Condo rule change would legalize many homes

Julie Ann Grimm: The New Mexican

A state law that goes into effect next month will halt the creation of new condominiums that don’t comply with the city zoning rules.

But most of the condos that skirted zoning rules in the city of Santa Fe during the last couple of decades won’t be negatively affected by the law change. If anything, insiders say, the law and a proposed change to the city code will clear up potential problems for small-time property owners who previously faced a legal quagmire.

About one-fifth of the city’s condominium associations contain dwelling units that exceed density limits for the lot size under city rules, according to a recent staff estimate. Of the roughly 4,309 condominium units that belong to 378 condominium associations in Santa Fe, officials say about 324 units exceed the maximum allowed density for the lot they were built on.

Prior to this year’s session of the state Legislature, buildings and lots could be subdivided as condominiums and recorded with the county clerk absent any city review. State Sen. Peter Wirth, D-Santa Fe, succeeded after several tries to get legislators and the governor to amend state law so that cities can opt to require such a review.

City officials are taking steps to codify the change here. A proposal to amend the city Land Use code was approved Monday by the Public Works Committee and is on the agenda for the Finance Committee next Monday. A final vote and public hearing at the City Council meeting is scheduled for May 30, after which it would take effect immediately.

The practical result of the city adopting such an ordinance change would be two-fold, city Land Use Director Matt O’Reilly said.

“This ordinance, in a nutshell, is a way of addressing, within reason, the condominiums that exist illegally,” he said, “and permanently stopping forever this from happening in the future.”

Of the estimated 324 units that are illegal today, the city ordinance will effectively “grandfather in” about 80 to 90 percent. O’Reilly said that term actually isn’t an accurate description of what would happen. The right term, he says, is that those units will become legal structures that don’t conform to city zoning rules.

A small group of illegal condos would not be legalized, however. They include condominium units that were built without a building permit, and those that are still owned by the person who originally created the illegal condominium. Lots where owners have development rights but have already put up too many dwelling units under zoning rules also won’t become legal under the proposed changes.

Most of the affected properties are on the north and east side of the city, and half of them were originally intended to be guest houses, he said. In those older parts of the city, O’Reilly said, there are many legally nonconforming structures already, owing largely to the fact that much of that region was developed before zoning laws were enacted in the 1960s.

Condominiums that would become legal nonconforming structures when the city approves the law change don’t require any additional paperwork to get that status, but O’Reilly said owners who wonder about the status of their condominium should contact the land-use department.

“If you have reason to believe that yours was built without a permit, you might want to come see us,” he said.

Permits ensure that electrical and plumbing systems are safe, among other details.

Another consequence of making the illegal condos legal is that owners who had previously run into hurdles in refinancing, sales and efforts at renovation will now be able to accomplish all of those tasks.

Jennifer Jenkins, a development consultant in Santa Fe, said she had mixed feelings when she first learned about pending changes to the state law and the city code, but she believes the city is moving in the right direction.

“We have to comply with zoning. We do. It is normal. And for somebody to purposely create a project that is a nonconformity, they are just creating problems,” she said. “They are creating problems for themselves. They are creating marketing problems. They are creating future legal issues. It is in nobody’s interest to intentionally do that.”

Jenkins said she is pleased that the city plans to add what she called “the grandfathering language” as a consumer protection.

Wirth, an attorney, said he backed the state law change because the system was causing situations that were nearly impossible to navigate.

“We call this a legal quagmire,” he said, “because you’ve got, oftentimes, an innocent purchaser who bought one of these things, with the title insurance, who then finds out that it was illegally zoned and that they have a piece of property that is not worth a whole bunch.”

 Link to Original Article

Contact Ryan Bolton and Matt Desmond

Check out the article in the New Mexican about the Green Owl below.

Green Owl aims to revitalize St. Michael’s Drive food scene

By: Candelora Versace | For The New Mexican

April 12th, 2012

With its aging fast-food franchises and worn-out convenience stores, St. Michael’s Drive may not be the first place Santa Feans think of as a mealtime destination. Scattered among the car dealers and empty storefronts, the handful of midprice restaurants along the road are often forgotten by being “out of sight, out of mind.”

Bill Healy, owner of the Green Owl, hopes to change that with his high-profile gas station remodel on the south side of the busy thoroughfare. After an extensive renovation, the space now gleams as a cafe with shiny surfaces and a menu of comfort-food classics. Along with breakfast and lunch menus, the eatery also offers fresh-baked pastries, breads and pretzel rolls, as well as Agapao coffee and Hawaiian-style, soft-serve ice cream.

“I thought maybe it was time to retire,” Healy said as he recounted his decades-long career as a professional baker and cafe owner in Long Island, N.Y. He spent the last 10 years or so coming to Santa Fe to visit his daughters, who now live in Albuquerque, so frequently that he considers the Inn and Spa at Loretto his second home.

“I got an offer for my business in New York, and thought maybe I’d look for a hole-in-the-wall space just to keep busy,” he said.

