Albuquerque Economic

Revival
A Proposal to the Albuquerque City Council
By:
Christian Pacheco
12/12/16

Table of Contents
I.

INTRODUCTION....3

II. NEEDS/PROBLEMS..3
III. GOALS/OBJECTIVES...6
IV. QUALIFICATIONS....7
V. COST/BENEFIT ANALYSIS7
VI. CONCLUSION...9
VII.

WORKS CITED....10

I. Introduction
As most of us know, New Mexico isnt known for its thriving economy, successful
businesses, and great economic climate. Instead, New Mexico is known for its atrocious crime
rate, poverty ridden communities, poor labor supply, and poor standard of living. According to
Forbes.com, New Mexico is 47th in the nation for Best States for Business. To achieve such a
low ranking, Forbes.com provides a short list of related rankings to back up the #47 placement.
These rankings include: #27 in Business Costs, #47 in Labor Supply, #33 in Regulatory
Environment, #49 in Economic Climate, #34 in Growth Prospects, and #43 in Quality of Life. As
you can clearly see, New Mexico isnt the best place for business, and a place where business
doesnt flourish is a place where the community suffers.
There is a way to turn the tables, however. Albuquerque is New Mexicos largest city
with a population of more than two million citizens. This means the economic climate of New
Mexico relies heavily on how much success comes from the citys businesses. If we as a
community, and I mean everyone in the community, can come together to fix the issues our city
struggles with the most, then our economy and very way of living may be able to start down a
path of recovery and hopefully, prosperity.

II. Needs/Problems
In order to fully understand the requirements to improve our economy, I must start with
the issues we must tackle in order to begin improvement. As I stated above, New Mexico has
many problems that affect our economy. Comparable to a sickness that damages our bodies until

we ingest medicine, Albuquerque is a city that is undergoing a prolonged sickness that has yet to
be treated.
The issues that plague our city stare us in the face every single day and we choose to
ignore them. Albuquerque is ranked 25th in the nation as one of the US cities with the highest
violent crime rates (World Atlas). This is due in part to our laughable police force. Without a
doubt, we here in Albuquerque know that our police force is lacking and the crime rate in
Albuquerque is reflective of that. An exorbitant amount of crime, including murder and theft
is increasing year by year.
Another issue is our businesses. New Mexicos economy is heavily reliant on tourism,
oil and gas production, and the federal government. To many, we may see that as good
considering that all of those sources are economic influencers nationwide, but so is business,
large and small. Many businesses in New Mexico are locally owned and are mostly family
operated, which dont bring in a whole lot of revenue to the state and its cities.
Lastly, a major issue that needs solving is education. Part of the reason for our poor
economy is our education systems and attainment rates. Right now New Mexicos attainment
rate for high schools is sitting very nicely at 84.2%, but when we speak in terms of college
attainment, the number plummets to a mere 26.5% with 11.4% of graduate degrees. The
reason for these numbers is the lack of money being brought into a household which stems
from poor labor supply, quality of life, and job growth.
These issues are in dire need of fixing and to do that we need help from people that can
set actions into motion. The Albuquerque City Council, to whom I am now addressing, can
do just that. I believe that if we can come together to improve our police force by having

patrols doubled, laws enforced more strictly (no matter how minor), and an increase in
funding to allow an increase in pay grades for each officer to keep them around and give
them a reason to keep a meal on the table for their families. Alongside the strengthening of
our police department, we need to allow more business to flow in and out of Albuquerque.
This means allowing franchises into the state that are not currently allowed. In-N-Out is a
great example of a franchise that is dearly loved by many in our nation. Although we have a
successful franchise of the same sort, Blakes Lotaburger, it would be more beneficial to have
both as a means of revenue generation. We would not stop there either. Many businesses
nationwide are flourishing and are looking to expand, but the idea of expansion comes with
limitations, and those limitations include the quality of life in certain areas, which brings me
to our next issue. Crime is a major issue in the city and with our improvement to the police
force, we can shave off the number of crimes committed annually, which may allow outside
business to come to us. This will allow labor supply to increase and with that, more jobs will
be created and poverty will decrease. For a visual representation of what our workforce is
looking like at this point, I have provided a graph that shows the unemployment rate from
September 2015 to September 2016

Figure1

Unemployment Rate
2015-Sep

2016-Sep
4.8
4.9

United States

6.2
6.1

Albuquerque Area

5.9
5.8

Bernalillo Co.

6.8
6.6

Sandoval Co.

9
8.8

Torrance Co.
7.1
7.2

Valencia Co.

