San Ildefonso Pueblo Lt. Gov. Christopher Moquino, left, and Councilman Tim Martinez await the discussion of rights of way on Pueblo lands Tuesday at the Santa Fe County Commission meeting. Photo by Maire O’Neill/ladailypost.com

Residents of El Rancho gather at Tuesday evening’s Santa Fe County Commission meeting. Photo by Maire O’Neill/ladailypost.com

Santa Fe County Commission and the Pueblos of San Ildefonso, Pojoaque, Nambe and Tesuque have reached agreements in principle on road rights of way and hope to sign four individual settlement agreements next month.

Residents of the community of El Rancho attended the Commission meeting Tuesday evening along with representatives of the Bureau of Indian Affairs and San Ildefonso Pueblo.

San Ildefonso Pueblo Lt. Gov. Christopher Moquino called the occasion “momentous” because the proposed settlement agreement finally puts to rest the longstanding issue of roads in the Pueblo, which the Pueblo has been dealing with for decades.

“There have been several attempts in the past to reach resolution, but none have been successful. The success of this most recent attempt is a reflection of the good faith of each of the parties,” Moquino said.

He said the solution is truly a compromise and that San Ildefonso Pueblo fully supports the agreement.

“What this means is that not all parties got what they wanted but they got what they needed. By putting the existing identified roads in the BIA inventory and granting the BIA rights of way for two 99-year terms, this ensures that the roads are public with open access,” Moquino said.

Under the settlement agreement, San Ildefonso Pueblo and the County will grant the BOA rights of way for County-maintained roads 84, 84A and 84B. The County will survey CR84, CR84A, CR84B and CR101D (north of CR84 and south of CR84D and these rights of way will be placed in the BIA’s Tribal Transportation Program. The Pueblo will over time rename the public roads. County-maintained roads located entirely on private land will remain and continue to be maintained by the County.

In two to three years, the road of convenience located on Pueblo land just south of the Rio Pojoaque and west of CR101 D, which is not a County-maintained right of way will no longer be accessible. Property owners will be required to begin using a surveyed legal access point.

In “gap” cases, which are cases where Pueblo land is located between an existing right of way and a non-Pueblo parcel with the “gap” in ownership preventing lawful ingress and egress to a parcel, the settlement agreements will establish a process whereby the non-Pueblo landowner may obtain insurable access across Pueblo land. San Ildefonso has agreed to provide legal access to all private lots through a legislative grant of temporary access from identified rights of way.

The County will construct entirely on Pueblo lands, Yellowbird Loop (formerly portions of CR84C, CR84D and Sandy Lane) and Blue Dove Road (which will serve properties between CR84 and CR84B) within five years of the agreement.

County Manager Catherine Miller thanked all the entities involved for being “incredibly professional, polite and respectful” in some very difficult times of negotiation.

“I think everyone came into this with their own conditions, not necessarily wanting to enter into negotiations at this time. And I cannot say how much I feel the people put aside personal feelings or any kind of personal position or governmental position they were hanging on to too tightly in order to find a resolution,” Miller said. “Litigation is lengthy, costly and divisive and would not have brought us to this point today.”

San Ildefonso Pueblo Gov. James Mountain was on travel and unable to attend Tuesday’s meeting but addressed its positive outcome during a telephone interview Wednesday with the Los Alamos Daily Post.

“I’d like to congratulate and commend the professionalism and commitment of the Santa Fe County Commission and more importantly our staff and Pueblo leadership,” Gov. Mountain said. “I am personally looking forward to a strong path forward for the committee.”

Deputy County Manager Tony Flores said the goal up to Jan. 5, 2018 is to convene small townhall type meetings with small groups within all four Pueblos in the northern part of the County to start going through the dialog and receive feedback and comments from those communities.  Commission Chairman Henry Roybal and Rep. Carl Trujillo are expected to oversee those meetings.

The issue with the El Rancho land goes back to 1701 when the Spanish governor gave land grants to Spanish families of land the Pueblo claimed it had owned for centuries. Ownership disputes continued until 1868 although land patents held by the Pueblo had been recognized by the governments of Spain, Mexico and the United States during that time.