That search took two years, he said. His son-in-law, a physician at the former St. Vincent Hospital, frequently mentioned the lack of food options on St. Michael’s Drive. The more he researched the area, the more Healy became convinced that the location would be ideal for a culinary endeavor.

“I saw the need for our concept,” Healy said of his vision for fresh, high-quality baked goods, light meals and coffee. The breakfast menu includes breakfast burritos, bagels or rolls topped with eggs and cheese, and baked goods including muffins, morning buns and danishes. The lunch options include: individual pizzas, wraps, paninis, sandwiches, salads and soups.

Healy also offers what may be the only pretzel-roll “snackwich” in Santa Fe. He said he spent two months in Germany perfecting the combination of pretzel and bread for his pretzel rolls. “It’s low in carbs and fat and has such a unique taste.”

While the cafe does not source many of its foods locally, Healy and manager Cindy Sheptow said they are working to scout local vendors for their food sources. “We’re happy to use as many local products as we can find,” Healy said, noting that he’s already in discussion with a local produce farmer.

As for coffee, Healy said he has spent 40 years in the coffee business, starting with Chock Full o’Nuts (“the official coffee of the city that never sleeps”), and he’s confident about his choice.

“I know coffee, and I can’t speak highly enough of Agapao coffee and David Black,” Healy said. “He came out with a special blend for us. He really knows coffee; he may even be a step ahead of me. And the best part is, he’s local and he’s good people.”

Sheptow, formerly the pastry chef at Santacafé, agrees. “I’ve been a coffee snob for 40 years myself,” she said. “It’s clean coffee, it has no aftertaste, and we have some [talented] baristas.”

After eight months of renovation, Healy said, the cafe opened in early February. The building was so decrepit, he said, that it had to be completely gutted and rebuilt, including the wiring and plumbing. “It needed a lot of work,” he said.

After sifting through more than 100 applications, Healy hired 15 workers and has since let one go.

“We love the staff, we love the people that work here,” he said. “People always say that there’s a problem getting good workers here, but we think that’s wrong, dead wrong. We want the residents of the St. Mike’s area to have a nice place to come to, and we’ve already succeeded.”

With a comfortable patio, indoor seating and a drive-thru lane, not to mention eventual catering and delivery, Healy fully intends his big investment to pay off. Healy is so confident in his experience of providing good food and coffee with service to match that he’s already opened a satellite cafe inside the Inn and Spa at Loretto.

“It’s such a great hotel. I’ve been talking to them about it for a while, and a space finally became available,” he said. “We bake everything here and run it downtown. Hopefully, we’ll make a very good team.”

IF YOU GO

Where: 1698 St. Michael’s Drive

Link to the New Mexican Article HERE.

Contact Matt Desmond and Ryan Bolton

From an recent AP article:

Santa Fe tops global list for its clean air
 
 
SANTA FE, N.M. (AP) — New Mexico’s capital, which regularly tops rankings for its quality of life, has something new to brag about. The first-ever World Health Organization survey on air pollution said Santa Fe’s air quality readings are among the cleanest in the world.
Santa Fe Mayor David Coss said he’s pleased but not surprised as the city consistently gets high rankings from the American Lung Association.
“It’s one of the things we love about living in Santa Fe,” he said.
The high mountain desert city is used to ranking high on lists of best places for living, visiting and playing. In fact, Coss said he is traveling to New York next month to find out if it will win Conde Naste travel magazine’s No. 1 ranking of places to visit.
“We were voted in the top three best cities to visit,” he said. “I am going to see if maybe we are No. 1.”
Santa Fe and the Canadian Yukon Territory’s capital Whitehorse were among the cities with the top rankings in the global survey from WHO, which measures the levels of airborne particles smaller than 10 micrometers — so-called PM10s — in almost 1,100 cities.
Whitehorse had a yearly average of just 3 micrograms of PM10s per cubic meter, while Santa Fe measured 6 micrograms.
“It’s absolutely wonderful,” said Whitehorse Mayor Bev Buckway. “A lot of people come up north and they smell the air and the say, ‘Oh wow. Amazing. The air smells so good,’” she said. “And we tend to take it for granted because we just have that all the time.”
Washington, D.C., had a level of 18 micrograms, Tokyo measured 23 micrograms, and Paris had 38 micrograms of PM10s per cubic meter.
Cities in Iran, India, Pakistan and the capital of Mongolia rank among the worst on the planet for air pollution.
The southwest Iranian city of Ahvaz walked away with the unfortunate distinction of having the highest measured level of airborne particles smaller than 10 micrometers. Ahvaz’s annual average of PM10s was 372 micrograms per cubic meter. Heavy industry and low-quality vehicle fuel are the main causes of air pollution in that desert city of 1.3 million.

