Community Partnership Program
Most large urban areas in New Mexico contain large tracts of trust land within or close to their borders. This offers many opportunities for community partnerships with local governments to make trust lands available for business and industrial parks, recreational facilities, open space, housing (including affordable housing), and joint planning. As New Mexico communities – 32 counties and more than 100 municipalities - complete and update their comprehensive master plans for future growth and development, the State Land Office can become a strategic partner. Commissioner Powell has directed staff to work with those communities to develop joint planning agreements that integrate trust land planning with long-term land use planning, infrastructure extension, and overall growth and development goals of local government.
The State Land Office has entered into a joint planning agreement (JPA) with the City of Rio Rancho and several other cities and counties are under consideration. Joint planning efforts have resulted in business leases for economic development, such as business and industrial parks in several New Mexico cities and counties, including f Aztec, Las Cruces, Santa Fe and Lea counties.
For more information, contact Thomas Leatherwood, Urban and Regional Planner, at (505) 827-5792.