Nate Downey

City Council Candidate District 2

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I support the resolution adopted in October, 2015 leading to standards for the Old Pecos Trail Scenic Corridor for adoption by the Governing Body into the City’s Land Use Code.

I believe we can have development of the new housing and commercial development we desperately need in Santa Fe without despoiling the Old Pecos Trail entrance to the city. We certainly must avoid further commercial development on Old Pecos Trail.

I do support building at higher densities in the core of the City. It’s high time that we recognized that Santa Fe’s most livable and traditional neighborhoods are dense, walkable, and mixed-use. Everyone deserves the opportunity to live within walking and biking distance to parks, commercial areas, and schools. If the only housing that young families can afford is out in the county, and the only growth in the heart of the city is high-end, we will doom ourselves to sprawl and gentrification.

I will lead a city effort to identify sites where livable, walkable neighborhoods can be built with a mix of housing types, including apartments and multifamily dwellings, to create opportunities at every stage of life to live and work in Santa Fe: apartments for young people, reasonably-priced homes for the “missing middle” of young families, and all the way through to housing for our seniors.

These sites should be close enough to the City core that they can be connected by bike paths and transit to the services their residents need, without having to drive every time they go to school or go shopping. One such site is SFUAD, and more broadly the St. Michael’s corridor, which can become a vibrant mixed-used community. But this is not the only one: another possibility is the Siler area, where Meow Wolf is anchoring an exciting cultural renaissance. Young people like those who created Meow Wolf are desperate to find places to live in Santa Fe, and currently this is nearly impossible for them.

Finally, we need to recognize that while this effort is essential for the future of the city, it is not easy. I will work to find common ground between developers proposing to build the housing the city needs and neighborhood associations who want to preserve the character of their surroundings. People have many concerns about growth, and rightly so. But it is possible to create housing that is affordable, sustainable, and planned to work well with the surrounding areas and existing traffic patterns, and offer a complete set of amenities as part of a walkable city.

I have a natural inclination towards finding common ground. Combined with my business experience, background as a political activist, and communications-based education at St. John’s College, I expect to use my position as a City Councilor to bring people together to find consensus on appropriate development.