Link To Original Article

Contact Ryan Bolton and Matt Desmond

Read more about the upcoming summit in the following New Mexican article:

Santa Fe finishes first in race for bike event; Officials say 2012 world summit will pump up leisure tourism

Julie Ann Grimm | The New Mexican

Santa Fe will be the site of a major gathering of mountain-biking enthusiasts — the 2012 International Mountain Bicycling Association’s World Bike Summit — city officials learned Thursday.

The October event is expected to fill more than 1,200 hotel room nights, as it draws as many as 400 mountain-biking enthusiasts from across the nation and around the globe for a four-day meeting. The event will include conference sessions on bike trail building and other issues at the Santa Fe Community Convention Center as well as organized trail rides at the city’s Dale Ball Trails and La Tierra Trails networks.

The city beat out bids from Lake Tahoe, Nev., and from Jackson Hole, Wyo. Previous World Summit events were held in Park City, Utah, and Augusta, Ga.

Bob Ward, one of the founders of the area’s fledgling Fat Tire Societyfor mountain bikers, said the news has been a well-kept secret for more than week.

“We were just chomping at the bit,” said Ward, store manager at REI in the Santa Fe Railyard. “Only a couple key, key players knew.”

The Fat Tire Society helped organize area businesses and other outdoor-recreation groups to promote Santa Fe as the summit location after a trail-building crew from the International Mountain Bicycling Association worked in the city two years in a row and recommended it as a potential biennial meeting site.

When Convention and Visitors Bureau sales director Chris Madden learned the city was on the short list for the meeting, she offered the association a package worth $100,000 in products and support, including lodging discounts and free use of the convention center for the event. Bicycle Technologies International, a bicycle-parts distributor based in Santa Fe, and other area bike shops plan to provide parts and maintenance to participants. Other businesses, including the local Subaru dealer and the Second Street Brewery, also have promised to help.

Madden said Thursday that the effort was in line with the city’s goal of increasing its marketing for leisure and recreational tourism.

“This will have some carry-over,” Ward said. “If we put on a good show here, it will open people’s eyes, and we will get on the map as a great destination. I don’t think the great-outdoor stuff has been publicized like it really should. I’m really happy to see that the Convention and Visitors Bureau is starting to take that little tack that there is more to Santa Fe than arts, history, culture and food.”

Ward said other partners are working on event plans, including arrangements for participants to help build a new planned trail in La Tierra. They also plan to create a map and brochure that showcase mountain biking opportunities in the area.

Mayor David Coss said credit for getting the event to come to Santa Fe is partly due to the years-long work of the Bicycle and Trail Advisory Committeeand investment in recreation over time.

City Councilor Patti Bushee, who chairs the committee, said the conference represents the coming of age of the bicycling community. Bicycling advocates want to work on adding economic development opportunities to the city, she said.

Officials say recognition of the city as a travel destination continues to grow. Condé Nast Traveler magazine has already told Coss the city will be named as one of its best 2011 destinations. The mayor is going to New York City next month to learn whether the city is at the top of the list. Last year, it was No. 3.

Link To Original Article

Contact Ryan Bolton and Matt Desmond

Fiesta de Santa Fe: Spirit of community on parade
Robert Nott | The New Mexican
   

 Some were hysterical — like the float featuring pirate ravens fighting ninja prairie dogs. Others were historical, like the Johnnie’s Cash Store float celebrating 65 years of small-town, family-owned business. Some celebrated long-held traditions of the region, as with the La Sociedad Folklorica float. And some were just cars and trucks draped with banner advertisements for political figures, local organizations and long-standing community groups.

Yet, the more than 100 floats and vehicles involved in Sunday’s Historical/Hysterical Parade — which started around 1 p.m. and wound through the streets of downtown Santa Fe for a couple of hours — certainly shared a sense of community.

Which is what the parade is all about, according to many of the participants, who showed up as early as 6 a.m. Sunday at the starting gate on Guadalupe Street near the DeVargas Center to register and prepare.

“It’s about sharing the true meaning of Fiesta, and not just getting caught up in Zozobra,” said Jessica Lucero, a member of La Sociedad Folklorica and a former La Reina de la Fiesta. “Our float celebrates the state’s official cookie, the bizcochito. A lot of Northern New Mexico traditions are based on family and friends getting together and making memories, and a lot of that activity revolves around food.”

Maria McMahon, who serves on the parent advisory council for the Cathedral Basilica of St. Francis of Assisi, feels the same way. The church’s float featured a roughly 12-foot replica of the cathedral — with room enough for a youth marimba band to play.

“The parade is a huge community event, a huge social event,” she said while volunteers put the finishing touches on the float. “These are the sort of things you don’t always get in the big cities. Isn’t that why we live in Santa Fe?”

Part of that life in Santa Fe — according to some students from the Santa Fe University of Art and Design — is the ongoing battle between defenseless prairie dogs and predator ravens over at the college campus.

Float spokesperson Yusef Seevers related a rather convoluted tale of how the prairie dogs, realizing they were being picked off by the pirating ravens, began taking up ninja battle tactics to fight back. The float featured a rather gruesome-looking image of huge dark birds descending on a prairie dog village.

