A new voice for Congress?

Santa Fe County Commissioner Harry Montoya is running for Congress and argues that he, and not the two perceived front runner, has the experience to do the job.

From the first time you hear Harry Montoya’s voice, you can tell he’s from northern New Mexico. Montoya was born and raised in the 3rd Congressional District.

He has worked for years in the district, first on the Pojoaque Valley School Board from 1994 to 1999. In 2002 Montoya successfully ran for Santa Fe County commissioner, and he continues to hold that position; it is this experience, Montoya feels, that makes him the ideal candidate for the 3rd Congressional District to replace U.S. Rep. Tom Udall, D-N.M., who is running for the soon-to-be-vacant Senate seat held by Republican Pete Domenici.

Some have noticed.

In April the Nambe Pueblo endorsed Montoya. The Los Alamos Montior followed suit on May 7.

He has more governmental experience and a wider range of knowledge of northern New Mexico. Given that our next Congressional delegation will be all rookies, we need to send someone who can hit the ground running the fastest and we believe from the Democratic side, that is Montoya.

Montoya told the Independent in a phone interview he has more experience than anyone else in the race.

“I believe the other experience that I bring is working at the local level, at the state level, at the federal level, at the tribal level, even at the international level,” he said.

Increasingly, Montoya has found it difficult to get his message out, however. His better-known rivals -- and many say frontrunners for the Democratic nomination -- Public Regulation Commissioner Ben Ray Lujan and Santa Fe developer Don Wiviott are engaged in a fierce battle with two weeks to go before the June 3 primary. Wiviott started running a negative ad questioning Lujan's experience, prompting the Lujan campaign to disparage the ad and put out its own fact sheet.

The sparring has left lesser-known candidates groping for traction in their efforts to tell voters about their experience and stands on issues.

Montoya cited his work with the U.S. Embassy developing substance abuse programs in Mexico and Argentina in addition to his work in New Mexico.

“I’ve advocated and lobbied on Capitol Hill on behalf of education,” Montoya said of his experience in Washington, “on behalf of IDEA, Individuals with Disabilities Education Act, making sure that is something that is fully funded.”

And Montoya believes he is doing it on his own terms, the same way he has always done politics.

“I’m not independently wealthy, and, like I said, I don’t have anyone’s political coattails to ride on either,” Montoya said, referring to his two main Democratic primary opponents. Wiviott has loaned his campaign more than $1 million and Ben Ray Lujan is the son of powerful state House speaker Ben Lujan, D-Nambe.

“I am definitely doing what I know how to do, and that’s person to person, community to community,” Montoya said.

While Montoya's answers about the campaign are short, his responses on talking about both local and national issues are detailed. And Montoya can bring the national issues, such as high gas prices, down to the local level.

“Gasoline prices are taking a toll on everyone,” Montoya said. “Farmers and ranchers are getting hit especially hard because they have not only the big trucks that they need to do their work, but also the equipment that they need to do their work as well.”

So what will Montoya do about gas prices if he becomes a member of Congress?

His solutions include “tax incentives for hybrid vehicles, tax incentives for the creation of alternative fuel and alternative energy as well.”

The tax incentives would be for both manufacturers and consumers, and Montoya emphasized it would be "more so for the consumer" than the manufacturers. "But," Montoya admitted, "in order to get the big corporations to work with us on the reduction of the fossil fuels, we need to get them involved."

On the big issues, Montoya has clear stances. When asked where he stands on single-payer health care, he said, "I favor a single-payer system."

Montoya cites Germany, France and Switzerland as countries with universal health care plans that work.

My brother is stationed out there now; he’s in the Army there in Germany. He was telling me that they’ve got a selection so that you can pretty much pick what it is that best fits your needs. We need to look at what those countries have done, Canada as well. I recently ran into a Canadian national, and he told me that people here talk about how their health care system doesn’t work -- but in reality it does. He had an emergency procedure that he had to have an operation, and he got it taken care of right away.

He supports a timetable to withdraw troops from Iraq, with all troops to be out of the country within 12-18 months. Along with the draw-down of troops, he said the funding needs to be cut in proportion.

Montoya has the stances on the big issues, but he also recognizes that some issues are unique to New Mexico and the West that need to be addressed. One issue that doesn't get much attention, Montoya said, is water. Where the water is going to come from and how it will get to those who need it is important in his county and throughout the district, Montoya said.

An extreme example is that of the community of Chimayo. According to an Infrastructure Capital Improvement Plan for the years 2009-13, residents of Chimayo use an approach that seems anachronous to the 21st century to get their water. "As of today," the report, dated Nov. 2, 2007, said, "the citizens continue to draw drinking water from the centrally-located water buffalo [and] portable water tank."

In 2001, the report said, Gov. Gary Johnson was forced to declare a state of emergency for the area after the New Mexico Environment Department and the New Mexico Department of Health "identified the presence of fecal coliform, and/or total coliform in the drinking water."

Along with his fellow county commissioners, Montoya is "working on getting running water into those people's homes."

"That’s my dilemma as a county commissioner," Montoya acknowledged. "As a congressman, it will be much larger, because there’s a lot of other places that are in the same situation in this district. So that’s huge."

Another issue that is not widely acknowledged is the need to make access to health care for veterans easier, Montoya said. From making sure they are getting the right medicine to physical availability to the services, these are issues that need to be addressed.

They’re not getting the services that, to me, should be granted. It’s not even a question of if they should be available. They should be available and they should be granted to them because they put their lives on the line for us, so that we can continue to have our civil liberties and our freedom in this country. One of the things that I think needs to be done is expanding to have an urgent care center in north-central New Mexico so that veterans don’t have to travel all the way to Albuquerque and then wait once they get there. Now with gas prices the way things are, that’s again the decision they’re having to make. 'How am I going to get the medical care that I need and fill up the gas tank to get there and back>'

Montoya has a clear grasp of the issues that are facing not only northern New Mexico and New Mexico as a whole, but also the United States. As he keeps his grass-roots campaign going, he hopes to gain enough support in the June 3 primary to go on to the general election in November.

The winner of the Democratic primary will have a big advantage; Democratic hold a 2-to-1 registration advantage over Republicans in the district.

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