2008 Municipal Elections
2008 Municipal Elections
2008 Municipal Elections
Patti Bushee
2/7/2008
During that 14-year history, she's been re-elected four times and once lost a campaign for mayor. Although rumors fly around the city about her political ambitions — namely that she plans to run for mayor in 2010 — Bushee says she's focused on keeping her council seat for one more term.
After that, Bushee said during an interview, she will be ready to shed some of her hectic schedule.
"In all likelihood, if elected, this will be my last term on the council. I don't think I can keep up the pace," she said. "I don't think I want to."
After she finishes her 9-to-5 job as public outreach administrator at the State Engineer's Water Use and Conservation Bureau, nearly every evening is booked with a City Council committee meeting or with reading the inches-thick packets of materials for deliberation. Bushee chairs the Public Works Committee and serves on several other City Council groups.
She ended up on the governing body by mistake, she said. Debbie Jaramillo appointed Bushee to serve out the rest of her term when Jaramillo was elected mayor. Bushee said in a recent interview that when Jaramillo asked her to sit on the council, she politely declined. But bullish Jaramillo wouldn't take no for an answer.
Less than a year later, after the councilor had won an election, Jaramillo told Bushee she regretted appointing "bimbos" like her.
In those early years, Bushee's name often appeared with the tag of "the city's first openly gay city councilor." While that is still true, and it's true that she advocated for gay rights as a founding member of the Santa Fe Human Rights Alliance, Bushee said the label isn't thrown out as much as it used to be.
"It used to be the kind of precursor to my name," she said. "It's not how I define myself, but it's not something I hide from."
She lives in the tallest house on Mesa Vista, in the Barrio de Torreon neighborhood, west of Casa Solano. She shares the home with partner Elizabeth A. Martin, who she identifies as her "life partner," and the couple's four small dogs and cat.
"I'm an apparition in so many ways to Santa Fe politics. I am not from around here. I am who I am. I have been frank and spoken my mind," she said.
One such instance occurred when Bushee stuck her neck out to support Asenath Kepler, a former city manager who was fired by the City Council. Bushee and two others voted against that action.
Kepler, who prior to her stint as city manager had served as city attorney from 1994 to 1996, said Thursday that she respects Bushee and has seen her grow as a councilor.
"When I took a position on something, she would ask really hard questions about why and how," Kepler said. "She is not just taking what I say or what anybody else says and just nodding her head. She really drills down."
Bushee, who owned a landscaping business for more than 20 years, puts off a granola vibe. Last year, she started riding a Vespa as her main transportation and preaching the virtues of gas conservation.
She glows about the eight summers she spent in a primitive mountain cabin with "the Jemez mountains as a TV screen" when she first moved to Santa Fe in the 1980s and about her weekends at a cabin she recently purchased in Chama.
"I need water and I need quiet," she said. "My cell phone does not even work up there."
Over her political career, Bushee said, she is most proud of her support of a citywide smoking ban, first in restaurants and other buildings, then also at bars; and of her involvement with the Early Neighborhood Notification process and its early, contested incarnation, called Community Impact Statements.
Although she hasn't always identified public safety as one of "her issues," she said, Bushee has been a critic of the Police Department, recently picking on the way burglaries and street-level narcotics were being investigated.
She weathered the storms of the city's purchasing the Railyard property in 1995 and this year witnessed a neighborhood outcry over the unintended consequences of development there.
Other supporters noted Bushee's voice on water conservation, open space and trails, and other "sustainability issues," is valued.
Sara Noss, director of the Santa Fe Farmer's Market Institute, worked for Bushee in the 1990s as a gardener and counts herself "an old friend," she said She also sees the professional side of Bushee.
"Patti is a good advocate for what we are trying to achieve here in terms of education and bringing fresh food to the city," said Noss, "She tends to have a more citywide view of things altogether."
PATTI J. BUSHEE
Age: 48
Birthplace: Stoneham, Mass.; moved to Santa Fe 25 years ago from Portland, Maine.
Education: Bachelor of Arts degree in international affairs, University of Maine (summa cum laude, Phi Beta Kappa), studied international economics at George Washington University; studied for a year in Spain at La Universidad de Sevilla.
