Taos County area code will change to 575 in 2008
By Patricia Chambers, The Taos News
Nov. 14 - 9:38 a.m.
The Taos County area code will change within about two years.
The county drew the short straw with the decision made Nov. 9 by the New Mexico Public Regulation Commission (NMPRC) to geographically split the state into Area A and Area B.
Area B will keep the 505 area code and the rest of the state will switch to the 575 area code. Taos County is in Area A.
Area B is an odd swatch of land from Shiprock to Aztec, south to Farmington then to Bernalillo with some towns to the east.
Ojo Caliente, Abiquiú, Española, Santa Fé, Chimayó, Dixon, Velarde, Truchas and Las Vegas are included in Area B.
The line crosses half the state from the west at Fence Lake to Belen and Mountainair.
Dulce, Chama and towns south to San Ysidro will fall into the new area code.
The PRC commissioners decided in early November to designate the areas by geographic split. The decision about which area keeps the 505 area code was made at the recent PRC meeting.
Chairman Ben Lujan said the decision was “extremely difficult because Commission District 3 is split the most. I have had to weight the impact of each alternative.”
Lujan, who is the son of state Rep. Ben Lujan, has been commission chairman since 2005.
Vice Chairman Jason Marks said his decision was focused upon creating the least impact on the largest number of people.
The PRC held 16 public hearings throughout the state on the new area code and received more than 1,300 comments through the Web site called nm575 (www.nm575.info) and by telephone. An overwhelming majority of comments supported the geographic split.
The commission estimates telephone service providers will require 27 months to implement the change.