent for the public's benefit. Somehow we doubt that will happen. gobbledygook Each academic discipline and each branch of the government has its own convoluted form of communicating. When you combine the discipline of physics, and the weapons research bureaucracy, you come out with something like this release from Los Alamos National Laboratory. Copied from a notice in a laboratory housing unit, it seems The Taos News (USPS 615-840) Succesor de El Crepusculo, fundado en 183Jf por el padre Antonio Jose Martinez Robin McKlnney, Publisher Keith Green, General Manager Billic Blair, Editor John Garcia, Advertising Manager Staff: Phil Bateman.

reporter; Patrick Burns, sales representative; Frieda Archuleta, classified; Barbara Coca, bookkeeping and circulation; Steve Winston, reporter; Nancy Startler, composing supervisor. eVe 7 rsda y- Second 'ass postage paid at the Post Office in Taos, N.M., and additional mailing office, Albuquerque vX Published by El Crepusculo, 11 Guadalupe Plara, Taos, New Mexico. Changes of address may be mailed to P.O. Box Taos, N.M. 87571.

All departments, telephone: (505) 758-2241 to be explaining that the stove and furnace don't work well, and will be fixed when money is found: "Controls on the heating judged unreliable with respect to their functions in limiting temperature and pressure. "Cooking in need of replacement because of unreliability of the controls and because of an undesirable potential for gas leakage, "The boiler controls have been replaced; the possibility for off- normal operating conditions and concurrent explosion hazards has been reduced. "Means to fund stove replacement are being Perhaps scientists find this notice more comforting than a bald notice saying: "CAREFUL-THE FURNACE MAY EXPLODE. THE GAS MAY LEAK." your turn Esperanzafor battered wives Members of the Taos Battered Women's Project submitted this cartoon as a "Your turn" column. Since the project was organized in 1977, it has provided "safe homes," a place to stay, for battered wives and children and free transportation to Esperanza, Santa Fe's home for battered family members.

The project is supported by benefits and other fund-raising projects and is otherwise voluntary. Anyone who wants to talk with someone about a problem, or wants help or shelter from a battering spouse, may call 7589888. THAT NY CHOOSE TO WHX IS it HARD YPUK -h forum A copy o' the fallowing tetter, addftntetf to Chfte Mondrngon, Kit Carson electric Cooperative secretary, was lent to The TAOS News for publication, I'm writing you direct as 1 know you have been par- tlcularly interested and cerned with the thoughts and opinions of we members of the Kit darson Cooperative Association. First of all 1 wish to congratulate the board and employees of the Kit Carson Co-op In Taos. 1 feel we have had less outages, better service, and certainly more 'Enchantment'a waste of money business understanding of how to operate an electric utility than ever In the past leveral years, This compliment however does not mean that I think this cooperative Is 100 percent perfect, and I'm still convinced that private enterprise could run this utility much more efficiently than a government cooperative ever could.

My immediate concern now is not the co-op, but your magazine (Enchantment) which most of us members consider an unnecessary waste of money, Why do we need a newspaper to run a co-op or to sell electricity? Our Taos News Is CofC concerned? Editor: it's obvious that none of the members of the Taos Chamber of Commerce lives along the Rio Hondo. It's also quite obvious that none of its membership is dependent on the water of the Rio Hondo for drinking or other domestic purposes. Otherwise, I doubt that they would be so heartless and so careless about condemning those who are, to a stream polluted by sewage. The main issue with the people of the Rio Hondo area has not ever been 30,000 gallons sewage versus 90,000 gallons, not 5,000 skiers versus 10,000 skiers. The main Issue Is and always has been, why dump sewage In our water! This issue continues to get clouded by committees, proposals, public meetings and master plans.

Why spend more money, regardless of Its source, on a system that still discharges into the water? Surely with today's technology, there must be alternative methods of dealing with this sewage problem. If the Taos Chamber of Commerce Is truly concerned about Taos and Its people, they would set finding an alternative method of sewage disposal for the Ski Valley as their goal. DOROTEA MARTINEZ Taos can be the necetsary sounding board for all compulsory publication of notices, rates, meeting dates, etc, It is obvious that Mr. Paul Wesslund and John Whitcomb, not to mention Carl M. Turner, afraid the new budget cuts might put them out of a job, and so it might; but for them to try to scare the general populous that we are heading for the poor house; and that people will move out of rural areas because of budget cutting is completely ridiculous.

