Opposition to a concrete batch plant in the mountain community of Alto, New Mexico escalated earlier this month when dozens of its residents appealed to the state’s environment department to deny an air quality permit for the proposed industrial operation.
“We have received donations from over 250 individuals to aid in this fight,” said Brenda Restivo, president of the Ranches of Sonterra Property Owners Association, which is a collection of homeowners living near the proposed concrete batch plant.
"We are putting ourselves in debt to fight for our rights. These are individuals concerned about air quality, water rights, the environment, safety, wildlife, the very air we breathe. With passion we are in this fight."
Restivo was among residents of Lincoln County attending a Feb. 9 public hearing for the proposed industrial plant.
The homeowners association is a member of the Alto Coalition for Environmental Preservation (AltoCEP), which is the legal entity created to fight the establishment of the concrete batch plant proposed to be built by Roper Construction Inc. The AltoCEP is in a pitched fight with the construction company’s owner, Ryan Roper, who this past summer submitted an air quality permit for the plant he said would be built on his property near the intersection of N.M. Highway 48 and N.M. Highway 220 in Lincoln County.
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Dozens of residents spoke in opposition to the proposed concrete batch plant – AltoCEP’s website stated 30 people gave oral comments – and more were invited to submit comment in writing to the New Mexico Environment Department, which hosted the online public comment hearing.
“If this plant goes in, I see no choice for my wife and I, other than to leave our home,” said Bill Horton, who lives less than 700 feet from the proposed plant. He said his wife was diagnosed with a respiratory condition 14 years ago, and the couple had moved to Alto for the clean air, which improved her breathing. A concrete batch plant would change that, he said.
“I cannot risk her health to what this plant will produce. Unfortunately that also means we probably can't sell the house. No one would want to live within 660 feet of a concrete batch plant.”
Other speakers cited concerns with a negative impact on the plant life, wildlife, groundwater and expressed frustration that an industrial plant could be opened despite the community opposing it.
“It is one man's profit versus literally thousands of people's health, well-being and property,” said AltoCEP member Kathleen Weems, who also spoke at the public comment hearing.
The opposition did not phase Roper, who said he still plans on pushing forward.
“I still think it's a needed resource in the area,” he said after the hearing.
He acknowledged that he had not anticipated the pushback from homeowners, but said his venture would only create as much cement as the community’s needs demanded.
“We are not increasing demand or decreasing demand at all. All we are doing is working with supply. The concrete plant would only be providing what customers require.”
He said he does not agree that the proposed concrete batch plant would create health risks for area residents.
“I live a half mile from this proposed location as well. I have my family in the same proximity as all these other people. It's just a difference of opinion,” he said. “Overall NMED (New Mexico Environment Department) and EPA (Environmental Protection Agency) are known as pretty conservative bodies, not in the political sense, but in the sense that it is highly regulated to protect people. If I thought I was endangering people's lives I would not be pursuing this,” Roper said.
A concrete batch plant is an industrial site where cement, stone aggregate, sand and water are mixed to create concrete, which is then trucked to construction crews who use it for building projects. Identified primarily by their towering silos, batch plants typically employ the use of mixers, batchers, conveyors, stackers, bins, heaters and chillers to produce the concrete product.
Because of the potential for dust, concrete batch plants must be granted an air quality permit – under guidelines set by the Air Quality Control Act – by the New Mexico Environment Department and the state’s environmental improvement board. A new concrete batch plant cannot be legally built unless this air quality permit is granted. Approval depends on an applicant showing that they will comply with air quality regulations, NMED officials said.
The Feb. 9 public hearing was held as a video conference, with NMED officials, attorneys for AltoCEP, which is the primary opposition group, and Roper Construction, Inc. of Carrizozo. All sides presented summaries of their evidence either in support of granting the permit or denying it. Concerned residents dialed in from their homes or gathered at the Traylor Gym in Capitan and the Ruidoso Convention Center to participate in the online public hearing.
NMED serves as a neutral party in the application process, compiling all information to be sent to Stephanie Stringer, deputy cabinet secretary of operations for the New Mexico Environment Department, who will make the final decision on whether to grant or deny the air quality application.
