A Green Future

...He defeated better-known and better-financed candidates by promising to battle for strict growth control, neighborhood preservation, and progressive taxation...

...Environmental activists need to connect with social and economic issues," says Moore, who has played an important role in shaping the agenda of New Mexico's burgeoning Green movement...

...The left needs to out-populist the right...

...One of the problems with the left in other places is that when they get into office they give up on outreach," says Moore...

...After talking with a number of older Hispanics on Santa Fe's east side, however, he decided to enter the non-partisan race...

...At the same time, he maintains a frenzied schedule of participation in neighborhood, environmental, and union organizing...

...Even when you get into office you still have to do community organizing...

...Though Mayor Debbie Jaramillo, a Democrat, is only half joking when she says, "Cris drives me crazy," she adds that, "He brings an intellectual energy to the process that can be really exciting...

...Moore's success is all the more amazing because he is an Anglo newcomer representing a part of town with a large Hispanic population that does not easily place its faith in outsiders...

...We've made a big mistake by allowing the Reagan Republicans to suck small business in with big business," says Moore, who is organizing a series of meetings between Greens and local business owners...

...Coming to Santa Fe at age twenty-three—after receiving his Ph.D in physics from Cornell, where he was active in campus Green politics—Moore threw himself into street-level organizing for property-tax relief...

...That put him into the homes of elderly citizens, who took to the boyish activist...

...I want us to be a movement party—I want the Greens to prove that you can work from within and still be a revolutionary party...

...That's death...

...Moore's combination of Green idealism and the practical politics of coalition building and community outreach have made him a critical player in Santa Fe's rapidly evolving political scene...

...Running with support from the Greens, the Sierra Club, and a number of local labor unions, Moore raised $12,000 and put together a highly sophisticated yet unyielding campaign...

...That's just a recipe for a one-term tenure that alienates everyone...

...We need to deliver a powerful message that the status quo isn't working, and Greens are in a position to do that more effectively than Democrats ever will be...

...Since his election, Moore has been an effective advocate for the council's most progressive initiatives—including support for city workers in contract negotiations and the establishment of tough limits on development in the mountains surrounding Santa Fe...

...Moore won the support of the community not by spouting philosophical maxims but by rolling up his sleeves and joining local battles for affordable housing and tax relief—issues that he easily relates to Green concerns about land use and development controls...

...The left just hasn't spent enough time talking to them...

...When someone suggested that he run for city council, Moore initially rejected the idea...

...For Moore, that translates into active involvement as a Green in union organizing drives, and in an effort to establish a higher minimum wage in Santa Fe—perhaps to $7 an hour...

...J.N...

...It also means reaching out to small-business owners—who can play a vital role in developing sustainable economies...

...The pony-tailed complex-systems researcher at the Santa Fe Institute became the first Green Party activist elected to public office in New Mexico when he won a seat on the Santa Fe city council last year, and he has rapidly established himself as an environmentalist who recognizes few of the false boundaries of contemporary politics...

...There's no reason that these people shouldn't be on our side...

...He's driven to find workable solutions that are not compromises...