The float’s band planned to play music throughout the parade as the float moved along the route. But that band’s name seemed to change as quickly as the story behind the ravens and prairie dogs.

“Call us Improv,” Seevers said of the band. “We play original work, contemporary, classical, post-modern, apocalyptic. We span across the entire musical range; we span across boundaries. We are the boundaries. In fact, that’s our new name — call us Boundary.”

Santo Niño Regional Catholic School parents and students set up a more sedate, playful float across the way, one based on the children’s game Candyland, replete with Candy Cane Forest, Gum Drop Mountain and the Chocolate Swamp.

School Principal Theresa Vaisa said the fifth-grade students came up with the concept for the float — on which small buckets filled with candy rested. The students also made their own Candyland costumes.

Kindergartner Shania Murillo was helping prep the Candyland float around midmorning Sunday. Proving herself to be a master at brevity, she answered all questions in one word. Does she like Candyland? Yes. Is the parade fun for the community? Yes. Will she fall off the float? No.

Aside from some vehicles promoting local and regional politicians, there was little sign of political floats, be they historical or hysterical. But citizen Susan Lopez entered a car decorated by banners calling for Public Regulation Commissioner Jerome Block’s resignation.

“Resign now,” one of her signs read. “Our schools need the $.”

As both a mother and a Santa Fe Public Schools employee (though she emphasized she was not speaking for the district), Lopez said the news that impeachment hearings for Block could cost taxpayers $1 million motivated her to get involved.

She said parade officials initially suggested to her that they would not let her in the parade. “They said the float has negative connotations and they want to keep it cheerful,” she said.

“I pointed out that this has always been a political parade, that I am not defaming anyone, and that I am just stating the facts. This is not politically motivated — it’s common-sense motivated.”

She credited parade officials with accepting her argument and letting her take part. Perhaps it helped that she had the popular Peanuts character Charlie Brown walking near her car during the parade.

When the parade was over, Lopez said she received almost unanimous support from spectators along the way, although one lady said to her, “That’s not nice.”

Other floats were musically oriented — like the one that Capital High’s performing-arts department entered with a “Yellow Submarine” theme. All four Beatles were present, as were some Blue Meanies, the Walrus and other “Submarine” characters.

But Capital senior Jennifer Valerio was pretty honest about why the group chose this theme: “Because our marching band was learning ‘Yellow Submarine’ to play in the parade.”

Parade officials said there were no major problems or disruptions during the event. Oddly enough, they said no one seems to know when the parade actually started as part of the city’s Fiesta celebration, though they are fairly sure it dates back at least 50 years.

 WINNING ENTRIES

Hysterical

1st place: Wings for Hope/Toys 4 Tots

2nd place: Santa Fe Spirit Cheer

3rd place: The Hive

Musical

1st place: Santa Fe Care Center

2nd place: Cathedral Basilica of St. Francis of Assisi

3rd place: Divine Destiny

Western

1st place: Bear Creek

2nd place: First Impressions

3rd place: Santa Fe County (Fair) Queen

Historical

1st place: La Sociedad Folklorica

2nd place: Johnnie’s Cash Store

3rd place: La Chica Latina

Link to Original Article Here

Contact Ryan Bolton and Matt Desmond

The following piece from the New York Times outlines the nationwide foreclosure situation and discusses how much worse it may get.

ARTICLE:

As Lenders Hold Homes in Foreclosure, Sales Are Hurt
 
By Eric Dash; The New York Times

El Mirage, Ariz. — The nation’s biggest banks and mortgage lenders have steadily amassed real estate empires, acquiring a glut of foreclosed homes that threatens to deepen the housing slump and create a further drag on the economic recovery.

All told, they own more than 872,000 homes as a result of the groundswell in foreclosures, almost twice as many as when the financial crisis began in 2007, according to RealtyTrac, a real estate data provider. In addition, they are in the process of foreclosing on an additional one million homes and are poised to take possession of several million more in the years ahead.

Five years after the housing market started teetering, economists now worry that the rise in lender-owned homes could create another vicious circle, in which the growing inventory of distressed property further depresses home values and leads to even more distressed sales. With the spring home-selling season under way, real estate prices have been declining across the country in recent months.

“It remains a heavy weight on the banking system,” said Mark Zandi, the chief economist of Moody’s Analytics. “Housing prices are falling, and they are going to fall some more.”

Over all, economists project that it would take about three years for lenders to sell their backlog of foreclosed homes. As a result, home values nationally could fall 5 percent by the end of 2011, according to Moody’s, and rise only modestly over the following year. Regions that were hardest hit by the housing collapse and recession could take even longer to recover — dealing yet another blow to a still-struggling economy.

Although sales have picked up a bit in the last few weeks, banks and other lenders remain overwhelmed by the wave of foreclosures. In Atlanta, lenders are repossessing eight homes for each distressed home they sell, according to March data from RealtyTrac. In Minneapolis, they are bringing in at least six foreclosed homes for each they sell, and in once-hot markets like Chicago and Miami, the ratio still hovers close to two to one.

