Recent Town Meetings Highlights

Due to time constraints on my part, this post will contain only the most significant highlights or things not mentioned in nm news coverage. To view agendas and packets, they are posted under recent meetings at the town website. The Watch Meetings feature on the home page points to the town’s You Tube channel. 

Town Commission meeting of October 14, 2025: This meeting featured an hours long session that went past midnight. It was not a record but came close. Earlier in the meeting, town staff mentioned that they have received communication from an individual to the effect that a “former town employee” had promised that improvements to Range Road would be forthcoming, and was angry because no action has yet been taken. 

Commissioners rightly mentioned that improvements to Range Road will be difficult and expensive. Range Road and the area around it were already in place upon the town’s incorporation in 1999 and has been a problem for many years. It serves as a textbook example of the effects of lax development standards: sooner or later someone else is left with the burden of cleaning up a mess. 

When developers are allowed to proceed without making adequate provision for the “Big Three” of subdivisions (water, access, and utilities) someone else pays later. What this means to the average citizen is that when the policy of the planning office is geared towards making things easier for developers, the taxpayers eventually have to pick up the slack and that translates into less money available for future infrastructure development and quality of life amenities. 

The Town government needs to find some way to place a prominent notice on its website warning the public than no single elected official or employee has the power to obligate the town government on road improvements or other services. If it is, indeed, true that a town employee did make such a promise it only highlights the cronyism that has plagued the new Commission/Manager government. 

Planning & Zoning Commission meeting of October 14, 2025: PZC Commissioner Rush should be commended for his efforts at improving the quality of plats and for ensuring that plat approvals are consistent with town ordinances. The Commissioners appear to be gaining benefit from having legal counsel present at meetings because the quality of their questions improve with each meeting.  

Campbell Ranch update

EMPAC and Bernalillo County have filed a motion to intervene as interested parties in Campbell Ranch’s suit against the Town of Edgewood. Campbell Ranch filed suit in State District Court after the Edgewood Town Commission vacated the Planning & Zoning Commission’s approval of a “minor subdivision.”

Special meeting of the Town commission called-and cancelled

 The state of disorder continues. Make of it what you will. 

Town Commission’s regular meeting 09/23/2025

The problems highlighted by the brevity of the 09/19/2025 special meeting were confirmed in the prolixity of the 09/23/2025 regular meeting which lasted more than three and a half hours. I do not have time to summarize the substance of either; watch the videos and form your own conclusions. 

Nevertheless, the town’s foray into becoming a water wholesale entity bears close watching. The description of intent, and the emphatically delivered protestations that eminent domain clause will NOT be used lack credibility. One possible outcome might be to enact a tax on at least some Edgewood properties to upgrade water infrastructure. Yes, Virginia, there really is an Eminent Domain clause in the recently adopted Water Utility Ordinance. Qui bono?  

The now almost four years old Commission/Manager government continues its policy of “majoring in minors” while giving only lip service to essential functions. The latest round of personnel changes has revealed more audit findings, legal entanglements, and procedural deficiencies. Whether it’s the town commissioner who often arrives late, puts staff at a disadvantage by asking incomprehensible questions, and starts packing up before adjournment, or the attempts by another to avoid responsibility for current problems by blaming the previous administration, it becomes harder with each successive meeting to regard the town government as a serious enterprise.