Mayor Robert Stearley called the estimated $114,000 in improvements to the road "affordable" at the Town Council meeting on July 1.

The improvements were requested by the New Mexico Department of Transportation to accommodate traffic headed into the proposed playing fields, according to town staff.

"We'll find the money to find access," Stearley said.

The Town Council approved a motion to collect bids for construction of a playing field.

Although she didn't attend the meeting, State Sen. Sue Wilson Beffort has been pushing for the fields, she said in a telephone interview.

Beffort was an early supporter of playing fields in Edgewood and even brought in $260,000 of the $500,000 in legislative funding for the project.

Beffort is skeptical about the DOT's requirements for improvements to N.M. 344, she said.

"You don't have to have all this fancy stuff if you're only putting in one ball field," she said. "Let's do Phase 1 (of the fields) and get it in so that the government doesn't pull our money back, like they did with Phase 2 of the gym."

The funding for the gym she referred to was for the Fisher and Smith Memorial Gymnasium near East Mountain High School. A $1.5 million addition to the gym for Phase 2 was appropriated a few years ago.

The money might have been used to build a climbing wall, life-fitness room for yoga and other exercises, and an all-purpose room for tumbling, wrestling and the like. Beffort said she doesn't want to see the money she appropriated for fields in Edgewood disappear too.

"Let's get what we have in, because it's money in the bank," Beffort said, referring to the existing funds for a playing field in Edgewood. "I really went to the mat on this ball field thing … you're not going to have a quality community if you don't have infrastructure in place for our families. People want to know what there is for families to do (in Edgewood), since we're 30 miles from Albuquerque."

Along with moving forward on playing fields, the town also accepted a bid for wastewater collection lines for the town sewer, a project that was estimated to cost about $1.8 million.

The Town Council voted to award the contract to the low bidder, J&H Services, Inc, for about $1.2 million.

The town had gone through the bidding process before, but the work on a previous contract was not completed. This time, according to Karen Mahalick, who heads the town's community planning and development department, the screening process for applicants was far more detailed.

The Town Council also revisited the issue of wind turbines in town, something that has turned into something of a hot-button item.

Stearley expressed a concern that a proposed ordinance was not stringent enough and would lead to a proliferation of wind turbines in town. His position was opposed by Councilor John Abrams, who has pushed for alternative energy in Edgewood, and by Councilor Brad Hill.

"I don't see this, Mr. Mayor, as windmills in everybody's back yard," Abrams said.