The Los Alamos County Arts in Public Places (APP) Advisory Board met on Thursday, January 22, 2026 at 5:30 PM at 1000 Central Avenue, Suite 110, and via Zoom. Chair Stephanie Haaser presided with members Tim Foley and Andy Wright present; members Jasmine Stephens and Anna Buckthorpe were absent. Staff liaison Chelsea Ashcraft attended, and Leslie Bucklin, Assistant Public Information Officer, presented on the Homestead Interpretive Signage Project. The meeting covered updates on multiple working groups and active public art projects.
Homestead Interpretive Signage Project Update Leslie Bucklin provided an overview of the project to replace the existing 17 homestead interpretive signs (installed as part of a LANL settlement) with four new, standardized signs. She explained that the previous signs suffered from sun damage, were not ADA-compliant, and the driving-tour brochure was unpopular (only 500 printed in 2021, none distributed; contrast with 30,000 Oppenheimer film location tours given out in 2025). The new signs will be placed at Kwagy Mesa Trail, North Road near the posse shack/stables, and two at the Romero Cabin downtown. They will complement the existing historical walking tour signage. The board expressed disappointment at reducing to only four signs, feeling the earlier multiple locations gave better coverage, but accepted the rationale after discussion. A working group had previously voiced concern that the tour was under-advertised. Bucklin also noted plans for two to four wildlife interpretive signs and four existing "discovery spot" signs awaiting installation. Board member asked about the Marjorie Bell Chambers historical marker at Ashley Pond; Bucklin confirmed it should still be there, though landscaping and bollard installation may have changed the area's appearance.
Working Group Updates
Staff Liaison Report Chelsea Ashcraft provided updates throughout the working group reports and noted the upcoming recreation of board vacancies. Applications for board membership are due January 30, 2026; only one application received so far (from Stephanie Haaser for reappointment). Interviews will be scheduled after the deadline.
Chairman's Report Chair Stephanie Haaser had no additional items.
We will call the meeting to order. Board members and foley, Andy Wright and Stephanie Hodger here. So we have a quorum. We are missing Jasmine and Anna. Is there any public comment not on the agenda? Okay, then we will move on to business approval of minutes from the December 18, 2025 PPP meeting. I move that the board approve the minutes from the December 18th, 2025 APP meeting. I second that motion. The motion was made by Tim Foley, seconded by Andy. All in favor. Yes. Approved by everyone present. Move on to the homestead interpretive signage project update and overview. Anywhere in particular recording. I think you could probably just smooth your chair up if you want or stay right there. It's fine. Okay. Stephanie, do you want me to preface why Leslie is here? Or is that clear enough? So an introduction, probably just for the one of the name. I mean I know why she's here. So I'm Leslie Bucklin. I'm the assistant public information officer for Los Alamos County. And I am the project manager for the Homestead Interpretive Signage Project as well as kind of the project manager over signage. So I'm here today to give you quick rundown overview, update of what is going on with the homestead interpretive signage project. So you know kind of where we're at in the project, what's coming, order of operations, placement, that sort of a thing. So first I wanted to make sure you all know just a brief history. We've had two versions of homestead sign, kind of, you know, really really old version that was kind of rolled in with a circle walking tour that was also a very ancient version. Um we updated the historical walking tour sign, not this current time but the previous time. We broke out homestead LANL and uh the county worked with homesteader families as part of a settlement that Lanel had to interpret the homestead era as part of kind of um some legacy work following the Manhattan Project era. And so we had a huge event, we launched 17 signs around town. Uh Lanel had a couple signs down by the Romero Cabin. We had a big homestead event, and that was the homestead tour. And so we had a brochure that went with that, it was a driving tour. Um, and then over the years, um, the inevitable happened, which is at this altitude, the signs just don't last very long. Um, but the other thing is that there were a lot of lessons learned that came from that project. So lesson learned number one is that LANL really uh wanted to focus more on having a digital presence and learned through their agreement that uh their digital presence in the history and the storytelling they're doing on their website is enough, and so they were happy to relinquish the responsibilities of the interpretive signage back to us fully as opposed to in partnership. Um the other thing is that we learned that people aren't really overly thrilled with taking a driving tour across Los Alamos mesas to random places, and so we um those brochures were just not being picked up, and so we we don't haven't been printing those or putting those out there. Um can I interrupt you? Yes, please uh can I know there was some question when we were meeting with the working group about where those brochures were being given out. I will tell, yeah, so the history, so we have 22 kiosks across town that um there's actually one in the art center, and they're all over the place, 22 of them, uh several at LANL, um, and they hold there's one in the lobby if you want to see what it looks like on your way out. They hold eight brochures and they have a map that tells like where you are. And so um we would put the brochures that are strategic for certain things, uh certain locations in those. And uh the homestead brochures just didn't move, they just never ever moved. So we we tried putting them in different places, we tried handing them out by hand uh to say like, hey, try the homestead tour. Um, and just it was not a popular option. So they weren't taking the brochures, even though really it's just good information. So we pulled those and stopped making those and prioritize some other things. So and just for comparison, so you can understand how we were like pulling the information and making the decision, not just based on the fact that they weren't moving quickly, but other things as well. Last year, I think I ordered five hundred homestead brochures in like 2021, and we never gave them all out.