Occupation: Employed at the New Mexico Office of the State Engineer, working on water conservation issues. Previously owned Ladybug Landscaping for more than 20 years.
Experience: City councilor for 14 years; has worked on legislation at the local, state and federal levels; chairs the city's Bicycle and Trails Advisory Committee, Election Review and Rules Committee and Public Works Committee, and serves on the Public Utilities Committee.
Personal: Lives with partner Elizabeth A. Martin and four small dogs and one cat.
Have you ever been arrested? No.
Anthony Garcia
2/7/2008
Early in his campaign, the retired civil engineer talked about his 22-year-old son, Michael, as much as he talked about ousting 14-year City Councilor Patti Bushee from Santa Fe's governing body.
But as the race gets closer to crunch time, Garcia spends more time on issues, getting more serious about answering specific questions in candidate forums, where he frequently taps his pen against the table in cadence with his speech.
It's Garcia's second contest with Bushee. He lost by a wide margin in 1996, when he polled 11 percent, or 436 votes, against three opponents. But the challenger is undeterred. In letters to the editor and campaign press releases, he has called Bushee "burned out," "not responsive," "negligent" and "detrimental."
On the topic of his son, Michael, Garcia gloats. It's not hard to imagine the tall, thin candidate volunteering to coach his son's grade school basketball team and reliving his own student-athlete days. Garcia took an early retirement in his 40s, he said, to stay home with Michael after he and his wife divorced with a 2-year-old son.
Michael Garcia had a sterling athletic and academic career in high school that included being named a national track champion and graduating as class valedictorian. The younger Garcia plans to start medical school soon.
"The proudest thing in my life is my son," the council candidate explained during a recent interview. "Just raising him and what he has done. He is blessed, and I am blessed for having him and for the environment I grew up in."
Garcia recalls a Santa Fe that is now mostly the stuff of memories. "It was a really, really nice childhood. It was small," he said of the town. "Everybody knew everybody."
His family roots trace to the 1700s when one of his ancestors owned land that is now El Rancho de Las Golondrinas, the Spanish Colonial living history museum.
His lifestyle mirrors traditional values, he said. Garcia built his two-story home himself off West Alameda over a five-year span, including felling trees and hauling vigas from the mountains.
"I've always been pretty conservative, very conservative," he said. "I don't like to get into debt if I don't have to."
Simple decorations at Garcia's house include an antique sword and rifle, and rosary beads that belonged to his uncle, the Rev. Miguel Baca. Spanish guitar music played on the built-in speaker system as he occasionally stirred pots of red chile and beans on the stove.
Since he's been home-based for decades, Garcia said, he has plenty of time to devote to his own interests such as cooking, fishing and projects around the house. If elected, he said, he'll have ample time to put into being a city councilor.
After graduating from high school, he got a job at what was then known as the state Highway Department, working while earning his degree in engineering at New Mexico State University through a state work/study program. Garcia left that agency after a half-dozen years and then spent six years working for what was then known as the state Public Service Commission, where he gained experience with utility systems and their operations and value, and eventually was promoted to chief engineer. Garcia also owned a liquor license that he used briefly in Albuquerque, mostly for catering for the Knights of Columbus, a Catholic men's organization. He said he also lives off returns from stock investments.
Raised Catholic, Garcia attended elementary school at St. Francis Cathedral School and attended St. Michael's High School for a few years, but graduated from Santa Fe High in 1964. The candidate said he's now "basically unattached every which way."
He sees himself as the underdog in the District 1 council race. "It's an uphill battle with an entrenched incumbent," he said.
Yet Garcia doesn't plan to spend much money on his campaign. He voluntarily filed a declaration with the city clerk that he will limit his fundraising to $1 per registered voter, which in District 1 would mean a maximum of about $12,500. Bushee already has that much in her campaign chest.
In the first round of required campaign-finance reports, he indicated he loaned himself about $1,000 for the race as well as hit up three friends for a couple of hundred bucks in donations.
One of those friends is Richard Gilliam, a county resident who retired from the equipment rental business. When Gilliam got to know Garcia, they were in high school, and the candidate went by the nickname "Doisey." Gilliam said he supported Garcia's campaign financially because Garcia does not represent any special-interest groups and has no hidden agenda.
