LANL Major Subcontractors Consortium (LANL MSC) held its 6th Annual Donor Dinner Thursday, Oct. 10 at Rio Chama Steak House in Santa Fe.

The reception, presentation and dinner celebrated the positive economic impact LANL MSC investments continue to make for the Northern New Mexico Regional Economy and provided networking with members of the LANL community.

Los Alamos National Laboratory Director Thom Mason addressed the crowd and spoke to the importance of supporting economic development initiatives in northern New Mexico. He  explained that Triad’s Community Commitment Plan builds on the positive impact in the region that comes from the Laboratory’s support for education and economic development projects, and from its own procurement and hiring.

LANL MSC President Graig Newell and immediate Past President Joseph Sanchez recognized donors to the LANL MSC and its 2019 grant recipients during at the event. Those contributions to the MSC Grant Pool are one way MSC members support economic development initiatives in Northern New Mexico. Between 2006 and 2019, the Grant Pool has awarded more than 55 grants to 24 organizations totaling more than $655,000.

LANL MSC Vice President Liddie Martinez introduced the premiere of the 2019 Grant Pool Video that showcased three of the grant recipients projects that the MSC has funded. To watch the video, click here: https://youtu.be/4fiuW9hctnU.

“Economic Development and diversification of an economy heavily dependent on federal dollars does not happen overnight,” Martinez said. “The LANL Major Subcontractors Consortium donors have been pooling our resources for 15 years and investing as a change agent. Two of our three featured organizations have been partners since our first grant investments made 15 years ago.”

She explained that the initial grant to the Espanola Fiber Arts Center was to secure a permanent home for them and help bring their historic facility up code. Over the last 15 years, LANL MSC has seen their membership grow from a few dozen artists to more than 750 active participants with programing now available for the youth, senior population and everything in-between.

“We have supported them with training, equipment, creation of a web store, new program development, expansion of their Fall Fiber Crawl and, most recently, expansion of their dye room. The Center’s new mission to cultivate and support multi-generational participation is a reality because of donors like you,” Martinez said.

The Santa Fe Farmers Market Institute also is a longtime partner. The initial investment in their mission was not in dollars, but in talent from fellow consortium members, she said.

“Architects and engineers from our membership donated expertise early on to assist the Farmer’s Market Leadership in putting together the specs for their formal RFP process to find and hire an architect to build their permanent home. Their beautiful building was the first LEED-Gold Certified building in downtown Santa Fe,” Martinez said. “Over the years we have funded their Micro Loan program, Farmer Training programs, sponsored conference attendance for farmers to learn about organic certification, water and soil testing, and recently helped them launch a pilot program focused on marketing skills for farmers to including use of social media. On our recent site visit we learned that one of their members with a farm in Española is sending tweets from the field showing produce and fruit being harvested and are getting direct orders from Santa Fe Chefs for cases of their product via Twitter.”

Martinez said the Northern New Mexico region is slowly changing. The vision she and her colleagues had nearly two decades ago when the first fiber optic infrastructure projects began, is becoming a reality.

“Our vision of growing entrepreneurs in Northern New Mexico is working beyond the laboratories and technical companies to the fields in the valley and the artists in our pueblos positively impacting our economy and showing that we can, indeed, diversify,” Martinez said. “We were wise to begin the investment long before the infrastructure was built because now, the markets are ready, and we are seeing the fruits of our labor.”

One additional company featured in the video is ReUnity Resources. Three years ago, LANL MSC took a risk and invested in this small start-up company interested in developing a close loop system for recycling food waste from local restaurants and school cafeterias, she said.  

“When we met them, they were filling the compost they generated from the food waste by hand shoveling it into gunny sacks,” Martinez said. “They were limited to very small scale retail sales on site at their Santa Fe Location. We gave them a grant to purchase a bagger and transformed a very labor intensive manual process into a commercial bagging system that now provides wholesale product to major outlets in both Santa Fe and Albuquerque. Their success is our success. Our ability to collaborate and leverage our resources for economic success is something we all should be proud of.”

About LANL MSC

The LANL Major Subcontractors Consortium (MSC) is a centralized resource for Northern New Mexico businesses that do business with LANL. Combined, LANL MSC members employ thousands of Northern New Mexican residents and generates hundreds of millions of dollars in revenue for the region every year.

The mission of the LANL MSC focuses on positively impacting the overall success of the Northern New Mexico region by:

• Investing in programs and projects focused on the growth and diversification of the regional economy;
• Reporting on issues that impact the success of the region; and
• Connecting with regional and national business and community leaders, providing discussion forums and networking opportunities.

Attendees watch the premiere of the 2019 Grant Pool Video that showcased three of the grant recipients projects that the MSC has funded. Photo by Carol A. Clark/ladailypost.com