V.B. Price

Influential liberal commentator V.B Price jarred some of his brethren over the weekend when he blasted the proposed unification of the city of ABQ and Bernalillo County and urged voters to reject the proposal during the mail-in election now underway until November 4th.

Price, a nearly 40 year veteran of ABQ political warfare, and a writer with a big following in the state's environmental community, took off the gloves on this one calling the proposed unification charter "ill-conceived... a scenario for madness." And in an attack that is resonating in political circles, Price penned: "Unification is going way too fast for anyone but the designers to comprehend it." Interestingly, on the same ABQ Trib page that Price posted his thumbs down, Lora Lucero, another prominent ABQ North Valley liberal, was writing in FAVOR of the proposal. Earlier, Alibi columnist Jerry Ortiz y Pino, another respected liberal, also endorsed the unification. The ABQ Journal also weighed in over the weekend and gamely tried to carry water for the proposal, but the best it could do was to say this is the best chance to get unification so it should be approved. Not exactly a call to arms.

The Price knock that the whole process has gone way too fast is a key issue. The FOR side has done nothing significant to get a coherent message out. Attorney David Campbell, who engineered the unification before the Legislature has so far been AWOL. If the father of the proposal is not banging the drum loudly, who is? All this is leading to speculation that theirs is a "hit and hope" strategy--just hit the ball and hope it turns out to be a base hit. If not, que sera, sera. But that could mean hasta la vista November 4 to the dream of city-county unity.

POSTSCRIPT: After a long week of political junkie activity we headed for the movies Friday night and ran into Bernalillo County Clerk Mary Herrera, also seeking relief from the political firestorms. She told me counting the mail-in ballots will take days, and that she will hire extra workers to do the job. Mary fought the unification while it was under discussion but now that it's in the voters hands, she is done debating and is concentrating on running a fair election.