Whether I’m helping people run their nonprofits and businesses or organizing parents for our kids’ next cross-country meet, I see our strength as rooted in our ability to come together to get things done. People in House District 53 are largely united in the values and hopes we have for our families: ensuring a bright future for our children, protecting the safety and health of our aging parents, and getting dinner on the table and home in time to eat it.
This election is about protecting the freedoms that help us turn our hopes into reality: the freedom to decide if and when to expand our families, to spend time with our loved ones and enjoy their lives, to care for them when they are sick without losing their jobs, and to let our children be children and come home from school safely.
House District 53 includes the unincorporated community of Chaparral on the Texas border north of El Paso. Chaparral’s infrastructure needs include roads, gas and sewer lines, and parks. Funding these projects is critical to building a community where we can enjoy our freedoms.
This district also includes the eastern edge of Las Cruces, where the city plans most of its growth. The city recently celebrated the grand opening of pickleball courts there. In the coming years, neighborhoods, shopping centers, and major roads will be built. We need to fund the infrastructure that will create livable neighborhoods.
Between these population centers – also in House District 53 – lie the Organ Mountains and parts of White Sands Missile Range and Fort Bliss. A love of our natural environment and the jobs that military bases bring to the area could be one of the unifying forces for our people.
Every city, including Las Cruces, was once a small town with people who had big dreams of starting businesses or building homes. I look forward to helping our communities grow into the future.
I will support the incorporation of Chaparral, the state’s largest colonia, if its residents choose to create a city. The freedom of communities to determine their own future is crucial, and Chaparral’s proximity to El Paso creates enormous potential to improve the economic situation of the 16,000 people who live there and the state as a whole.
We need to invest in our families and communities in other ways: by enacting the Paid Family Medical Leave Act, for example, so people can care for sick family members. We need to work to lower health care costs and improve access in rural communities like Chaparral.
We deserve fully funded public schools. That means buildings full of caring adults, including counselors and nurses, libraries full of books, safe places to play and learn, clean indoor air and water, nutritious food, and the assurance that our children will come home every day. Our children’s freedom from school shootings and their ability to thrive depend on our commitment to this vision.
I hear concerns about public safety. These investments in our people are what will make us safer in the long run: living in communities where everyone has good-paying jobs, great schools, affordable health care, where we address problems with proven solutions instead of arresting people when they can’t make ends meet or get the help they need. This is another freedom at stake in this election.
As your state representative, I will work to ensure that our freedoms are protected regardless of background, color, gender, zip code, political affiliation, marital status—and whether you live in a city or colonia. No exceptions.
Sarah Silva of Las Cruces is the Democratic candidate for District 53 in the New Mexico House of Representatives, which includes communities in Doña Ana and Otero counties. You can reach her at newmexicansforsarah.com.
This article originally appeared on the Las Cruces Sun-News: Our Freedoms Are at Stake in This Election