Before the housing implosion, the inflow and outflow figures were typically one-to-one.

The reasons for the backlog include inadequate staffs and delays imposed by the lenders because of investigations into foreclosure practices. The pileup could lead to $40 billion in additional losses for banks and other lenders as they sell houses at steep discounts over the next two years, according to Trepp, a real estate research firm.

“These shops are under siege; it’s just a tsunami of stuff coming in,” said Taj Bindra, who oversaw Washington Mutual’s servicing unit from 2004 to 2006 and now advises financial institutions on risk management. “Lenders have a strong incentive to clear out inventory in a controlled and timely manner, but if you had problems on the front end of the foreclosure process, it should be no surprise you are having problems on the back end.”

A drive through the sprawling subdivisions outside Phoenix shows the ravages of the real estate collapse. Here in this working-class neighborhood of El Mirage, northwest of Phoenix, rows of small stucco homes sprouted up during the boom. Now block after block is pockmarked by properties with overgrown shrubs, weeds and foreclosure notices tacked to the doors. About 116 lender-owned homes are on the market or under contract in El Mirage, according to local real estate listings.

But that’s just a small fraction of what is to come. An additional 491 houses are either sitting in the lenders’ inventory or are in the foreclosure process. On average, homes in El Mirage sell for $65,300, down 75 percent from the height of the boom in July 2006, according to the Cromford Report, a Phoenix-area real estate data provider. Real estate agents and market analysts say those ultra-cheap prices have recently started attracting first-time buyers as well as investors looking for several properties at once.

Lenders have also been more willing to let distressed borrowers sidestep foreclosure by selling homes for a loss. That has accelerated the pace of sales in the area and even caused prices to slowly rise in the last two months, but realty agents worry about all the distressed homes that are coming down the pike.

“My biggest fear right now is that the supply has been artificially restricted,” said Jayson Meyerovitz, a local broker. “They can’t just sit there forever. If so many houses hit the market, what is going to happen then?”

The major lenders say they are not deliberately holding back any foreclosed homes. They say that a long sales process can stigmatize a property and ratchet up maintenance and other costs. But they also do not want to unload properties in a fire sale.

“If we are out there undercutting prices, we are contributing to the downward spiral in market values,” said Eric Will, who oversees distressed home sales for Freddie Mac. “We want to make sure we are helping stabilize communities.”

The biggest reason for the backlog is that it takes longer to sell foreclosed homes, currently an average of 176 days — and that’s after the 400 days it takes for lenders to foreclose. After drawing government scrutiny over improper foreclosures practices last fall, many big lenders have slowed their operations in order to check the paperwork, and in two dozen or so states they halted them for months.

Conscious of their image, many lenders have recently started telling real estate agents to be more lenient to renters who happen to live in a foreclosed home and give them extra time to move out before changing the locks.

“Wells Fargo has sent me back knocking on doors two or three times, offering to give renters money if they cooperate with us,” said Claude A. Worrell, a longtime real estate agent from Minneapolis who specializes in selling bank-owned property. “It’s a lot different than it used to be.”

Realty agents and buyers say the lenders are simply overwhelmed. Just as lenders were ill-prepared to handle the flood of foreclosures, they do not have the staff and infrastructure to manage and sell this much property.

Most of the major lenders outsourced almost every part of the process, be it sales or repairs. Some agents complain that lender-owned home listings are routinely out of date, that properties are overpriced by as much as 10 percent, and that lenders take days or longer to accept an offer.

The silver lining for home lenders, however, is that the number of new foreclosures and recent borrowers falling behind on their payments by three months or longer is shrinking.

“If they are able to manage through the next 12 to 18 months,” said Mr. Zandi, the Moody’s Analytics economist, “they will be in really good shape.”

Link to Original Article in the New York Times Here

Contact Ryan Bolton and Matt Desmond

It looks to be a challenging course travelling from Ft. Marcy to the Buffallo Thunder casino. However, it should be incredibly beautiful as well. Check out the following article from the New Mexican for additional information.

Article:

Half-marathon aims to lure runners for 13 miles of mountain views
By: Julie Ann Grimm | The New Mexican

A group of accomplished Santa Fe runners who are organizing the city’s first half-marathon this fall hope racers will include elite athletes, adventure tourists and local residents.

The new nonprofit the runners formed, Global Running Culture, would use the 13-mile race from the Fort Marcy Recreation Complex to Buffalo Thunder Resort & Casino to raise money for youth fitness and nutrition programs.

“All of us have been competitive runners, so we know the sport from the athlete’s perspective,” said Joseph Karnes, an attorney who is part of the planning team along with Abraham Kosgei, a Pojoaque Valley High School running coach, and Antonio Lopez, a former state track and field champ who won the New Mexico Marathon in 2009.

“All of us have made a commitment to give back to the sport because it has given us so much,” Karnes said.

