Letters to the Editor

By JODY BENSON
Los Alamos

I invited a friend to dinner for Vietnam Veterans Day—he, a Vietnam Vet in the 8th Infantry who got “in country” right after TET, and I, ARC SRAO (Donut Dollie) attached to the US military in Korea.

Later I was thinking about that half century between our service and now. Many of our generation understood that although our Myth of Moral America with Liberty and Justice for All was not yet true, we heartfeltedly believed that if we struggled for it, Martín Luther King’s arc of the universe would bend toward justice.

Now? Now the myth of a moral nation is so skewed that the arc of Read More

By LIBBY NOLEN
Los Alamos

This past Friday I was driving around town with my friends trying to find something to do.

It was cold and dark, so that took outdoor activities off the list. We had already eaten at one of the fine local restaurants, so that took food off the list, and we didn’t feel like going to the Teen Center because only one of us has a card because the sign up process is really long and annoying to go through, but also because we didn’t feel like playing video games with any other teenagers we see from school. So, we took 3 loops around town. Was Sala open and showing anything? Nope. Read More

By WILLIAM MEAD
Los Alamos

I oppose many of the actions being taken by Donald Trump and his allies. I think that Trump and his associates are damaging America and the world. I believe their actions violate the Constitution, laws, and spirit of America. Some of Trump’s specific harmful actions are noted online at wcmead.org.

If you agree, take a look at my list of legal, nonviolent actions that individuals can take to slow the Trump administration’s “progress”. These are cumulative actions: the more people take them, the more effective they will be. This list is also available at wcmead.org.

FYI, Read More

By Cheryl Wampler and Francisco Uribe
White Rock

We see that some necessary construction has been taking place along NM highway 4 between 502 and White Rock. However, we would like to call your attention to the lack of safety being practiced with this work.

This road is very narrow, without shoulders, and quite busy most of the time, besides being the only practical ingress and egress for White Rock. Large construction machinery is operating right beside the road, with no barriers of any kind providing protection or separation for the traffic. Sooner or later, someone will make a mistake, with Read More

By ANNA DILLANE
Los Alamos

Good morning Council members, 

I have just received clarification from Dan Osborne that this proposed $4 million investment in “affordable housing” not only doesn’t focus exclusively on the truly lower income Community members, that it also does not include utilities.

I voiced my concern before that this proposed $4 million investment does not in fact address the actual need, and let me reiterate that now.

I have been low income. However, I would qualify now as a store owner of a successful business for 22 years. The simple fact that AMI is calculated on the inflated Read More

By AGNES FINN
Los Alamos

I would like to encourage Los Alamos folks to attend the screening of No Other Land, which recently won the Academy Award for Best Documentary.

My husband and I viewed this film at Violet Crown in Santa Fe over this past weekend. This film is concerned with what is happening to Palestinian villages in the West Bank. It is not about Gaza but rather another very important and heartbreaking situation occurring in Israel. It includes live footage, interviews with residents and observations and ponderings of the filmmakers.

The Oscar-winning documentary was created by an Israeli-Palestinian Read More

By GEORGE CHANDLER
Los Alamos

I have now reviewed the (County Council) agenda documentation for Tuesday night’s proposed approval of the Low Income Housing Agreement for the apartments at 1027 and 1203 ninth street and 1211 11th street. I discussed this in a letter late last week before the agenda documentation was released. My initial enthusiasm for this project is now somewhat diminished by the discovery of a detail of the agreement that has not been publicly disclosed to this point, as far as I can tell. The audio/video of the March 11 meeting is still (4:42 AM Monday) not online so I can’t tell Read More

By RICHARD SKOLNIK
White Rock

The County has handled the risks of the “Route 4 Water Pipe/Cable Project” in a manner that appears to show considerable disregard for the citizens of Los Alamos County.

The County has known since the early development of the project that it could lead to substantial and repeated internet and telephone outages. During the planning stages of the work, therefore, the County should have developed a mitigation plan to keep to a minimum the impact of any outages.

This plan should have included an assessment of the economic impact of any outages under a number of scenarios. Read More

By ANDREW DELOREY
Los Alamos

In response to Gary Stradling, posted March 4, 2025 (link), quoting notable historical figures can get complicated. Abraham Lincoln would not easily fit into what most people think as conservatism today.

Here is another of his quotes, “The legitimate object of government, is to do for a community of people, whatever they need to have done, but can not do, at all, or can not, so well do, for themselves—in their separate, and individual capacities.” It is my contention that we are all not as individual and independent as Stradling suggests.

People in Los Alamos tend to Read More

By GEORGE CHANDLER
Los Alamos

I would like to alert my downtown residential neighbors to the plan being heard at the Council meeting Tuesday, March 25 regarding rehabilitation of the apartments on 9th St. and 1211 11th St. (fronting on Myrtle by the pickleball court).

The Council heard an outline of the plan March 11 and the documentation is available on the County Council Calendar here.

As I write this the agenda documentation is not available for next Tuesday.

From the information available I am in favor of this plan. On its face it looks like the ideal solution to the problem of preserving existing Read More