update on leadership
North Valley Coalition
Below is a story by Damon Scott in the North Valley News about my resignation as President of the North Valley Coalition and some of the issues addressed during my tenure. I intended to send this out in July. An executive committee will continue to run the Coalition and I will still be a participant as a board member. As noted in the article, ordinance O-24-69 continues to be an ongoing legal case. Its impacts deny citizens and associations the right to appeal land use cases administratively, either directly or by burdensome requirements. Allowed building heights within 1/4 mile of main street corridors, which include 4th Street, have been changed or eliminated. The process for amending the IDO is allowed directly by City Council with minimal public comment. We have finally set up a paypal account and encourage making donations to the Coalition, either for membership, donations, or legal donations.
1. Write a check payable to North Valley Coalition, 5116 Guadalupe Trail NW, Albuquerque, NM 87107.
2. Donate to North Valley Coalition through Paypal (includes Venmo and credit cards)
https://www.paypal.com/donate/?hosted_button_id=PXKCEYLFQVGTN
After Norton, Who Will Head North Valley Coalition?
Leader reflects on departure, 11-year run
by Damon Scott
Running a neighborhood association is a big job that takes considerable time and effort. So it’s perhaps not a surprise that doing the same for a coalition of associations can be downright daunting. Peggy Norton did just that for 11 years as president of the North Valley Coalition, but recently stepped down and left a key role to be filled.
The cause of Norton’s departure was a health scare—a heart attack that took place last month while she walked along a ditch with a friend.
“My friend called 911 and they told her what to do and she did it,” Norton said. “Two motorcycles came by—they weren’t supposed to be on these little dirt trails—but they said, ‘Let us help.’ My friend said, ‘Why don’t you go find the EMTs and bring them back?’ They did. I’m very lucky.”
The experience was enough to make Norton realize she shouldn’t run the day-to-day affairs of the coalition anymore in order to focus on self-care and doing the things she loves—swimming, walking, and hand watering corn, tomatoes, cucumbers and hundreds of plants in her garden and greenhouse.
“If you’re the president, you do everything and it’s hard,” she said. “Then it’s hard to find a replacement. Many people don’t want any part until something’s going to happen next door to them. Then they want the neighborhood association.”
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Norton said she’ll stay involved in the coalition and North Valley issues, but that her resignation is a real one.
“What I can’t handle is the responsibility of holding the whole thing together,” she said. “You have all these things that need to happen, and so people either need to step up, or we might decide not to continue. I’m hoping we’ll decide to continue.”
Whether the group will disband or not is one of the questions on the table for the coalition. Another is: Can it exist only with an executive committee and no president and still be officially recognized by local government?
As of press time, the question hadn’t been resolved and no new president had been selected.
At the forefront
Even an abridged list of initiatives Norton was involved in is a long one: land use squabbles, conservation issues, the creation of the North Fourth Character Protection Overlay Zone and the Candelaria Nature Preserve, and successful opposition to a proposed waste transfer station.
“The city declared that a transfer station was really no different than a storage facility,” she said. “Even though you’re dumping all the city’s garbage on the floors there, scooping it up, putting it into 18-wheelers and taking it out to the dump.”
Norton opposed a QuikTrip service station development on a site near Twelfth and I-40 and continues ongoing litigation against the controversial zoning reform ordinance O-24-69, which was spearheaded by City Councilor Joaquín Baca. The ordinance changed the rules for neighborhood associations pursuing administrative appeals in land use decisions, among other provisions.
“I’ll continue with the legal case,” Norton said. “There’s a lot in there that’s just terrible. It’s going to be a long battle.”
The seemingly smaller things also take significant time, too, she said, like making sure developers comply with the city’s Integrated Development Ordinance (IDO)—the vast zoning and subdivision regulations that govern land use development.
“It just takes so much effort to research the IDO and make sure site plans comply,” Norton said. “We’ve been very active in trying to make sure streetscapes happen the way they’re supposed to—landscape buffers, sidewalks.”
She’s also concerned about what might happen with a former pawnshop property and forthcoming car wash on Menaul near Second and Fourth streets.
But for now, Norton said her focus is to get healthy, swim, take walks and start a heart rehabilitation program in August.
“I took the job very seriously; took the issues very seriously,” she said.