Karnes was on the board of directors for the Big Sur International Marathon in California for six years. Kosgei, who was born in the Rift Valley of Kenya but now lives in Pojoaque, is an international competitor who qualified for the Kenyan Olympic team in 2000.

The three hope their experience, combined with Santa Fe’s natural beauty and challenging conditions, will contribute to making the Sept. 18 race an annual success.

Big Sur was one of the first “destination marathons” to advertise tourist attractions alongside a major athletic endeavor, Karnes said. The idea has caught on since then. But given Santa Fe’s lung-crushing, 7,000-foot elevation, organizers opted to try for 13 miles instead of 26.

“Most people live a lot lower than that, and running a full marathon at altitude is really pushing it. But then we said, ‘Wait a minute, there are not many destination half-marathons that we know of,’ ” Karnes said.

The course starts at Fort Marcy and heads north on Old Taos Highway, paralleling U.S. 84/285 and offering views of the Sangre de Cristos and the Jemez Mountains. It then passes the Santa Fe Opera and Tesuque Village Market, and ends at the Buffalo Thunder Resort & Casino on Pojoaque Pueblo.

The pueblo has organized a 12K race for the last two years, so Kosgei said he’s banking on some of the 200 participants in last year’s Thunder Run to sign up for the longer event. Pojoaque Pueblo Gov. George Rivera, who ran the Boston Marathon in 2009, also is lending support to the nonprofit endeavor this year, Kosgei said.

Kosgei was one of the founders of the AmeriKenya running club, which brought dozens of athletes to Santa Fe from African nations to train. Now, in addition to his duties with Pojoaque Valley High School, he’s also a youth fitness coach at Pojoaque Pueblo Wellness Center and operates an all-ages running club in Northern New Mexico.

Teaching children the value of being an athlete is important, he said, and bringing high-profile athletes to compete in Santa Fe will help inspire youth to eat well and stay fit.

“When we plant that in their mind, they will change,” he said, adding later, “Running is like a prayer. It is like a connection between you and nature. So if you’re running, you pass a certain limit where you are enjoying it, and good things come to you.”

Santa Fean Greg Gonzales, 48, said he’s already planning to participate and is looking forward to a race that requires no travel. In past years, he’s gone to Albuquerque, Phoenix and Los Angeles to run competitively. Years ago, he said, he participated in an event called Santa Fe Run Around and also recalls a local race around the Fiesta season.

“None of them really ever took off,” Gonzales said. “It sounds like what these guys are trying to do would really be something that will put Santa Fe on the map for runners.”

USA Track & Field recently certified the half-marathon course, which means it will be advertised as such for experienced athletes who want assurance that it’s well-organized.

Participants will be able to drive to the casino and park, ride shuttle buses back to the starting line, and then run back to their vehicles. Organizers also plan live music along the course.

Charity beneficiaries include the Boys & Girls Club of Santa Fe, Wings of America, which helps Native American youth get into competitive running, and Gotab Berur, a Kenyan charity that focuses on community improvement.

Cyclists have long visited Santa Fe for the annual Santa Fe Century, a 100-mile bike event that attracts about 3,000 participants and is planned for May 15 this year. The city of Santa Fe’s annual triathlon will be held July 16, and a 5K east-side race that benefits the Wood Gormley Elementary School Parent Teacher Association is scheduled for April 30.

Contact Julie Ann Grimm at 986-3017 or jgrimm@sfnewmexican.com.

IF YOU GO

What: Global Running Culture’s half-marathon from Santa Fe to Buffalo Thunder Resort & Casino

When: Sept. 18

Cost: $50, registration opens later this summer

Why: Proceeds benefit the Santa Fe Boys & Girls Club, Wings of America and Gotab Berur, a charity in Kenya

Link to Original Article Here

Contact Ryan Bolton and Matt Desmond

Home prices are hovering at nearly 9 year lows, which makes for some great deals for qualified buyers.

The National Association of Realtors said that sales of previously occupied homes rose from a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 5.36 million compared to 5.22 million in December. That represents at 2.7 percent increase. This is still considerably lower than the 6 million homes a year that economists claim represents a good market.

Nationwide, foreclosures represented 37 percent of sales in January. And all-cash transactions accounted for 32 percent of home sales. In places like Las Vegas and Miami, cash deals represent half of all sales. This likely reflects the relatively high amount of sales coming from investors at this time.

Millions of foreclosures have forced down home prices and more are expected this year. The median price of a home sold in January was $158,800. That’s a decrease of 3.7 percent from a year ago and the lowest point since April 2002.

Sales were up in three of the four regions of the country led by an 7.9 percent rise in the West. Sales were up 3.6 percent in the South, 1.8 percent in the Midwest and down 4.6 percent in the Northeast.

Santa Fe’s market appears to be on the rebound as well. We have seen a significant increase in showings and properties going under contract. And like the nationwide trends, many of these sales are being driven by investors, bargain chasers, and very well priced homes.

