An Interview with a Resident from Loma Parda
Anyone who lives in Taos knows the housing situation can be brutal: casitas for thousands of dollars a month, sheds with minimal amenities for almost as much, low income housing with poor conditions and authoritarian management practices, Air b&bs popping up and million dollar second homes being built all over the place. All this as local and working class people survive by living in rv trailers, tents, and moving further and further from town center.
According to a US census data from the pandemic, 21% of homes in Taos remain vacant, and 40% of homes are only occupied on a part-time basis. Meanwhile, according to findings by the Taos legislative finance committee “only 57 percent of renters can afford average rent prices in Taos County, and only 9.4 percent of renters can afford a median-priced home.”
I spoke with ‘A’, who is a current resident of Loma Parda and former resident of Tierra Montosa. Both of these properties are owned by Tierra Reality Trust LLC, a that has properties all over NM and the southwest. Tierra Reality owns 7 of the 9 low income housing complexes in Taos. This monopoly allows the corporation to blacklist residents who speak out against the untenable conditions Tierra Reality presides over.
‘A’ grew up in Taos in a family home, and as an adult she owned and rented in Taos before health issues changed her circumstances:
“Unfortunately, I had health problems that have prevented me from working anymore, so ended up on disability. Unfortunately, that does not pay not even a house payment. So [I] ended up losing the house, I had to actually go on housing. I never had to do that before and had to start renting.”
A told me about consistent issues with water during her time at Tierra Montosa where her daughter also lives: “…we’d call each other. Do you have water right now? Can I go over? Like, yeah. And it’s outrageous because I’m disabled…I mean, me having to go over there and take a shower, and here it’s just them literally putting bandaids.”
These ‘bandaid’ style fixes include the sizable hole in ‘A’s’ bathtub that maintenance has used some kind of putty to repair. Before this, her roof was leaking for an extended period of time, and her sink had cracked and was repeatedly “repaired” before management finally replaced it. “A” also uses a wheel chair and has complained about uneven sidewalks at the grounds. Another contact at Loma Parda informed us that she has tripped and fallen on these sidewalks.
On top of wheel chair hazards and untimely maintenance issues, “A” deals with repercussions for speaking up: “Yeah, um usually it’s if you try to stand up for your[self], it’s not accepted very well, so they get upset and then I, you know, I heard from one of the maintenance [men] one day like ‘they’re trying to get rid of you. They’re looking for a reason to evict you, just so you know,’ like, and it’s cause like I complained…the complaints are often like, well, are we going to get this done this year or, you know, I am disabled. I do need these things. And no, usually [the response is] ‘our hands are tied’.”
“…[it] kind of feels like these corporations are like putting you in a cardboard box. That’s what it feels like. You’d be homeless without us, so this is your cardboard box to live in, okay? Be glad you have water in the toilet. Right. Yeah. Meanwhile and sorry if your roof just puddled, you know flooded your living room, but be glad you have a roof over your head.”
We have learned from residents that it is nearly impossible to get a hold of higher up management at Tierra Reality, that names and contact information are guarded, and rarely if ever, do residents interface with even the general manager who oversees properties in the Taos area. I asked ‘A’ what she would want the CEO of Tierra Reality to know if she had the chance to speak with him:
“The part about wanting him to know isn’t the problem. It’s about wanting him to care. Let me see your books prove to me that you don’t have the money to fix your properties. If you had the money to buy these properties and you’ve rented them all out, according to you, they’re all full, then start treating people with dignity and respect and fix the things that are wrong and fix them right the first time.”
“And I know, I honestly know that the point of letting this Tierra Reality come in and build all these apartment buildings is because we desperately need these places. but how It’s one of those things where you just you don’t know what to say anymore, because you’re in a catch 22. It’s like my daughter. She’s been stuck there for years. She had her baby there. Her baby is now six years old. she cannot find another place and house to rent. Like I mean the places are gone like boom.”
“We can’t afford million dollar homes. We’re not the rich. yet we are the locals. We were growing up on farms and doing our own gardening, and there was a lot of differences back in the day and now you can’t buy a piece of land to save your life for a decent price even to be honest, so you want to start from scratch. It’s been insane because they’ve been trying to move and find a place, buy a home.”
As with most residents we talk to, I asked “A” what she thinks the solution is to these wide-spread issues:
A: “…I don’t know. I don’t know. It has to be people coming together. Yeah, like everywhere else. Literally it just has to be a movement. It has to be people saying I refuse to live like a dog.”
“…I feel like we have to go to the government, the city government. They’ve got to really, I mean, implement the rules that should have been implemented from a long time ago. Yeah, and they’re not… but if I could and if I could get everybody to do it, all of us should be crashing those council meetings those all the government meetings, the county meetings, the city meetings we should be crashing them. and protesting what they’re doing. They’re literally starving the actual Taos community out of here. so we can move in the Californian millionaires in and I get it yeah, you want the money but you’re getting the money start putting it towards the people too.”
“…you need to go into those meetings. You need to make your voice heard, and it really sucks, but cause good trouble. We need to cause good trouble. But even in Taos, maybe we can’t do a lot, but we can. Maybe we think we can’t. I’m sorry, but we can. We’re stronger than that. We’re just complacent… We’re willing to let a lot of things slide… and I’ve noticed that in Taos for decades.
Kenny: “and Taos has a history of, you know, revolting.”
A: “Yeah, We’ve had it. Yeah, we’ve had it before. Yeah. Okay. And we need to do it again. Why are people treating us like I mean, it’s back to almost those days of secondhand citizen. You’re just not worth it. Rise up, we’re worth it. We are more than worth it. I mean we built this community. How are we not worth it now? We were here before those millionaires. I’ve watched those millionaires moved in.”
The housing situation in Taos county (and anywhere else) isn’t going to be solved by un-enforced legislation limiting air b&b’s or eco villages or building more unaffordable homes. nor is it going to be solved by “affordable housing” non-profits funded by the ski valley peddling the idea of ‘trickle-down’ housing. It simply isn’t profitable for companies like Tierra Reality to manage their properties in a dignified way, even after some of their practices have made the into the Taos News and prompted Taos politicians to intervene, Tierra Reality will fix a few things, improve their public image, and continue squeezing their tenants and properties for everything they can. We must build a movement here in Taos (and beyond) to apply meaningful and sustained pressure for dignified living conditions for all. come get organized and share your experience at the next monthly meeting on housing hosted by Dare to Struggle.
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