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Community Plan Upheld! As part of the effort to preserve the peace and tranquility of the San Pedro Neighborhood, residents of the area (not SPNA) worked with the County over a 3-year period and produced the San Pedro Community Plan. While the Plan encouraged small home-based businesses, it prohibited large commercial operations. It also prohibits mining. This section was ignored by the Board of County Commissioners when they issued a special permit to San Pedro Rock (SPR). SPR operates a gravel pit (supposedly limited to five acres) on BLM land but has trouble trying to run a large operation within those limitations. The permit allowed SPR to expand the stockpiling operation onto 15 acres of private land immediately adjacent to the pit. One argument was that stockpiling was "industrial" but our Plan only prohibits "commercial" operations. Another was that the piles of gravel really weren't part of the mining operation. Another was that even though SPR only asked the BLM for a 5-acre operation, they needed to expand to make it commercially feasible. While these arguments are obviously a big stretch, for some reason the BCC granted the permit, and made our Community Plan look pretty worthless. So the matter went to court, and the bottom line is.... our Plan has been upheld. The ruling clearly stated that (among other things) the stockpiling of gravel for sale was clearly a commercial use, and was larger than a home business. This is good news for all the communities in Santa Fe County who have spent countless hours crafting Community Plans. These Plans aren't worth the paper they're written on if the County itself isn't going to abide by them.
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