Contact Ryan Bolton and Matt Desmond

ARTICLE:

Infectious confections line Santa Fe’s Chocolate Trail. Santa Fe’s renown chocolate trail is dotted with artisan shops that satisfy the sweet tooth

By: Jill Koenigsdorf | For The New Mexican

Any town that has four world-class chocolate shops in a 5-mile radius is my kind of town. Santa Fe is home to the infamous Chocolate Trail, a cocoa-dusted route that connects four esteemed purveyors of this fine food of the gods. Incredible as it sounds, there are actually some people who eat or give chocolates only on holidays — but now that science has informed us chocolate is chock full of health-giving flavonoids and antioxidants, we can all enjoy some guilt-free trailblazing.

Todos Santos

Entering Hayward Simoneaux’s 11-year-old Todos Santos is like stepping into a chocolate-dappled wonderland. The eyes roam from folk-art Pez dispensers depicting Ganesh and Wonder Woman to a parade of giant lollipops, and then to a case filled with antique chocolate molds in the shape of a crayfish, a skull and even a revolver.

Simoneaux is a New Orleans transplant who became interested in making chocolate in part because
he was collecting old chocolate molds he wanted to put to use. He puts much creativity and care into the presentation of his wares, and you will find delectable chocolates tucked inside anything from miniature Mexican wrestler masks, to containers made from recycled telephone keys, to little boxes that look like ancient books.

And what’s inside the pretty packages transports the taste buds to chocolate nirvana. His truffles are perfumed with rare pairings like tarragon and candied grapefruit peel, or hickory-smoked sea salt. And the pumpkin-seed toffee is to die for.

His chocolate milagros, costing between $12 and $30, are coated in edible silver or gold and are works of art. The shop’s pricing ranges from $1.50 for a playful foil-covered chocolate ring to $125 for a majestic tower.

Elegance meets fun in this festive shop.

Kakawa Chocolate House

What do Marie Antoinette, Thomas Jefferson and Aztec warriors have in common? They all drank elixirs made from chocolate. Peter Wolf, owner of the 5-year-old Kakawa Chocolate House, is doing his best to replicate the same concoctions revered throughout history — when chocolate was for kings and cocoa was so precious it was used as a currency.

But you won’t find anything even remotely resembling Swiss Miss. What you will find is thick, exotic brews flavored with ingredients such as roses, nuts, ancho chile, hibiscus and musk. The drinks are $3.50 for 3 ounces or $6.50 for
6 ounces.

The chocolatiers use mostly organic ingredients, sweeten with agave or honey and often substitute oat or almond milk for dairy. For Valentine’s Day, they offer The Love Potion, a sensuous concoction that uses an herb called damiana, known for its aphrodisiac properties. And if these rich beverages of the ancients still haven’t fully satisfied your yen for chocolate, don’t leave before trying one of the pomegranate or lavender truffles ($3 each).

The chocolatiers at Kakawa are passionate about these creations, so much so that chocolate expert Ariana Rossi has the DNA of chocolate tattooed on her arm.

C.G. Higgins Confections

Over the last 17 years, owner Chuck Higgins routinely has sold about 12,000 caramel apples during the two weeks of the state fair — a feat that requires about two tons of caramel. Knowing that should instill confidence that this man knows his sweets. And if this isn’t enough, C.G. Higgins is the official candymaker for Santa Fe’s 400th anniversary. His Chile Caramel Corn and Chile Pecan Brittle each took home first place at the renowned Fiery Foods show in Albuquerque.

Higgins offers a different take on truffles, using high-quality Guittard chocolate as the base, but omitting the hot cream often found in the chocolate ganache. That gives the treats a longer shelf life.

The center of his truffles — which cost $3 each — has a wonderful fudgy texture, and the
truffles come in tempting flavors like Blackberry Balsamic, Cardamom Raspberry or Jalapeño Lime. And what would Valentine’s Day be without chocolate-dipped strawberries? Higgins is already taking orders for these sexy treats, which are made on-site that very day. They sell for
$3.50 per delight, and six for $20.

If it’s fudge you desire, you’ve come to the right place. Black Forest Cherry, Chocolate Pecan, Raspberry Chipolata, or tried-and-true Maple Nut are all available for $17 per pound. Patrons can also enjoy happy hour in the cozy cafe, with specially priced sipping chocolates and espressos available from 4 to 6 p.m.

The Chocolate Smith

Jeff and Kari Keenan, owners of this 9-year-old confectionery, must know that once customers taste their chocolates, they will be hooked. The Keenans have copious amounts of samples on every flat surface. The aroma of chocolate fills the air, coming from the open kitchen that shares the sales area. Customers can watch the chocolates being made and see the signature pâtés being cut on the marble slabs.

These yummy pâtés are a dense, firm ganache covered in Dutch cheese wax, which makes them perfect for travelers. The Chocolate Smith uses local and organic ingredients whenever possible. The shop’s barks are wildly popular, especially the White Chocolate Lemon Lavender or the Green Chile Pistachio varieties, which cost $8 per quarter-pound.