Gregory Chakalian, administrative law judge at the New Mexico Environment Department, presided over the hearing, and coordinated the gathering of information from attorneys and experts involved in the air quality permit application. He also coordinated the input of public comment from residents who spoke during the hearing.
About 115 people registered to speak or submitted public comments in writing.
“It is my responsibility to conduct a hearing in a fair and impartial manner so that the relevant facts are fully developed,” he said, adding that both verbal and written statements were accepted by NMED. “I will consider both forms of public comment in my hearing report and recommend a decision to the deputy secretary.”
While the majority of the public speakers at the hearing expressed opposition to the proposed concrete batch plant, Roper and the batch plant have supporters in the building industry.
Clifford Richardson, owner of Digit Construction which has been involved in the Lincoln County building industry for 23 years, said currently he experiences downtime when waiting for concrete trucks to fill his orders. “If you need a load (of concrete) sometimes you’re sitting there until midnight waiting.”
He said he disagreed with the opposition to a new concrete plant being opened in Alto. “Ninety-nine percent of the work in house-building is up there in Alto,” he said. “That's no different than other people putting up businesses up and down that road. You still have trucks going in and out. Business is business.”
Johnny Autrey, owner of AC and Company – which is registered as a construction hauling company in Alto – said Roper’s move to open a new concrete batch plant “is good, it’s just progress.”
“It’s hard to get concrete right now, and we need it. Competition is good,” said Autrey, who remarked that most concrete pours end by early afternoon. “I hope Roper gets it in, and anything I can do to help him, I’ll do. They are good people and we need it.” About the protesters, Autrey said he believes they are overreacting.
“I’ve been around one (a concrete batch plant) my whole life. It’s nothing. They are just busy bodies, that’s my opinion,” he said.
But for Josh Botkin, the owner of High Country Landscapes which abuts Roper’s property, he said he “stands to lose quite a bit.”
“It has always been my aspiration to create a self-sustaining nursery and provide plant and tree materials to the community,” he said during public comment. “I have built this business from the ground up and I do not know why I stand to be the one who loses everything for the construction of the plant,” said Botkin, who also noted that his nursery is less than 100 feet from the proposed site of Roper’s silo.
Some Alto neighbors say they are also troubled by a lack of monitoring of Roper’s current concrete batch plant in Carrizozo.
“This plant in Carrizozo has not been monitored by the state,” said Galen Farrington, an active member of AltoCEP who lives in a subdivision across the street from the proposed plant. “NMED has not followed through with checking the plant in Carrizozo, they have not monitored it. They could not even provide us with dates. The plant has been in operation for years and we were just asking for the latest dates of monitoring and they could not answer the question,” he said.
When a media request was submitted to NMED inquiring specifically on the dates that the Carrizozo concrete batch plant was monitored, a response was returned which stated in part that an air quality permit “establishes allowable emission limits for each piece of equipment, which is accompanied by monitoring, recordkeeping, and reporting requirements that ensure process equipment and control devices are operating effectively to reduce emissions.”
The statement concluded with: “The permit for the concrete batch plant in Carrizozo contains similar requirements,” but no further specifics nor dates of previous monitoring were provided.
Regarding Roper’s proposed concrete batch plant air quality permit – a requirement for the construction of his Alto batch plant – NMED officials stated that “we anticipate this process concluding with a decision on this matter in mid-June.”
AltoCEP member Mark Severance, a retired NASA engineer, said that if the air quality permit is granted to Roper by NMED, he would see that as “a whole failure of the environment department's review process.”
“It has been disappointing to see this rather uncoordinated process that has pretty severe implications if it were to go ahead, that is potentially very harmful to our environment. It is not being looked at in a comprehensive, integrated manner, and I find that very frustrating and disappointing quite frankly,” he said.
This article was reported by freelance journalist Reyes Mata III for the Ruidoso News. Born and raised in El Paso, he is a graduate of New Mexico State University. His email address is rmataonline@gmail.com. Story ideas are always welcomed.
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