"I know that he has a real, sincere concern for the city and the people that live in it and he is mindful of the changes that are going on and would like to see that sort of thing happen in a controlled manner," he said. "He's not into what I would call the theater of politics. ... Some candidates are not what they appear to be, but they are pretty good actors. He's not that sort of individual."
Garcia has shown an independent nature in how he approaches his campaign. For example, he turned down a request from The New Mexican to take part in a short video for display on the newspaper's Web site and initially declined to submit responses to a written questionnaire.
Even in his earlier campaign, he said, he didn't like answering stacks of surveys and attending multiple candidate forums.
Asked what he learned from that earlier race, he said: "That's a good question. I have been thinking about that. What did I learn? To stay out of it? I need to be like the little mouse. At least if you are like the mouse, if you shock him a couple times, he learns not to go over there."
Garcia nevertheless says he won't stop being critical of Bushee, although he said in the interview he didn't want to "bash" the councilor.
"I could live just how I am living," he said, "but I want to make the city a better place."
Contact Julie Ann Grimm at 986-3017 or jgrimm@sfnewmexican.com.
GERALD ANTHONY GARCIA
Age: 61
Birthplace: Santa Fe
Education: Attended elementary school at St. Francis Cathedral School, attended St. Michael's High School and Santa Fe High School; earned engineering degree from New Mexico State University through a state work/study program.
Occupation: Retired
Experience: Worked for the state Highway Department after high school beginning in 1964, also spent six years with the former state Public Service Commission, where he gained experience with utility systems. Garcia also owned a liquor license he used briefly in Albuquerque, mostly for catering for the Knights of Columbus, a Catholic men's organization.
Personal: Son, Michael, is 22.
Have you ever been arrested? Yes. When I was a teenager I was charged with a misdemeanor. The charges were dismissed.
Robbie Dobyns
2/7/2008
Dobyns says his true characteristics — a local since second grade, a father of two daughters, a community volunteer — emerge as people come to understand him.
Dobyns, 59, first smiles his toothy grin, then laughs when asked if he is "The Realtor Candidate."
"No. I'm not. Obviously I can't hide from it, that's what I've been doing for the last two decades," he said. "But I'm local. I'm old."
Dressed in well-worn cowboy boots, corduroy pants and a striped, collared cotton shirt, he offers fresh espresso to visitors to his Palace Avenue office, where he works at Santa Fe Realty Partners. Instead of responding to a reporter's outstretched hand in greeting, he offers a quick hug.
"I'm informal," he says, offering a leather chair in the freshly painted outbuilding of what he says formerly was a Roman Catholic home for unwed mothers.
While his answers to questions about his political ideas are sometimes short, Dobyns waxes long about the history of buildings and his mostly Western-rooted family history. He brags about his daughters — Ayesha, a graduate student studying in Hong Kong, and Andrea, a Santa Fe city police officer.
Dobyns, a graduate of Santa Fe High School and The University of New Mexico, said he's a firm believer in a "good book education." He did post-graduate studies on a philosophy called "historicism." His conversation is peppered with words such as fiduciary, antithetical and proletariat.
He uses self-depreciating humor. On the topic of having a daughter on the front lines of law enforcement, Dobyns says: "I have learned a lot of things in life. I am pretty slow and dim-witted, but one of the main things I have learned is, you don't tell women what to do. That's just one of the rules of life."
Dobyns says his children are one reason he's seeking office. Like other longtime Santa Feans, he says, he feels lucky that half of his progeny still live in the city.
"One of the things that brought me to this race was a little selfish. It was missing children," he said. "I was seeing the best and the brightest of youth leave Santa Fe and never come back, and it was breaking my heart. Because, all of the sudden, you are a bunch of old geezers like me, and we are not the future."
As a Realtor, Dobyns specializes in commercial leases but also helps clients buy and sell houses. He served as the president of the local real-estate association and has made many friends in the field.
Lorin Abbey, a broker at Sotheby's International Realty who formerly worked with Dobyns, said he acted as a mentor when she started out in the business a few years ago. "I appreciated Robbie's native sensibilities," she said. "I liked him right away because he is just very down to earth."
Abbey said the two learned they had a common childhood ranching history, she at her family home in Stanley and Dobyns at the ranch of his uncle, Alva Simpson, which later became Eldorado subdivision.