You can custom-make an assortment for
$29.50 a pound. Were I to do this, it would definitely include the sake-soaked, chocolate-covered ginger; the chocolate-dipped apricots; and the succulent Don Juan Pecan Italian soft-style caramels.

There are many grab-and-go gifts available for under $10. You can also go for the whimsical Day of the Dead tin gift boxes, which cost $24.95.

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Contact Ryan Bolton and Matt Desmond

ARTICLE:

Santa Fe Economy: Optimism tentative, but definitely in the air: Turnaround time?
Bob Quick | The New Mexican 

It’s not a rip-roaring recovery, but things are finally starting to pick up after several woeful years, say local business people, an economist and others.

“I think we can say the worst is behind us,” said Mark Boyd, an economist with the state of New Mexico’s Department of Workforce Solutions. “The economy looks a lot stronger these days.”

“The feeling I get in the last couple of months that things are starting to turn around, thank God,” said Maggie Hanley Welles, the new association manager of the Santa Fe Gallery Association.

There’s still negative job growth in New Mexico, Boyd said, but the economy has reached the point where it’s going to start showing some positive growth again.

Santa Fe, Boyd said, was ahead of the rest of the state in lost jobs, especially when it came to construction. “Construction jobs stayed down a long time,” Boyd said. “It was a huge hit, and it showed just how deep the recession was.”

Most recently, the mining, logging and construction sector of the local economy lost more jobs — 100 jobs since November, according to the state Labor Market Review.

On the other hand, three industries — information, government and other services — reported over-the-year employment gains.

Four important industries — retail trade, transportation, warehousing and utilities and educational and health services — reported flat employment levels.

“The Santa Fe job market has been weak for over two years but is improving,” the Labor Market Review said. “At its worst last summer, the number of jobs was down as much as 6.8 percent over a
12-month period.”

By the end of 2010, Santa Fe’s employment picture started to improve with the pending construction of a new Walmart, with 300 employees, later this year and the announced expansion of CleanAIR Systems, with 50 new jobs.

Boyd expects revised economic performance numbers to be available around the end of March.

Bryan Chippeaux, president of Century Bank, said Santa Fe took longer than many places to feel the effects of the recession and is now seeing a belated turnaround.

“Real estate is improving, but no one is calling it a trend,” he said of Santa Fe’s real-estate market. “Everybody is nervous.”

Chippeaux said Santa Fe has benefited for the last year or so from a stronger stock market performance. Santa Fe is a beneficiary of discretionary income earned from investments in stocks and bonds.

As for Century Bank, “we made money this year, just not as much as we’ve typically done,” Chippeaux said. “We’re working much harder and making less money.”

One reason for that is the federal regulations that continue to come down, often resulting in additional expenses for banks, he explained. That means a lot of banks will be looking for additional fees to compensate for those expenses.

As for Santa Fe’s important tourism sector, Art Bouffard, president of the New Mexico Lodging Association, said last year’s tourism numbers “showed a slight uptick” over the previous year. “We think it’s going to increase slightly in 2011.”

Santa Fe’s Community Convention Center is bringing visitors to town, but not enough, Bouffard said. “It’s a lot of locals. They’re not bringing money to Santa Fe.”

Bouffard also said the Hyatt Place, Santa Fe’s newest hotel, off Cerrillos Road, “is doing fairly well.” Given the downturn in the economy and tourism numbers, no other hotels in Santa Fe are being planned, Bouffard added.

Keith Toler, director of the Santa Fe Convention and Visitors Bureau, said “the word is out that we’ve got a convention center. So far this year, 74 events are under contract, with another 38 tentatively planning to sign contracts.”

He added: “We will probably exceed the 182 events we had last year” at the convention center.

Among the returnees are the Bead Fest and the Japanese Cultural Festival. One of the largest conventions, with 500 visitors, is a cancer research group arriving in mid-February.

Art sales have been and will continue to be an important part of Santa Fe’s economy.

When it comes to those sales, “I am somewhat of an optimist,” said Welles of the local gallery association. “We’ve seen mixed reports of slow times and fairly good sales this month and during the holiday season.”

Welles calls it “lucky” that Santa Fe is a winter resort as well as a summer one. “It’s good for the hospitality industry and for the gallery industry,” she added.

Artists, Welles added, “need to be very creative and exert a certain amount of ingenuity to keep their numbers up.”

This includes visiting art fairs around the region and the country and doing art auctions online, she said.

Welles also said a new website, www.santafeart.tv, was launched at the beginning of the year and is a “fantastic way” to foster interest in Santa Fe galleries and artists.

The Santa Fe Gallery Association has also introduced a new category of association membership that allows for associate business members to join at reduced rates.

“This is a good time to be a member,” Welles said. “We’re really trying to get this show on the road.”

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Contact Matt Desmond and Ryan Bolton