Contrarily people throughout the United States are moving to rural areas as fast and whenever they can. Mr. Whltcomb's and Mr. Wesslund's attacks on President Reagan -and the attempt by these editors to ridicule the balancing of our country's budget simply says to me; we are liberal Democrats, we believe in the Big Give Away; appropriate more and spend more, and who cares how high our electric rates go. We certainly don't need the wasted expense of an eight page monthly biased newspaper, to criticize our President or an administration that's trying to cut spending, balance budgets, and actually get back to the basics that made our country successful and great in the first place.

We are a cooperative, and you do not have the right to take political stands. CHARLES B. BROOKS Taos Editor: The Taos News does not need funnies; we have the Arts page each week. Being part Irish, I do love my humor and jokes. So each week I rush to read the Arts page for my jollies.

The June 18 issue had me roaring with wit and glee! Now I am sure the contents of this page reflects the tastes of the publisher, and I am reminded of a current diet- drink commercial which I parody, "You don't have any taste Robin dear!" Of course what do I know, I am only an artist! If our sole knowledge of the local art flavor came only from The Taos News, we might have to agree with Helen Blumenschein, who was quoted in the LA Times not long ago, "There is not one artist in Taos today that is worth 10 cent- Arts page offers weekly funnies If you live in Taos, it necessarily follows that you have culture. If you don't believe that, just ask and look at our local school board! It's much like a Texan who goes into a gallery and says "I'm h'ar to buy culture!" So keep giving us local artists our "cultured" jollies and funnies each week, and keep driving those serious art collectors who support the art industry to Scottsdale, Carmel and other art centers, for we in Taos are in the golden age of taste. Now was that taste in Art in our mouths or was in it our feet? R. WM. COUCH Taos Mesa Spelling relief Editor: I hope the following, "Lady Looking Back," will bring joy and relief to some of your readers When I was young and mother to be, I met a woman smarter than me, Who spent her days learning how to be free.

Thus we climbed through the years past forty three, And I raised myself a family. But all she has is a lousy degree. Just how stupid can a woman be? RONALD F. OEST Valdez Taos 'future lies in agriculture Editor: A number of items in this week's Taos News caught my Kathy McElmury, In "Your turn" pointed out the choices we are soon going to have to make In Taos County, not to mention the rest of rural America. She told us that arable (farming) land is being paved over, built upon, or otherwise rendered useless at a rate which assures disaster for New Mexico's and the U.S.'s food producing potential in 20 years, if not sooner.

This loss of arable land not only contributes to starvation and the loss of a tax base, but it also causes ecological collapse in the photosyntheslaing capability of our own atmosphere. Parking lots cannot store carbon; they cannot release oxygen. They merely promote the waste that Js now killing Some people in Taos recognize these contradictions and want to do something about them. Those who oppose a bypass which would needlessly destroy arable land with water rights, for example. The choice of which bypass seems absolutely clear.

If money is the problem, make it a toll road for those passing through. The toll of Taos citizens will be much higher otherwise, The reasons for such a choice should be discussed in the context of Taos County's survival as a self-sufficient, independent economic entity. Any other reasoning is outmoded and selfish. Cleofis Vigil's letter brings the point home. Here is a man who has tried to live a dignified life as a rancher in northern New Mexico with all the cards in the deck stacked against him and other small farmers.

His complaint against the cuts are Appeals TSVplan copy of tile following letter, addreiied to ww Th( Our group, American Citizens Together, wishes T8tts my is one water standards. How long is contaminating precious better business profits To allow for expansion without highest priority to adequate waste treatment is to betray toe 1D that there may be a fit world tor i not even a sentimental is merely iirltn -I administration's budget for Social Security justified. Why is it that those who work the hardest are the least provided? Why is it that here in Taos hard work doesn't count anymore; only money and connections? No wonder kids in Taos become is their future? Finally, I asked myself: in the face of these realities, what does Sen. Schmitt say about the future of Taos and its people? He says the future lies in tourists, mining and industry. Of course he does.

Schmitt's friends are precisely those out-of-staters who now run New Mexico. The oil interest with addresses out of state, the food producers of multi-nationals with addresses out of state, the developers gobbling up land In Taos county with addresses out of state. Even the radio, TV ana newspaper owners with addresses out of state, This Is Schmitt's real constituency. No wonder he has ignored the obvious answer to Taos County's economic problems. His friends want a quick profit from our resources, holding up the prospect of quiPk cash to our unemployed.

And your future? The waste, the tailings, the pollution, the poison from their greed. Tne future of Taos lies in the development of agriculture. mean intense cooperative development of small-scale organic farming methods and large-scale processing and distribution. The possibilities are endless. Beginning with low-interest loans we could develop seed banks, machinery and fuel cooperatives, greenhouse horticulture, vocaUonal-Ag training in appropriate technology and solar applications to horticulture, management itratoing, tooA pnaeesstag pJtote, distribution ae4 retail.