The Española City Council shot down a resolution to approve the purchase of city-owned property off of North Riverside Drive for a second time at its Feb. 10 meeting.

Carlsbad, California-based company Public Safety Towers originally moved to purchase the property in November for $135,000.

According to documents from the company submitted to the city’s Planning and Zoning department, it planned to build a 235-foot-tall support tower surrounded by a 50-foot by 50-foot fence at 1813 N. Riverside Drive.

The council rejected a resolution to sell the property at the Dec. 9 meeting and at the time, District 1 Councilor Pedro Valdez was the sole vote in favor of the project.

Although it was rejected just about two months ago, Valdez broke council procedures to get it back on the agenda.

District 2 Councilor Peggy Sue Martinez immediately called this out during discussion about the resolution and said Valdez’s choice to put it back on the agenda was offensive.

Only a person who voted in the majority to reject a motion on a resolution can bring it back for reconsideration, Martinez said.

“Councilor Valdez did not vote in favor of that motion, so he should not have the ability to bring it back,” she said. “What happens in that scenario is that what you’re doing is you’re challenging the councils’ authority to govern the community.”

Community Development Director Mike Adams presented the resolution to council at both meetings.

Valdez defended his support of the sale and said it raised money for the city and supported the police and fire departments, as well as schools.

District 4 Councilor Samuel LeDoux said that while public safety is in the name of the company, it does not mean that this tower will help those departments.

The antenna array at the top of

“Councilor (Pedro) Valdez did not vote in favor of that motion, so he should not have the ability to bring it back. What happens in that scenario is that what you’re doing is you’re challenging the councils’ authority to govern the community.”

— Peggy Sue Martinez District 2 city councilor the tower would belong to AT&T, which LeDoux said does not provide good service to the area. It would not impact city-owned cellphone service because the city recently switched service from Verizon to T-Mobile.

At the Dec. 9 meeting, Martinez and Mayor Pro Tem Justin Salazar-Torrez said that they wanted to see community input on the project if it were to ever be brought back to council for reconsideration.

Neither Adams or Valdez presented public feedback during the meeting.

“I know that both Pedro and former city manager (Lauren) Reichelt were the ones who wanted to put it back on the agenda,” LeDoux said. “I think if they wanted to do that, they should have gotten buy-in from the community, did all the things that were suggested by both Councilor Martinez and Councilor Salazar-Torrez and then we could have that discussion, but it wasn’t done.”

He said this is an example of why he wants to bring back the practice of council sponsorships. Two councilors would have to approve an item before it could be listed on the agenda.

Martinez then apologized to City Manager and Police Chief Mizel Garcia, who took on the dual role in January, for the resolution appearing on the agenda.

“We put you in the bad place because I don’t think you realize that we already defeated this, and it should have never come back the way it came back,” she said.