If elected, Dobyns has said, his first goal would be to work on a sustainable affordable-housing policy.
The candidate says he wouldn't be a puppet for the real-estate industry. He said he realized early in his candidacy he would get that tag. He heard insinuations that his campaign account would be stuffed with money from developers, speculators and their brokers. "There is this insinuation that there is all this money flowing into the campaign," he said, "and that is not true and that is not factual."
In the first round of required campaign-finance statements filed last month, Dobyns reported about half as much money as his opponent. But his money came from two major, real-estate-related sources. He got $2,413 from the New Mexico Realtors political action committee and $1,500 from Santa Fe Realty Partners.
Dobyns said he hopes to run a "very low dollar" campaign. "If I don't resonate within the voting community," he explained, "then I don't deserve to be even looked at, period."
Although he has professional ties to the business community, Dobyns said, he also has connections through his work with various nonprofits. He serves on boards of the KSFR public radio station and Open Hands, a program that serves the elderly.
ROBERT E. DOBYNS JR.
Age: 59
Birthplace: Pensacola, Fla.; moved to Santa Fe in second grade
Education: Wood-Gormley Elementary School, Harrington Jr. High and Santa Fe High; University of New Mexico bachelor's degree in 1972; studied for an advanced degree in historicism at Boston College until 1973
Occupation: Licensed real-estate broker
Work experience: His longest tenure was with French & French Fine Properties; currently an associate broker with Santa Fe Realty Partners. Served as regional vice president of the state Realtors association as well as president of the Santa Fe Realtors association; certified to teach Diversity in Real Estate through the state of New Mexico and teach locally on Fair Housing Law and Cultural Awareness.
Political and civic experience: Serves on the boards of public radio station KSFR and Open Hands, which serves the elderly.
Personal: Divorced father of two adult daughters, Ayesha and Andrea Dobyns. His dog, Lucia, is a pit-bull/dalmation mix.
Have you ever been arrested? "During the invasion of Cambodia and the Kent State massacre, I found myself incarcerated but without charges."
Rosemary Romero
2/8/2008
It's easy to tell you've arrived in her Casa Linda neighborhood because the blue and red signs poke out from many yards along the street.
Romero, 54, a professional facilitator, talks a mile a minute. She appears to be at the controls of an organized political machine.
"I don't think I have ever seen anybody like me running for office in Santa Fe," she declares, describing a career in conflict resolution where she has conducted meetings and written strategic plans on topics such as forest restoration, water supply and the environment.
He schedule, she says, is "crazy." In addition to running for office, she continues to run her own business from home and serves on the boards of directors for four local nonprofits: St. Vincent Regional Medical Center, Farm to Table, Neighborhood Network and Leadership Santa Fe.
She likes to begin each day by about 6 a.m., moving across the hall from her bedroom to her office to answer e-mail in her pajamas. Later, she dons her "business casual" costume, usually combined with a matching set of signature Santa Fe silver-and-gemstone jewelry.
Romero often wears the jewelry when she travels, she said, and people can tell where she is from by what hangs from her ears or her neck.
She has served as director of a national mediation group with 6,000 members and has participated in international workshops, but decided to stay near home for the long term.
"My roots are community," she said. Born in Santa Fe as one of five siblings, Romero's family traces 14 generations in Northern New Mexico. She lives within sight of the first house her parents bought in Santa Fe and spent childhood weekends working on a family ranch near Otowi Bridge.
Romero has experienced life challenges that could have been crippling, but she says built her character. She offers cheerful, if trite, expressions such as "I took lemons and made lemonade" in describing how, after her daughter, Anita, died last year after a long illness, she poured hours into the landscaping of a "pocket park" near her home in the Casa Linda neighborhood off Cerrillos Road and Monterey Drive.
Her brother, Leonard Romero, was shot and killed in 1976 during a downtown traffic jam after the burning of Zozobra. Like her daughter, he was in his mid-20s when he died.
"Our family has suffered, ... and I learned to let go and forgive. Otherwise it would have eaten me alive," Romero said about losing her brother. "I have learned forgiveness at a really profound place, and that's a different way to look at the world. ... Often what happens in Northern New Mexico is that people can't get to the substance of an issue because they are still mad about something that happened last year or the year before or 10 years ago."
