Your votes

We respectfully request the following to be made a part of the minutes on the below agenda items.

Tuesday night you will be voting, in name of a supposed economic development, to give a developer 1, 500,000 of taxpayer funds to pay for the infrastructure of an apartment complex behind Alamogordo fun center. The infrastructure includes water / sewer lines and other necessary related costs. The city of Alamogordo has previously invested millions of dollars in water / sewer infostructure for this area of town in the name of economic development. Recently the city of Alamogordo extended Scenic Dr to the bypass for a cost of more than $4,000,000 dollars in taxpayer funds. This was to provide access for the development of land on the other side of the railroad tracks. There is a substantial amount of land suitable for development in the exciting city of Alamogordo suitable for development. This land has adequate infrastructure of water / sewer. The city commission should pursue development of this land in lieu of paying for a developer’s water / sewer infrastructure on the other side of the railroad tracks.

NEGATIVE BENIFTS OF ABOVE ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT

Currently there is no economic benefit to the city of Alamogordo in this area. Millions of taxpayers have been spent for supposed economic development. For example, Pre Check offices are closed. The Fun Center is dismal failure, and the only benefit is to developers to build houses.

OTHER SUPPOSED ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT

You previously voted to except property taxes in a 144-unit complex named Patriot Apartments. This amounts to $1,131,000 in property taxes that will not be paid by an out of state developer.

ALAMOGORDO CHAMBER OF COMMERCE ETHICS CRISIS

There have been resignations of board member and the Vice President of the Chamber. It was reveled in an auto tape between executive directors that 2 prominent organizations, the Alamogordo Chamber of Commerce and Alamogordo Main Street that there were delinquent unpaid payroll taxes in excess of thousands of dollars, the audio included foul language. To hear the audio go to 2nd Life Media and click on the link. The chamber has been instrumental in support of land development schemes. For example, Patriot Apartments with $1,131,000 dollars exempt property taxes and other apartment development. Quoting the resigning Chamber Vice President “There has been no meaningful small business development “the Vice President also stated the chamber has lost its purpose.

HOUSING AND APARTMENT SHORTAGE. UNSUPORTIVE NARRATIVE TO PUMP TAXPAYER DOALLRS INTO PRIVATE DEVELOPMENT IN THE NAME OF ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT

We have constantly requested the number of active and inactive water meters as of Aug 31, 2025. These request has been to you and city staff. We received late last week unusable information to our request (no reflection on city staff). It appears that you are stonewalling this information because it will not support the claim of a house and apartment shortage. The reported vacancy rate in Alamogordo for housing and apartments is 15.54% or double the national rate of 7%. There are some 700+ houses currently for sale in Alamogordo.

46.5% WATER / SEWER REATE INCREASE

You passed a huge 46.5 % water / sewer rate increase in 2024 to paid for by city residents. In the study supporting the rate increase you have reported the number of active and inactive water meters. You passed a rate increase based on those numbers. The financial information you published, including the years 2024 and 2025, includes the number of inactive meters. The number of total meters in 2024 was 13,539 and 13,149 in 2025 down 390 meters. We can only conclude you are not making available August 31, 2025, number of active and inactive meters because this will not support your housing and apartment shortage narrative.

ALAMOGORDO SCHOOL SYSTEM AND OUR CHILDERN

Alamogordo high school students have a proficiency rate of 14% in math and 33% in reading. When you voted to exempt Patriot Apartments of paying property taxes in the amount of $1,131,000 dollars you took tax dollars that would have gone to support our school system and our children’s education. The question you need to ask yourself is how do you think you can promote economic development and jobs with these test scores. Also, if you were coming to Alamogordo would you want to put your children in a school with these test scores?

We request you to take Tuesday night’s vote concerning land development as economic development, to a public vote and let the public have the decision in their child’s education.

Respectfully

M.E Watley and Others