My Values- HOUSING IS THE KEY!
Los Alamos County government should be fiscally conservative, reflecting the choices and standards reflected by most of the community.
Los Alamos local government must overcomes the historical limitations that have prevented a full range of housing and business options.
OUR BUSINESSES SERVE OUR COMMUNITY
County government must better plan, encourage, and facilitate local business development.
Los Alamos needs and wants local retail, restaurant, entertainment, medical, and consumer service businesses. These businesses serve community residents. We should not have to travel to distant communities for these services. A key role of county government is to facilitate the development of these businesses, not to be a barrier to their success!
We have a rich supply of technical talent and should provide circumstances that encourage spin-off technology development businesses.
HOUSING IS THE KEY!
Los Alamos needs more and more varied housing.
– As LANL grows, new staff need places to live. Nine thousand lab employees (plus many more contractors and local business staff) commute long hours to work here, because they cannot find housing in the county. They would love to live and shop locally.
– Workers are needed to staff local businesses. Los Alamos is a company town, and the lab is a magnificent and generous monolith in our community, but for our city to thrive we need to cultivate a community of more: more interests, more backgrounds, more entrepreneurs, than the Lab and our expensive housing market can currently provide. Any fledgling businesses will wither without motivated staff.
We can only be attractive to them by letting them invest in our community by growing families and businesses here with us
– Many retirees love Los Alamos, and will stay here, but need age-appropriate housing: cottages with small yards, condos, assisted care centers, etc.
These problems are opportunities to enrich and invigorate our community, if housing development is handled well.
HOW DO WE DO IT?
Los Alamos is surrounded by thousands of acres of undeveloped federal land, which can be transferred to the County. This land can be developed into genuinely affordable housing for our workers for the laboratory, local businesses, and spinoff businesses. These new residents will invigorate our business community.
We can do this without materially affecting the beautiful mountain environment around us. While some of these lands may be currently used for low density recreation, these recreational needs can be moved to other nearby locations, which are still plentiful.
COUNTY GOVERNMENT SERVES THE CITIZENS
Los Alamos County government is to serve the citizens, not rule over them. The County Council represents the citizens to the government and must manage it, setting the agendas, and setting county policies. We must maintain transparency, balance, and tolerance in a community of variety and diversity. County government must enable our future while respecting the range of interests and perspectives of residents, preserving safety and peace, and encouraging neighborhood quality, and beauty.
Los Alamos County government must focus on reliable and economic delivery of utilities and services, including affordable gas, electricity, and robust and modern cell and internet services.
THE ENVIRONMENT
Caring for the environment must be focused on things that make a genuine difference, and must be balanced with cost. I agree with Counselor David Reagor that the recent LARES report recommendations appear to be mostly virtue signaling by wealthy idealogues at the expense of regular folks. If there were evidence that sacrificing natural gas energy production in residential Los Alamos had any impact on overall carbon production IN COMPARISON WITH COUNTY NON-RESIDENTIAL USAGE, I would be more sympathetic.
Similarly, county residents must not be punished with disproportionate increases in water rates for raising families, for beautifying their homes with gardens, growing vegetable gardens, and fruit trees, which all use more water. Industrial and farm water usage vastly outstrip our residential usage. Regulate things that make a difference! We celebrate diversity in how we love nature, too!
Los Alamos is situated in a beautiful recreational environment. County government should provide great local parks and services.
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Paid for by Stradling4Council, Ken Shelley, Treasurer
Gary Stradling for County Council 