Monday, January 28, 2013

Bosque VS. Walmart

I snapped this picture of the Bosque early this morning as the sun was peaking over the Sandias.  It was a beautiful scene.  I am glad I can go out and take walks again on my new knee.

The Bosque is a very special place for many of us in the Valley.  Whether you live on the east or west side of the Rio Grande it is a place of quiet nature.  Well, kind of quiet.

The Albuquerque City Council will soon have to decide whether a big box Walmart will settle itself into the scene near the Bosque School on Coors road.  This controversial siting decision by Walmart and its minions has been denied by the Environmental Planning Commission and the City Hearing Officer who upheld that decision.  There are over 7000 pages of written record and thirty hours of recorded testimony for the Council to peruse.  Nobody will ever convince me they will read those 7000 pages or listen to that testimony.  They will just sit and listen for a couple of hours and then make a political decision.  The question is will the five republican councillors and Mayor Berry just bend over for Walmart and enable them to build in this inappropriate place.  Or will one or two brave GOP councillors break ranks and do the right thing.  Let us hope so or the city will most likely be in for litigation that will cost us taxpayers deeply.

There are many places for Walmart to build their stores.  This site is not even close to being appropriate.

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

That is beautiful.

I was trying to endure another winter a few years back when I happened to read that Frank Lloyd Wright would roam around the Midwestern prairie in the winter to get inspiration, so I started taking another look at the bleak winter landscape you see from the interstates. In the Midwest it's flat or gently rolling and with the snow, all white but interrupted by dark fence rows and meandering rows of trees marking where a stream runs, or little clusters of grain silos poking up from a farmer's co-op.

I noticed everything was a shade of brown, ranging from almost black in the trunks of trees to almost grays in the frozen branches to different shades of tan of the different prairie grasses.

Some of the browns were very beautiful, but I have seen nothing anywhere like out here in the Bosque. It's just breathtaking down there in the winter time. It's something about the varieties of trees and grasses and maybe the lack of humidity or something. I don't know, but once in while I'll be coming into town in the morning and the sun will be coming up like that, and from the semi I can see over those concrete walls they have along the expressway and it's a sight to behold.

The Bosque is unique and valuable for a number of reasons but the winter is one and if you've ever looked into how Wal Mart treats its employees and what those Waltons do with their money, supporting everything from reactionary politicians to the assault on public education, it is an evil, evil company and should be kept a thousand miles away from there and from anywhere.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Criticism_of_Walmart

http://www.thirdworldtraveler.com/Corporations/Walmarting_Charity.html

And the newly formed Wal Mart employees union:

http://forrespect.org/