by Joe Zupan
I would like to take this opportunity to describe the work of Amigos Bravos and other entities to improve the Río Fernando watershed, an important resource to the Taos community. In a My Turn column in The Taos News June 28, our erstwhile ally (in years past) Mr. Jerry Yeargin expressed significant criticism of our work and our approach in this arena.
Amigos Bravos is a statewide organization dedicated to protecting and restoring the waters of New Mexico. Founded 30 years ago, our initial efforts were focused on impacts to the Red River and Río Grande from the Molycorp mine in Questa.
Since then, our mission has grown to include issues and watersheds that are statewide. Current examples include our work at Los Alamos Laboratories to address the impacts of historical contamination in the Río Grande, fighting the reopening of the Mount Taylor "zombie" uranium mine, successfully suing the Bureau of Land Management to keep oil and gas exploration out of the Santa Fe National Forest, fighting the various schemes to add diversion structures on the Gila River and many other issues besides.
Some years ago, concerns about the headwaters of the Río Fernando brought forward by people like Mr. Yeargin caused Amigos Bravos to take a close look at this river and put some careful thought into ways our organization could help to address the problems... [Read More]