New Mexico Planning Awards

Interesting to know what good work is being awarded around NM.

Citizen planner award goes to NM Senator Cisco McSorley for his part in protecting the localized impact fee provision in the Planned Growth Strategy. Mostly, this goes back to recognizing and respecting local decision-making.

Student award goes to a group project from our own UNM-CRP program, a paper on AMAFCA that explores how to protect and enhance our ditches as cultural and community amenities. Go lobos!

Economic development award goes to a planning effort out of Santa Fe that looked at design and capitalizing on the unique assets within the community on which to base future efforts of revitalization and economic activity.

Collaborative and innovation award goes to Taos County Comprehensive Plan for its water and natural resource section, which looked to partnerships among local govts, national forest, and LANL to implement growth controls through linking land-use to water availability.

Best plan award goes to Hobbes for its Comprehensive Development and Community Plan. The mayor said Hobbes developed out of need, not desire, when oil/gas companies had to provide for its workers. The plan attempts to redefine itself as a community, as a city, "a community of desire, not community of need." The plan focuses on implementable steps with clearly-defined responsibility by each agency.