New Mexico’s top environmental official on Thursday signed off on a wastewater permit requested by a luxury resort and nearby homes that has sparked ongoing objections by residents in nearby Tesuque Village.
Environment Secretary James Kenney gave final approval on the permit allowing Bishop’s Lodge to put 30,000 gallons per day of treated wastewater into a new low-dose disposal field using a treatment plant installed in 2024. The previous permit allowed Bishop’s Lodge to discharge about 14,700 gallons per day into two disposal fields on the property.
“Bishop’s Lodge’s water treatment system meets all standards under the Water Quality Act,” Drew Goretzka, a spokesperson for NMED, said in a statement provided to Source NM. “The Department retains the authority to conduct future testing and will do so to assure continued compliance for the protection of public health.”
Kenney’s sign-off follows a Sept. 8 recommendation from a hearing officer after nearly a year of proceedings. An organization of residents called Protect Tesuque have mounted weekly protests, and filed objections during administrative proceedings and in the courts, claiming the method will pollute drinking wells downstream, and that state officials are unequally enforcing water treatment standards. In July, the New Mexico Supreme Court threw out an emergency petition to stop the permitting process.
Kenney noted in his final order that Bishop’s Lodge completed the required sampling of the treated wastewater for a list of pollutants, the results of which showed undetectable amounts or ones below the standard. No additional testing will be required.
Bishop’s Lodge declined to give a comment Thursday. After the initial approval earlier this month, Chris Kaplan, the head of Asset Management at Juniper Capital, which owns the resort told Source NM: “Bishop’s Lodge has been in operation for more than half a century; and, as the report acknowledged, the evidence presented in the May 2025 hearing demonstrates that the Lodge’s upgraded wastewater treatment facility meets all New Mexico water quality standards and then some.”
Requests for comment to representatives for Protect Tesuque remained pending Thursday afternoon.
Bishop’s Lodge and members of Protect Teusque are currently embroiled in a separate lawsuit. The resort’s owners sued individual Protect Tesuque board members, requesting a district judge ban protests in front of the resort within a 1-mile radius, claiming they are a danger to drivers and veers into harassment.
Protect Tesuque has said the claims are exaggerated and is a form of retaliation for opposing the sewage permits.
A Santa Fe judge scheduled a hearing for Nov. 3 in that matter.
