Peralta Fiestas canceled

PERALTA — There will be no ninth annual Fiestas de Peralta y Valencia this year.

That was the decision from the Peralta Town Council during a regular meeting of the council on Tuesday, Sept. 9.

The fiestas were planned for Saturday, Oct. 4. Signs promoting the event had already been put up in town, and raffle tickets had already been printed for the event.

Peralta Town Councilor Claudio Moya, who has played an integral role in planning the fiesta every year, first alerted the council to potential problems due to parking and space for the fiesta activities during the council’s Aug. 12 meeting.

Discussion about parking and the fiestas came up during that meeting. Moya said the town was going to need extra help with parking.

Councilor Randy Smith suggested eliminating the fiesta’s car show, which would give extra space needed for parking. The fiestas’ parade and fireworks display were also eliminated at the time.

In the Sept. 9 meeting, Moya brought up the issue of canceling the fiestas entirely due to safety concerns stemming from the parking issue, which has been made worse this year due to ongoing construction around the new Peralta Elementary School building at the corner of N.M. 47 and Molina Road in Peralta.

Moya said in his report that two parking areas had been found, but that he had his doubts about them and asked the council for guidance.

“I measured it and in my opinion, it’s not enough parking,” said Mayor Bryan Olguin. “If the rain comes, we’ll have problems.”

Revelers at last year’s fiestas reported that parking lots were very muddy and messy due to rain, something the council said they didn’t want to see happen again.

Moya said he needed a decision to let vendors and other people know as soon as possible.

The discussion on the point first went on ideas of how to keep the fiestas going for this year, but eventually, the entire council and the mayor agreed that having the fiestas this year was just not feasible under the circumstances.

Olguin said the fiestas postponement hurt but was necessary with the current situation.

“This just fell in an awkward time,” he said, “and rather than see an incident happen and somebody get hurt, we felt this had to happen, what with the rains that we’ve had over the several years we’ve had the fiestas. And then having to park so far, with people walking in. That’s just a recipe for trouble there. So we don’t want to go down that path. Now, we just build it up for a bigger and better one next year.”

Olguin further explained after the meeting that property across N.M. 47 from the elementary school cannot be used due to it being used as a staging area for the ongoing school construction.

“It’s disappointing, but we’ve got to look at the big picture and do what’s best for everybody here and not put ourselves in a predicament here,” he said. “It’s a sad one with me going out this year.”

Flooding on La Ladera Road

During her report to the council, Peralta Town Clerk Kori Taylor reported some of the “worst flooding residents have seen in years” happened on La Ladera Road on the eastern outskirts of town limits on Saturday, Sept 6.

Torrential raids from a large thunderstorm that night caused large amounts of water and sand to flood off the mesa east of Peralta and cause havoc for residents. Taylor reported that several properties were severely damaged, with some residents “unable to get out of their homes due to roads being washed out.”

She added that gas lines were exposed, phone pedestals installed by CenturyLink were wiped out, along with exposed cables and wires. Other damages came to pipe fences and mobile homes, which had skirting torn off by the flooding.

Some residents were also unable to get out of their homes due to roads being washed out.

“We’re still working on the roads and were able to get people out,” she told the council last week. “Our crews started working at 10 p.m. Saturday night, and they worked until 2 o’clock in the morning trying to clear the road from all the sand and debris.

“They came back Sunday morning and found roads washed out and gas lines exposed.”

She also reported that crews worked with Desert Fox Paving to clear the roads on Monday and Tuesday, Sept. 8 and 9. Some areas of La Ladera Road were still covered in sand on the night of Sept. 9.

On Monday, Sept. 15, Deputy Town Clerk Steve Robbins said crews had continued work the rest of the week and much of the sand had been cleared. The rains that came to the county Friday night, Sept. 12, did not add to the damage, he said.

“We’ve had crews out working on the roads every day since then and continue to do the best they can,” Robbins said on Monday. “What’s really the problem is that a couple of roads out there are private. Black Quail Run is public, but Redondo and Peanut Roads, my understanding is that they’re private, so the work we can do there is very limited.”

In her report, Taylor said she met with Valencia County Emergency Manager Sarah Gillen to talk about the possibility of Peralta getting reimbursed for the cost that it incurred from the flood damage. The town will also be looking into getting additional help from the state and federal government.