Christmas may be over, but Torrance County is hoping there is a late present in the form of a big, fat, cash-stuffed envelope courtesy of Rep. Melanie Stansbury.
Stansbury (D-NM) has said that she has $22 million to spend on 11 “shovel-ready” projects within her district and the county commission has several times bandied about potential endeavors that it should submit.
During its meeting Jan. 10, the commission made the building of a new firehouse on land near Estancia where a new county roads building was recently completed, its top priority. If it can gain access from the architect for the plans used for the firehouse that was built in 2023 in Moriarty, the cost would be about $6.2 million, commissioners were told.
“We might as well swing for the seats,” Commissioner Samuel Schropp said.
The other projects would cost significantly less, but may be more viable, with about $250,000 for renovating the emergency management building.
An upgrade of the county’s emergency dispatch and communications services, for an undetermined amount, was next on the list although that could be rolled into a new firehouse project if that comes to fruition.
Building a containment fence around the Estancia Valley Solid Waste Authority landfill is a project that could be ready to go immediately at a cost of about $75,000, followed by a proposed joint Estancia-County flood mitigation project that is relatively far from coming together.
Finally, about $2 million for the county fairgrounds for the remaining about $2 million needed to top off the funding for a multi-use building.
“What I’m also hearing is we’re under a heck of a lot of assumptions and what parameters they do have, you know, this is not a grant that comes out saying this is what we want to do,” Commissioner Ryan Schwebach said. “This is a representative saying, ‘I have $22 million and I want to spend it.’ So in my line of thinking the parameters are very, very loose.”
In other items, the commission agreed to wait on a plan to offer county firefighters and emergency-management services workers an option to join the state-run PERA retirement program until new fire chief James Winham is on board and the budgetary process begins.
The commission also agreed to a proposal by the county sheriff’s office to change the way their hours are allocated to provide less in initial salary but a greater contribution to the deputies PERA accounts.
Schwebach was again elected by the rest of the commission as chairman, with Commissioner Kevin McCall again elected vice-chairman.
Schropp , who was appointed to the commission in March 2023 to fill a District 3 vacancy after Commissioner Leroy Sanchez died, announced that he will not be running again when his term expires this year.