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APPEAL Old Pecos Trail Scenic Corridor R3 Decision

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Please help protect the heritage of the Old Pecos Trail Scenic Corridor. On behalf of the many concerned citizens across the City of Santa Fe, we are raising money for an appeal to overturn the City of Santa Fe's decision to allow increased zoning at 2200 Old Pecos Trail at West Zia Road.

We urgently ask for your financial support to fund legal counsel that will represent the appeal to Santa Fe District Court.

For those who want further information on this community-at-large effort, Bruce Throne has provided the following reasons for and objectives of the appeal:

We are challenging the lawfulness of the January 21, 2023 decision by the Mayor and City Council of the City of Santa Fe (by a 6-3 vote) to approve the Application by Albuquerque developer Pierre Amestoy to rezone 9.59 acres of currently vacant land at 2200 Old Pecos Trail, located within the "Old Pecos Trail Scenic Corridor" (from Cordova Rd. to I-25) as designated in the City's 1999 General Plan, from its existing zoning density of R-1 (one dwelling unit per acre) to R-3 (three dwelling units per acre) in order to allow him to subdivide that property, which is bisected by the Foothills Arroyo, into 25 lots for twenty "market-rate"-priced homes and five "affordable"-rate homes, and to cover all costs for conducting that appeal to that Court and, if necessary, the New Mexico Court of Appeals.

It currently is estimated that the cost of completing this appeal of that Governing Body's rezoning decision will be approximately $50,000-$55,000.

Members of and organizations in the Santa Fe community that have contributed substantial time and energy to providing written public comments and sworn testimony to the City of Santa Fe in opposition to this rezoning request, believe they have established sufficient factual, procedural and other legal grounds in the City's record in this case for the Santa Fe District Court and New Mexico's appellate courts to overturn that decision by the City's Governing Body which they believe is not only contrary to applicable law, but also contrary to the interests of Santa Fe community-at-large and the unique visual character and "sense of place" that is important to the City's special character as the "City Different" and its long-term economic interests.

The primary objectives of this legal appeal will be to (i) overturn and negate the Governing Body's decision to approve the developer's rezoning request for 2200 Old Pecos Trail and thereby protect the Old Pecos TrailScenic Corridor for the community-at-large unless and until the City of Santa Fe first completes the "public participation process" to develop density and other development standards for that Corridor and codify them in the City's Land Use Code as "articulated" and promised in the City's 1999 General Plan and reiterated in City Resolution No. 2015-92 and (ii) thereby prevent that decision from establishing a City precedent supporting similar up-zoning requests by developers for other vacant land located within the Old Pecos Trail Scenic Corridor (including 4.8 acres of adjacent vacant land currently posted as "available" for sale) in the future that would further destroy the benefits of that Scenic Corridor to the Santa Fe community-at-large which was recognized as "iconic and irreplaceable" and in need of immediate protection in that 2015 City Resolution.

Another objective and potential benefit of this appeal would be to seek and obtain appellate court rulings that would have the effect of directing the City's Governing Body to change, going forward, several procedures used by the City's Planning Commission and the Governing Body in this rezoning case that the appellants will assert violate established constitutional principles of "procedural due process" and fairness to all community members and interests in such "quasi-judicial" City of Santa Fe land use proceedings.


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Organizer

Anne Campbell
Organizer
Santa Fe, NM

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