The Golden River/Arianna Solare case goes to trial next week on November 5th and 6th at 9am in Taos District Court presided over by judge Jeffry Shannon. It will be a bench trial decided by the judge, not a jury trial. At the most recent hearing this past Monday October 27th, motions a motion for a summery judgment in favor of Solare was denied. A motion to strike some tax records presented as evidence presented by Solare was also denied. From what was said by the judge at that hearing, it looks like what Solare actually occupied and possessed among the 60 lots she is claiming adverse possession on will be examined. This is a partial victory at this point because the initial Golden River quiet title suit was for 60 acres, 4 times as many lots,  but it is still a large claim. The best outcome for our community is that she gets none of it due to improper color of title and fudged tax payments. The worst looks like some of the 60 lots currently being claimed. Solare’s attorney is trying to use the animal sanctuary as a justification for more lots but the only lots she has truly possessed are the ones her house is on. That house was built on a road that is a platted easement.

One of the things I have found most offensive in the way Solare’s current attorney has presented the case was the denial of community in Tres Orejas in one of his briefs. It is in fact, the very existence of community here that gives the land its current value and makes it attractive to speculators like Solare. It was the work of some members of our community documenting the “green land” in the 1990s that gave Solare the information on what was the largest and most valuable piece of of that land for her initial attempt to claim it in 2004. Without an active community of people who cared there would have been no intervention either in 2004 or 2023. And so this trial is in fact the community of Tres Orejas vs. Arianna Solare even if on paper it is just between one member of the community and Solare.