Dear HCN,
I am writing to express
my appreciation for your excellent article, “Lack of Enchantment,”
Feb. 5. I lived in Santa Fe for about five years between 1987 and
1992 and spent a year and a half as Santa Fe county attorney. I saw
the decline of the middle class and the forced emigration of the
Hispanic population.
The county commission
agonized over the plight of their constituents and did all they
could, but the real power behind the growth of the tourist industry
lay with the city council and Mayor Sam Pick. That organization
pursued tourist growth with lodgers’ tax money and cared not at all
about the consequences.
I remember clearly when I
gave up on the city. The sole remaining small business in the
old-town area was my barber, who established his business in the
mid-1950s. He was forced out by stratospheric rents. After that,
there were only art galleries, hotels and restaurants, almost none
of whom catered to the local
populace.
Norman
Osborne
Las Cruces, New
Mexico
This article appeared in the print edition of the magazine with the headline Then the barber left.
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