As you can see in Figure-1, our unemployment rate has risen in the past year in almost
every major county. The improvement of living conditions will fix this given proper time and
steady improvements to our society.
Lastly, I would like to state the need for improvement in our education system. We are
doing great in high school attainment and graduation, but many students dont attend college
because of financial restraints. This issue can be fixed along with the issues I have stated
previously through the same methods, but also need a solution to compliment these methods.
More scholarships need to be available for a broader range of academic and extracurricular
achievements to allow students who may not be lucky enough to attend even a community
college. To provide these scholarships, I ask that funds be made available to supply these
scholarships by external benefactors. A charity can be put into place where men and women
across the nation can contribute to the success of newer, upcoming generations.

III. Goals/Objectives
The goal I plan to achieve from this proposal is economic stability, better living
conditions, and to make Albuquerque a better place overall. This goal will not be obtained
overnight as it is heavily demanding. However, I believe that as the years go on and we make
progress along the way, this goal will be met and hopefully, exceeded. Our main focus is to
bring money into the city, and to accomplish this we need to spend money. To increase the
effectiveness of our police department and to lower the crime rate, we need to fund them
properly to keep them working at their full potential. To bring more money into the state, we
need to allow more ways for money to be made within the state, and that means allowing
more business to come in and out. To do this, we need to evaluate what our citizens need,
narrow our search, and reach out to businesses outside the state and invite them in to expand
their business. This will open up a whole range of jobs for our citizens to utilize. If we can
reduce our unemployment rate by 2-3% we will be in great shape, as a 3%-4%
unemployment rate is a nationally ideal rate to obtain to create an economically stable
climate. If we can obtain a greater labor supply, lower crime and unemployment rate, and a
higher rate of income per household, we will be on track to bringing economic efficiency
back to Albuquerque.
IV. QUALIFICATIONS
I am currently a business student at the University of New Mexico through the Anderson
School of Management and pursuing a major in Marketing and a minor in Economics. I
believe that my knowledge of both areas of business qualify me for knowing what our city

needs in order to thrive. Along with that, I have experience in dealing with economic
decisions in the workplace that allow for more revenue to accumulate based on those
decisions. If I can gain your support, councilors, I believe that we will be able to make a real
change. We need this, we need economic stability and prosperity if we hope to bring
Albuquerque out of the poverty ridden, crime dense hole our it is in. With you by my side
and many others who are willing to support this cause, nothing can stop us.
V. COST/BENEFIT ANALYSIS
As I stated previously, we have to spend money to make money. Because of this, this
project will not be cheap, but at the same time, I believe that it will be cost efficient in the
long run. It will cost millions to fund the police department, procure agreements to allow
business into the state that were not previously allowed before, and fund scholarships for
students who wish to attend a higher level educational institution. I estimate that the average
annual cost for this project is between 60-80 million dollars. If we can allow businesses
within the state sooner rather than later, this cost could decrease as the years go by and within
ten years, we may be looking at average annual costs within the 25-40 million dollar range.
In the figure below I have compiled projected annual costs of this project. As you can see,
after a few decades, the cost to attract business into Albuquerque will decline, as businesses
will eventually have the desire to expand into New Mexico. Law enforcement and
educational funding will remain priorities in that each will be funded consistently year after
year.

Chart Title
40
35
30
External Business

25
Cost (in millions)

Law Enforcement Funding

20

Educational Funding

15
10
5
0

VI. CONCLUSION
The benefits of this project are difficult to dismiss as they include a better way of life for
those who live in Albuquerque and those who plan to live here. That is my main concern
because this city has been given such a bad image, and for good reason. I would like for the
Land of Enchantment to be what the title suggests and that includes Albuquerque. We cannot
accomplish that if this proposal is not taken into consideration. I hope that what I have
provided is more than enough to convince you all that this city and this state needs a new
economic climate, one that is sustainable and beneficial to all. I thank you all and hope that
you will take my proposal into consideration. If you would like to contact me with any

questions or concerns, I am available by email at chpacheco@unm.edu and by phone at

(505)-850-4299.

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Works Cited
1. "OECD Economic Surveys: Euro Area 2003 (Summary in Italian)." OECD Economic
Surveys: Euro Area OECD Economic Surveys: Euro Area 2003 (2004): n. pag.Www.bls.gov.
Web. 9 Nov. 2016.
2. "Why Not Target a 3% Unemployment Rate?" Bloomberg.com. Bloomberg, n.d. Web. 01
Nov. 2016.
3. "Albuquerque, NM." Forbes. Forbes Magazine, n.d. Web. 01 Nov. 2016.
4. Boetel, Ryan. "Report: NM Ranks 2nd in Nation for Violent Crime." Albuquerque
Journal. N.p., n.d. Web. 01 Nov. 2016.

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