In its 19 May meeting, City Council rejected a citizens’ petition to withdraw the new zoning ordinance in favor of a referendum to be voted on in the fall. Councilors were abusive or arrogant in their comments about the petitioners. Noah Raess’s “Petition to stop new zoning ordinance fails,” The Bulletin (20 May 2025), reported:
After nearly an hour of divided public comment, City councilor Joanna [sic] Bencomo spoke saying that the petitioners were spreading “misinformation” about the integrity of the process and “exploited peoples [sic] worst fears about their neighbors” causing at least one person to leave the meeting angrily. Bencomo finished by saying that if you are against “diverse housing going up in good neighborhoods and with good parks, then I would ask you to reflect on where your segregationist tendencies come from.”
Raess did not report who or what caused an angry person to leave the meeting angrily. He also did not report to whom Johana Bencomo addressed her remark. Bencomo accused petition supporters of misrepresenting, lying, or fear-mongering about the city’s plan “Realize Las Cruces”—accusations later repeated by Becky Corran and Yvonne Flores. Worse, Bencomo insinuated that the supporters were racists because of their “segregationist tendencies.” Corran and Flores agreed, saying that supporters do not want to be close to people different from themselves. Bencomo’s, Corran’s, and Flores’s personal attacks are at odds with the rules of behavior posted for the public at City Hall meetings; apparently, they do not think themselves bound to observe them.
When I viewed the televised meeting, I knew next to nothing about the plan. I had signed the petition only because I believe that a plan for city-wide zoning changes leading to major social and lifestyle changes is an issue which should be decided by the entire electorate. Whatever else might be said about the plan or the petition supporters, they wanted only a vote by city residents.
Council had approved the plan “Realize Las Cruces” in February, and many citizens spoke favorably about it in Monday’s meeting. Strictly speaking, their remarks were irrelevant. For the issue before Council was whether to accept the petition and place the issue before Las Cruces citizens in a referendum. Petition supporters argued that they had collected far more than the requisite number of signatures but that the city’s mishandling of the petition process, one not used for 10 years, and picayune technicalities led to the rejection of nearly 2000 signatures. Both City Clerk Christine Rivera and City Attorney Brad Douglas assured Council that the validation or disqualification of petition signatures was entirely aboveboard.
From the exchanges, I could not tell who was right, who was wrong, or whether each side was a little of both. Council members offered testimonials to the extensive time and effort to develop the plan and to the expertise of Ms. Rivera, recently voted the outstanding City Clerk in New Mexico. Yet the process involved only those interested in the planning process, who might not have represented the perspectives or interests of most citizens. And patrons of local media and my blog know that Rivera was the city official whose violations of the Inspection of Public Records Act were so egregious that the city settled my legal complaint against her and the city at a top-dollar cost of about $150,000. If her transgressions reflected compliance with orders from higher authority, she might have received similar orders affecting the inspection of signatures to reach the desired outcome, rejection of the petition. Councilors’ praise of this clerk was of the lady-doth-protest-too-much-methinks variety.
What most disturbed me was the councilors’ smearing petition supporters. I do not know whether the councilors’ charges of misrepresentation, lying, or fear-mongering are true or false. I do not dismiss those possibilities out of hand, but I do allow that different interpretations of the plan and brochures might be involved instead. It hardly matters whether anyone can adjudicate the charges. I doubt their validity because public officials resorted to smearing private citizens by insinuating that people who oppose mixed high-/low- income residential housing are racist. Their attacks suggest animosity to dissenters and a defensiveness based on fear about a weak position, namely, that a referendum might lead to an overwhelming rejection of their plan.
Yet I heard no comment suggesting such prejudice. I heard concerns that zoning changes would disrupt neighborhoods by intrusive, small-scale businesses like cafes, grocery stores, and gas stations, and result in increased traffic. I heard concerns that these changes would adversely influence property values and unsettle established personal relations. In themselves, these reasons are not racist and do not imply racism. But councilors who pretend to be without prejudice probably heard that talk as reflecting racism. In the absence of evidence, their remarks to that effect disgrace not only those who uttered them, but also those who tolerated them. They offend citizens who expect their elected representatives to be respectful of citizens with whom they disagree and not to impugn motives.
Advocates of the plan spoke of affordable housing, diversity, and inclusion; and a different kind of neighborhood and community lifestyle. There is much, but not everything, to be said for the plan. Petition supporters represent those who do not want change or do not want its changes; they want to keep their present lifestyle. City planners everywhere else expect such differences and know that responses to proposed large-scale plans vary. In some cities, they are rejected; in others, they are accepted, but, even then, their implementation often has painful and persistent problems. Anyone who wants some insight into the problems might read about my hometown in Laura Meckler’s Dream Town: Shaker Heights and the Quest for Racial Equity. A rich and nearly all-white suburb in the 50s, it welcomed and encouraged integration. Yet, since then, it has struggled to overcome cultural differences, and economic and educational disparities to achieve its goal. There and elsewhere, these problems are difficult, and they are not abated or avoided by foisting change upon a population which is divided between those willing and those unwilling to accept it. This plan, with little public input on its final form, imposes a kind of DEI-inspired plan on all citizens.
In developing this plan, city staff operated in contempt of citizens. Its planning process, at least in this effort, was seriously flawed. Its city planners mistakenly assumed that the citizens participating in the planning process represented the general populace. They mistakenly assumed that those not participating would accept the results. They should have known that many citizens would wait for the final version of the plan, want a chance to consider it, and take the opportunity to address Council and urge it to accept, change, or reject the plan. One or two City Hall meetings and no District meetings were grossly insufficient for a plan of great impact, no matter how long and hard city planners and interested parties worked on it. Citizens who were uninformed about or uninterested in the process are now likely to resent and might obstruct a plan quickly adopted. Council’s rejection of the petition for a referendum might cause trouble.
In pushing this plan, Council members have also been contemptuous of citizens. They blame tens of thousands of citizens for not participating in the planning process. Council gave citizens little time to consider the final version because their fear of rejection was great. So they rushed to approve a plan which can easily be deferred at little or not cost until consensus is reached. If they wanted citizen participation, they could have had it with a referendum. But, no, for a selfish reason: they would be embarrassed if they discovered that a majority of citizens did not approve of the plan in which staff and they had invested so much time, effort, and ego to develop.
In addition to the councilors smearing petition supporters to discredit or silence them and manufacture the appearance of consensus, two councilors—Becki Graham more than Corran—pontificated about representative government. Graham claimed that Council members were elected to make decisions based on due diligence. She then commended herself for all the work which she had done and concluded by declaring this plan to be the work of representative democracy in action. Both councilors forgot two things about democratic processes: one, the First Amendment guarantee of the right to petition; and two, the provision in state and city law for referendums, which enable the enactment of law by a vote of the people—direct democracy.#
On a major issue like the redesign of the city and the reshaping of citizen lifestyles, the only way to get consensus (not to be confused with unanimity) is to get “the consent of the governed” by persuasion, not by political power plays to impose the plan on an unknown, but probably large, number of the unwilling. If they truly cared about public participation, Council members, if they were smart, civic-minded, and unselfish, could have rejected the petition, yet reconsidered their approval of the plan, and moved for a referendum. Instead, they doubled-down to avoid a democratic process adverse to its members’ sense of their righteousness and importance.
# NOTE: Democracy Docket (23 May) reports on Republican efforts in several states to hinder direct democracy. Lots of people otherwise regarded as Americans do not like democracy and do not respect those who do like it.
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