Financial support for her candidacy is coming from family, friends and business colleagues. While her opponent's first campaign finance report showed heavy backing by a real-estate political action committee, Romero reported she raised a little over $9,000 from a list of individuals.
Among them is Marylin Bane, who unsuccessfully ran for a council seat in District 2 during the last election. Bane, past president of Old Santa Fe Association, had planned to run again this year but dropped out of the race when Romero stepped forward. She serves with Romero on the board of directors for the Neighborhood Network and said the two have a "personal connection."
"I know her clarity of thinking, and I know her principles," said Bane, "particularly in terms of neighborhood advocacy."
Romero likes to be identified that way but says she'll always listen to all sides of an issue when making decisions on the council.
She oozes confidence. "I'm tough," she said. "I don't think it is going to be close. I think I have support from people wanting somebody who is balanced. ... I think I've got it."
ROSEMARY ROMERO
Age: 54
Birthplace: Santa Fe
Education: Associate of Arts, Santa Fe Community College; attended College of Santa Fe's Environmental Management Program; attended Antioch College in Yellow Springs, Ohio; 200 hours of mediation, facilitation and strategic planning training; 1994 graduate of Leadership New Mexico Program
Occupation: Facilitator/mediator
Work experience: 16 years as partner at Western Network, a nonprofit organization focused on environmental mediation and public involvement; seven years self-employed consultant
Other experience: Former city Planning Commission member; facilitation and strategic planning for federal, state and local agencies and tribal governments; St. Vincent Regional Medical Center board member; past president and board member of Leadership Santa Fe; Farm to Table board member; has been involved with Santa Fe Conservation Trust; United Way Santa Fe County past president; Association for Conflict Resolution past president; La Nueva Vida; Friends of Farmers Market; Girls Inc.; Santa Fe County Pregnancy Taskforce; Choices Program
Campaign finance: Reported donations of $9,011, with major contributions from Canyon Road attorney Richard Ellenberg, Walter Ganz and physician David Gunderdson
Personal: Single, partner Rob Leutheuser; daughter Linnea Morris and fiancé Christian Moreno; dogs Angela and LitaFord; and cats Zoe and CB
Have you ever been arrested? No
Miguel Chavez: Incumbent emphasizes heritage
2/9/2008
The words are reflected in his lifestyle. He spends his days building traditional furniture, milling away in a tidy workshop in his backyard off Baca Street.
It's a yard busy with more than a dozen urban chickens and from which he can see the house where his wife grew up. Inside, the walls are decorated with fading ancestral portraits. More recent cultural milestones recorded there include an 8-by-10 photograph of his oldest daughter, Elena, now 29, who was picked to lead the Fiesta court as queen in 1997.
Miguel Chavez, 53, has a soft voice that he sometimes uses to unleash long speeches about New Mexico's and Santa Fe's past. At times, he's emotional about that topic.
His family roots trace to the Spanish explorers Juan de Oñate and Don Diego de Vargas, and Chavez enjoys participating in the Caballeros de Vargas, a Roman Catholic men's group that he explains is "a sort of an honor guard responsible for safeguarding the image of Our Lady of Peace," a figure of the Virgin Mary also known as La Conquistadora.
"I have tried to balance that background with the decisions that we have to make in putting the interest of the public ahead of any special cultural interests," the two-term councilor said.
That posture was tested during a City Council scuffle last year over a proposal to name of the new Southside Branch Library in honor of a member of New Mexico's Maloof family in exchange for a $1 million donation to help fund library operations. Chavez sponsored a proposal to adopt the name, but an ensuing debate turned into what some in the community perceived as an unnecessarily polarizing of Hispanos versus Anglos, he said.
When other councilors balked at the Maloof name, a compromise was proposed under which the city would accept the donation and name the library after Mike Maloof, with the condition that an already-named downtown branch be renamed in honor of the late historian and educator Pedro Ortega.
Instead of arguing against the notion, Chavez said, he went along with what he thought was a workable solution. Now, he regrets the idea.
"I feel like the public lost," he said. The Maloofs, discouraged by the unfolding drama, withdrew their offer. Chavez said the library still does not have the long-term funding or operating plan in place that it deserves.
