Conferences won’t solve violence

After reading in The New Mexican about the rash of violence in Española (“Española gathering to confront violence,” Oct. 29), I felt I could share some information. This was not a rash of violence. This is how we live. This is us. Anyone who lives here (like me) was not shocked but heartbroken to see more lives destroyed by the perpetual preventable stupidity.

I love Española. I also like to work with realities. It gets real, quick, when your child goes out with some friends and never comes home.

While most of Santa Fe is worried about Donald Trump’s tweets or weeds in the sidewalk, we are killing each other. We kill each other with bullets. We kill with drugs, with cars, stupidity and heartache.

Another conference will not help our problems, and Mayor Javier Sanchez and others, both inside and outside city government, know it. Mayor Sanchez states that they are going to get together and “uncover the root causes of the destruction that pervades us.” Without a conference, I can clear up his confusion.

We have one of the worst education systems in the nation.

We have one of the worst drug problems in the nation.

Our citizens accept this as the norm.

Our elected officials do nothing but squander taxpayer money and hold conferences.

It’s very simple — when we address these problems, Española can and will improve.

Our elected officials are corrupt and self-serving. Decades of history prove this. We the people, our citizens, need to get up and do something — not march around with silly signs complaining or voting in more corruption — really do something positive for our community.

If we are waiting on the mayor’s conference to fix our problems, then get ready for more death. That’s the reality.

P.S. Good luck with those weeds.