Electric co-op riven by lawsuit, political conflict

Ousted board member is trying to get his seat back, remove someone else

A former member of the Jemez Mountain Electrical Cooperative Board, who recently was removed from the panel after winning an unopposed election, is suing to get his position back and to have another board member removed.

Bruce Duran of El Rancho, whose June election was invalidated by a split vote of the co-op board in early July, filed the lawsuit this week in state District Court in Santa Fe.

Duran’s opponents on the board claimed he didn’t meet qualifications because he is not a valid member of the co-op. They noted Duran’s wife — from whom he is legally separated — paid most of the recent electric bills for the house. Despite the separation, the couple still resides in the home, said Duran’s lawyer, A. Blair Dunn.

“I am very concerned that this board under its current leadership is incapable of acting with integrity and following the bylaws,” Duran said in a news release.

Dunn, representing four plaintiffs, said in a news release the co-op’s lawyer, Chuck Garcia, is giving the board “advice to play stupid games. … We all know what happens when you play stupid games, you win stupid prizes like earning yourself a lawsuit that should never have had to happen.”

Jemez Mountain is the largest electric co-op in the state, supplying electricity for parts of five counties, including Rio Arriba, Santa Fe, San Juan, McKinley and Sandoval. A 2017 annual report submitted to the state Public Regulation Commission says the co-op has more than 21,000 members.

Dunn said Friday that while the Durans are separated and have a property division agreement, the

couple is not divorced.

He added that under Jemez Mountain’s bylaws, married couples have a joint membership in the co-op, even if just one name appears on their membership agreement.

Board Chairman Nick Naranjo declined to comment on the lawsuit, referring questions to Garcia, who couldn’t be reached for comment Friday.

Besides reinstating Duran, the lawsuit also asks the court to remove another board member, Lucas Cordova, claiming Cordova doesn’t live in the district that elected him.

Patrick Herrera, a former Española school board member who lost to Cordova in June’s co-op election, also is a plaintiff in the suit. Herrera and Duran ran on a “reform” slate in last month’s election, as did Dixon garlic farmer Stanley Crawford, who defeated incumbent Victor Salazar.

Cordova lives in co-op District 4, Ward B, the lawsuit says. However, the district from which he was elected was District 4, Ward A.

Citing voting records kept by New Mexico’s secretary of state, the lawsuit says Cordova since 1996 has voted in 10 school district elections, nine city elections and 22 general and primary elections from his home on East Granada Street in Española, which is in Ward B.

“Plaintiff Patrick Herrera is the properly qualified candidate that received the highest number of votes for the trustee of District 4, Ward A,” the lawsuit says.

In the news release Herrera said members of the electrical co-op “deserve to be represented by someone that is actually a bona fide resident of the ward. Lucas Cordova does not reside in the ward and it is flat wrong for the board to continue this charade.”

Cordova — who was with the majority of trustees who voted to remove Duran — couldn’t be reached for comment Friday.

The Rio Grande Sun reported this week that Cordova’s co-op membership is linked to a home in Chili, which is in the ward that elected him.

The co-op’s website says Cordova “resides in Española and represents Chili, Chamita and other areas from Santa Clara Pueblo north to Medanales including Lyden and La Canova west of the Rio Grande River.”

The Sun quoted Garcia as saying that residency requirements for a co-op election are different than those in national, state and local elections.

There are two other plaintiffs in the lawsuit: co-op board member David Salazar of Española and Robert Garcia, who lives in Santa Fe County.

The case has been assigned to state District Judge Bryan Biedscheid.