Chavez was known in younger years as "Mike" or "Michael" outside his home. He quit high school at the beginning of his junior year to pursue his own business. He trained in the construction trades and learned woodworking from various family members and mentors, and has ever since been self-employed.
He doesn't regret dropping out during the early 1970s, a tumultuous period in the nation, he said. "I really wasn't being challenged," he said. "I just didn't fit in, and so I went to work and continued working. I was fortunate to find a trade I could excel in."
He began his political life as a teenager when he helped his father, Mariano A. Chavez, run for an at-large City Council post in 1971. The elder Chavez lost the election to Sam Pick, who later became mayor. But the younger Chavez didn't realize he would aspire to be an elected official — or as he prefers to label the job, a public servant — until about 20 years later.
"I started going to City Council meetings back when there was no public access (via cable television). So if you wanted to know what was going on, you had to go to City Hall," he said. "I would go to City Hall and I would go to the back of the room and I would watch and I would listen and try to pay attention."
He soon was appointed as a citizen member of the board of directors of Tierra Contenta Corp., which oversees the city-initiated affordable-housing project in southwest Santa Fe. He later was named an at-large member of the Occupational Tax Advisory Board, which recommends how the city should spend money raised by a tax on hotel rooms.
It was during that service that he became interested in advocating for the city to promote authentic culture and heritage tourism, helping push a city policy that would not only help his cottage woodworking industry, but other craftspeople as well.
He still works on that mission, he says, and is proud of his role in getting a permanent gallery space for locally produced work in the civic center that is slated for completion this year.
Fred Flatt, who runs a business-form and check-printing company and lives in District 3, is one of Chavez's supporters. Chavez got Flatt appointed to the city Ethics and Campaign Review Board. Flatt said he wants to see Chavez stay on the council because he's a voice for "the common man." "He's a humble man," Flatt said. "He's very much a man of the people."
Chavez first ran for the City Council in 1996, losing in a three-way race. Then-Mayor Debbie Jaramillo appointed him that year to the city Public Works Committee, a move the council later overturned.
But his next campaign earned him election in 2000, when he beat incumbent Art Sanchez and now-Mayor David Coss. Chavez then won re-election in 2004.
His goals have become broader since he took office, but a 1990 story in a publication about Santa Fe's annual Spanish Market shows Chavez had already developed his life emphasis.
"I'm trying to hold on a little bit tighter to our heritage," he told a reporter more than 18 years ago. "If I can in my own small way preserve part of that heritage, hopefully my kids will grasp onto it and continue it."
MIGUEL MARIANO CHAVEZ
Age: 53
Birthplace: Las Cruces; his family moved back to Santa Fe when he was 3 years old.
Education: General educational development certificate
Occupation: Furniture maker; owns Chavez Woodworks
Work experience: Self-employed since 1978
Political or community experience: Worked on his father's City Council campaign in 1971; won election to City Council in 2000 and 2004; chairs city Public Utilities Committee; served on Tierra Contenta Corp. board of directors and as member of Occupancy Tax Advisory Board and Mayor's Apprenticeship Task Force
Personal: Married to Liz Chavez since 1978. Three children: Elena, Camilia and Manuel. Elena is married to Brian Tercero and they have two children. Chavez has a dog named Spike, two roosters (Dominic and Pico de Gallo), 11 hens and one goldfish.
Campaign finance: Chavez reported collections of $8,379, more than half of which he rolled over from a previous campaign. His major contributors include minimum-wage-law activists Carol Oppenheimer and Morton Simon.
Have you ever been arrested? No
Martin Lujan: Seeks to bring community together
2/9/2008
"Martin loves to read," he said, referring to himself in the third person. "I believe you can learn a lot of the things in life from leaders. ... I am a life learner."
He offers inspirational observations such as: "It takes a village to raise a child. I think we are so busy building the village that we forget about the child." Or "Through life we are always going to go through times where we have to think, 'What sacrifices do we need to make to see the bigger outcome?' "
He said getting elected twice to the Santa Fe school board and facing decisions for public schools was good preparation for his City Council bid. But he maintains it wasn't his aim to use the school-board post as a springboard.