The 1924 Pueblo Lands Act required both Pueblo and non-Pueblo people to prove their claims and it was thought that the issue of trespassing was settled but it was far from settled. In 1933 the Act was amended allowing Pueblos to file complaints for trespass. Over the years, deviation from original road beds, boundary survey errors and the development of private points of egress onto County roads have been documented by the Pueblo.

In 1989, the Pueblo and Santa Fe County signed an agreement, which the County believed gave them the right of way on the roads in question, however, the Pueblo and the BIA believed the County read the agreement too broadly and the County does not have the legal authority to occupy all the roads in question.

The BIA called that agreement “poorly drafted” and says it contained a number of ambiguities concerning the intent and scope of the easements granted. It claimed it is not clear if it granted easements for access to private homes and businesses in exchange for paving and maintenance of CR 84 as alleged by the County, which has maintained the road for more than 100 years. The BIA disagrees that there were provisions in the agreement for perpetual easements for non-tribal residents or agreements for all arterials on CR 84.

In December 2013, Raymond Fry, superintendent of Northern New Mexico Pueblos Agency of the BIA sent a letter to Santa Fe County saying it lacked easement to use County Roads 84, 84A to A84D and Sandy Lane. Tension increased between the residents of El Rancho and the Pueblo because the letter gave the County 30 days to negotiate a rights of way easement with the Pueblo for the roads or face fines and possible eviction. El Rancho residents were afraid that the Pueblo was going to deny people access to their property, some of which had been in their families for hundreds of years.

For the next two years, the Pueblo claims it attempted to negotiate with the County and paid for surveying of all the lands in question. Then in July 2015, a group called Northern New Mexico Protect filed a lawsuit claiming that the rights of way had been public-vested property since as far back as the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo in 1948 and the Mining Act of 1866 with their status confirmed by the Pueblo Lands Act of 1924. Northern New Mexico Protect maintained that homeowners are unable to refinance their homes and that buyers can’t get loans to purchase homes in the area.

In 2016, Santa Fe County passed a resolution requiring the legal status of Santa County roads within the exterior boundaries of the Pueblos of Nambe, San Ildefonso, Pojoaque and Tesuque to be resolved before the County appropriates funds for construction of a regional water system as outlined by the Aamodt Settlement. Linking the land issue with the water issue caused a whole new scenario.

The Aamodt water rights case was filed in April 1966 by the state engineer against some 1,000 defendants and was the third-longest federal case in U.S. history. In July, more than 50 years later, U. S. District Judge William P. Johnson handed down the water rights adjudication, which allows the four Pueblos 2,500-acre feet annually and non-Pueblo users 1,500-acre feet per year.

One condition of the Settlement is construction of a $253 million water system, which will divert water from the Rio Grande River and bring it to nearby residents of Santa Fe County who will have the option to continue to pump from the wells from which they already get their water. The Settlement set a 2024 deadline for substantial completion. Santa Fe County’s contribution to the water system project is $11.7 million now and some $9 million later but the County’s 2015 resolution to withhold funding until the land issue has been resolved has the potential to put the brakes on the project.

Josh Mann, an attorney at the U.S. Department of the Interior, Office of the Solicitor, who was called “the man in the middle” during Tuesday’s meeting, said the settlements were “complex, sensitive and time-consuming”. He said the agreements are not quite done yet but are solid and designed to resolve the roads dispute.

“They will allow the parties to return their focus to developing a regional water system that can supply clean and reliable water to the people living in the Pojoaque Basin,” Mann said.

Editor’s note: Carol A. Clark contributed to this story.

Former San Ildefonso Gov. Terry Aguilar, right, chats with Shannon McKenna, supervisory highway engineer for the Bureau of Indian Affairs Southwest Regional Office. Photo by Maire O’Neill/ladailypost.com

​Santa Fe County Commissioners, from left, Anna Hansen, Chair Henry Roybal, Anna Hamilton and Robert Anaya at Tuesday’s meeting. Photo by Maire O’Neill/ladailypost.com

Santa Fe County Commissioneer Anna Hansen and Rep. Carl Trujillo chat following Tuesday’s County Commission Meeting. Photo by Maire O’Neill/ladailypost.com

U.S. Department of the Interior attorney Josh Mann, second from right, visits with San Ildefonso Council members Glenda Fred-Weahkee, Lt. Gov. Christopher Moquino and Tim Martinez. Photo by Maire O’Neill/ladailypost.com