Image: VPC

Many people don't realize that the "Upper Valley" was more than just the farming community that provided much of the food for the El Paso area. It was also home to a way of life that was in balance with nature.

That has changed and it may be gone forever. Now we have the doubling of the population in a small area with little or no farmland left. Where do the animals go now?

The valley was our ecosystem's life line. It was the oasis to not only we humans... but also to a huge animal and bird population. That is what the valley was. But no more. The Great Blue Heron with its elegant and graceful motion in flight and its majestic posture as it stood by a canal... is a rare sight anymore.

Now instead of the Great Blue Heron and the Red Tail Hawk we have people dumping trash in the canals and drains throughout the valley. We have homes going up with chain link fences and some with barbed wire. We also have people leaving cars for sale out on the road endangering all of us.

How can we destroy this and consider ourselves more intelligent than the animals that we destroy. And as Susan Austin, exiled former City Representative, once said, "The greenbelt is for county land." Meaning that we can just draw a line and say "We can destroy all this and not give it a second thought... the county has land".

But there are those who are waiting to annex more county land and their are more mercenaries like Austin who will say... "The valley really is further out... beyond what we want to destroy now."

The valley is under seige and only we can protect this great community treasure.

Send feedback to:

Editor, Upper Valley Beacon

© Copyright 2004-2005 Valley Publishing Company:
All Rights Reserved.
For questions or comments concerning this site, contact: webmaster@valleypublishinginc.biz