Lujan, 42, is one of six siblings. He grew up in what is now Council District 3 and left Santa Fe briefly to attend New Mexico State University in Las Cruces. A high-school athlete and senior class president, he went by "Marty" when he was younger.
He has a continuing interest in sports and has coached wrestling, football and basketball up to the junior-high level. He works as an assistant division director at the city of Santa Fe's Genoveva Chavez Community Center. He held a golf tournament to raise campaign funds.
The candidate enjoys support from many in the education community, including former school board member Carmichael Dominguez, who in 2006 was elected to District 3's other council seat.
Lujan said he wouldn't align automatically with Dominguez to form a voting bloc, but the two are longtime friends and hunting partners. Dominguez said he looks forward to having Lujan as a colleague because the two share a vision.
"I know that we work well together, and that was something that was evident at Santa Fe Public Schools," Lujan said. "I have to stress that we did not always agree. There were times that we battled in chambers very hard. ... But we always knew that we had to move on to tackle the next issue, and that's what we would do."
Dominguez would also be Lujan's neighbor if the candidate buys a Tierra Contena lot he has his eye on.
Exactly where Lujan calls home has been a campaign issue. Lujan this fall changed his voter registration to a house he rented on Hickox Street, but his family has continued to live in another house they own outside the city's limits.
The house on Hickox is both within Lujan's school-board district and the City Council district he seeks to represent. However, while the lot he's trying to buy is within the City Council district, it's outside the area he represents on the school board.
Lujan said he and his wife, Sue, the principal at Capshaw Middle School, stay in the Hickox home sometimes but not every night. He says the transition "has been challenging."
But Lujan said he makes a point to have "committed family time" and to tuck his 3-year-old son into bed at his county house.
Lujan said his ideal situation would be to build in Tierra Contenta after selling the county house, which has been on the market for more than a year.
"I am crossing my fingers because the market is not as hot as it used to be," he said. "I moved into District 3. I made that commitment, and we are committed to moving. My wife and I are looking for a sense of neighborhood where we will have the local school and the local park. Right now, we don't really have that. ... Soon enough we will be building the home we'd like to see in District 3."
Lujan said he didn't get negative feedback after a story appeared in The New Mexican in which the incumbent councilor, Miguel Chavez, said it appeared Lujan was trying to mislead voters.
"What I heard was 'What is he trying to say?' Because I think if you know Martin Lujan — if I'm committed to do something, I am going to do it. I am going to follow through."
Lujan said he's interested in working on better relationships within the community. He said he is proud that he recently was asked to film part of a documentary with the son of civil-rights leader the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. and that he got to talk about "living the dream."
"We talk about our immigrant community, and we talk our Anglo community, our Native community, our Hispanic community. That's not what I'm looking at. Todos son Latinos. We are all together. We almost need to re-educate people about how it works. The power is in the numbers. The power is in being together."
Lujan describes himself as "an early riser," saying he's up most days by 5:30 a.m. If he is elected, he said, he will have to both resign from the school board and quit the job from which he has already taken a leave of absence to campaign. Nevertheless, he said, he's got "new energy" to bring to the council.
MARTIN G. LUJAN
Age: 42
Birthplace: Santa Fe
Education: Associate of Applied Science degree and a Bachelor of Science degree from New Mexico State University; certificate in executive management from The University of New Mexico's Robert O. Anderson Graduate School of Management
Occupation: Assistant division director at the Genoveva Chavez Community Center
Work experience: City employee for more than two decades
Other experience: Elected to two terms on the Santa Fe Public Schools Board of Education; 2001-present, Santa Fe Regional Juvenile Justice Board; 2001-present, National Association of Latino Elected Officials; 2001-present, New Mexico School Boards Association; 2001-2004 Santa Fe Junior Wrestling Association
Personal: Married to Sue Lujan; nearly 4-year-old son, Lucas Martin Lujan; two dogs, Lab mixes Buddy and Maggie
Campaign finance: Lujan had collected $11,350 as part of the first campaign finance report, filed on Jan. 24. Among major donors were investor Garret Thornburg and Canyon Road retiree Thomas Dillenberg.
Have you ever been arrested? "Twenty-three years ago, while a student at NMSU, a fraternity brother and I were detained for trespassing. No charges were ever filed and no action taken."
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