News

New Mexico continues to be sluggish in its recovery from the recession and according to a new report, the state lacks over 100,000 jobs.

Gerry Bradley is with New Mexico Voices for Children, a nonprofit children’s advocacy group that produced the report. He says the state needs a jobs package to fill the gap caused by job loss and lack of job growth.  Bradley says state government has conducted an experiment over the last ten years- cutting taxes for high income people and corporations.

With another bad wildfire season expected across drought-stricken New Mexico, Angel Fire Resort is establishing a fund to aid firefighters.

The northern New Mexico resort says it is creating the Northern New Mexico Firefighter Fund and will donate 10 percent of all sales from this weekend's summer season opening activities, including mountain biking, golfing, fishing, boating, zip lining and chairlift tickets.

Santa Fe police say the number of property crimes in April is a 10-year low for a single month in Santa Fe.

Authorities in the northern New Mexico city began keeping monthly totals for burglaries in 2003. Police Chief Raymond Rael says the 88 reported burglaries in April are the lowest since.

Officers took reports for 41 residential, 36 automotive, eight commercial and one attempted burglary last month. Police also recorded two unlawful entries.

The figures represent nearly half of the property crime reported in April of 2012.

The state Game and Fish Department is asking a federal court to lift a decades-old order preventing the agency from providing New Mexico residents with more licenses to hunt bighorn sheep, ibex and oryx.

The department wants the U.S. District Court to lift an injunction in place since 1977. The court determined that New Mexico discriminated against out-of-state hunters by setting quotas on how many licenses would be issued to them.

Three people were injured Monday after explosives caught fire at a southern New Mexico university research and testing site.

New Mexico Institute of Mining and Technology spokesman Thomas Guengerich says the injuries to a university employee and two subcontractors were non-life threatening.

He says four people had been moving the explosives from a flatbed truck onto a concrete pad as part of routine testing.

The fire spread to two vehicles, destroying them before crews were able to put it out.

The deadline has been extended for public comments on a controversial new uranium mine in New Mexico. The extension is in response to requests from multiple parties who say mining operations could threaten the Mount Taylor area, a site considered holy by many Native Americans in the southwest.

Royalties from leases, and oil and natural gas production on New Mexico trust land netted more than $45 million in revenue in April.

The revenue coming into the State Land Office each month supports public schools, universities and hospitals.

New Mexico Land Commissioner Ray Powell says the goal is to create jobs while protecting the state's working lands. He says his office works with tribes, local and federal agencies, and the private sector to optimize the revenues.

Interior Secretary Sally Jewell says the nation is heading into a tough wildfire season made even more challenging because budget cuts mean fewer firefighters to battle blazes.

Jewell said Monday that a dry year is creating the potential for another extreme summer of forest and range fires.

Jewell spent the past two days touring the National Interagency Fire Center in Boise. She was joined by U.S. Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack, who said a 7.5 percent cut to the 2013 U.S. Forest Service budget means 500 fewer firefighters on the ground this year.

"Breaking Bad" actor Steven Michael Quezada is scheduled to address the League of United Latin American Citizens New Mexico convention as activists aim to tackle education reform.

Around 800 activists from around New Mexico are expected to take part of the three-day state convention of LULAC New Mexico slated to begin Friday at Albuquerque's Sheraton Uptown Hotel.

The state's first Latina congresswoman, Michelle Lujan Grisham, also is scheduled to address advocates.

Parts of the Cibola National Forest are imposing additional fire restrictions due to drying conditions.

KOB reports that the additional restrictions imposed in the forest's Sandia Ranger district include prohibitions on campfires, except in recreation sites.

Also, smoking isn't permitted except in vehicles and in recreation areas in places three feet in diameter that are clear of any flammable materials.

Fireworks are banned, along with driving off National Forest roads.

Bernalillo County commissioners on Tuesday will again consider a proposal to ship out hundreds of inmates to relieve crowding in the county jail in Albuquerque.

The commissioners deadlocked last month on county officials' recommendation to send up to 300 inmates to jails in Cibola and Sandoval counties, to the Torrance County Detention Facility operated by Correction Corp. of America in Estancia and possibly a facility in Littlefield, Texas.

Facebook fans of the Albuquerque BioPark have spoken.

They've chosen Abiquiu (AH'-bee-kyoo) — or Abi for short— as the name of the female giraffe calf that was born at the zoo on April 20.

Officials say more than 1,000 votes were cast, with 60 percent in favor of Abiquiu. Gisele came in a distance second.

Zookeeper Bricker Thietten says Abiquiu was a favorite among zoo workers because if the female giraffe ever moves to a different zoo, she'll always have a New Mexico name.

Abiquiu is the name of a small community in northern New Mexico.

A Santa Fe police officer investigated for possible affiliation with a motorcycle gang has resigned.

The Santa Fe New Mexican reports (http://bit.ly/ZQE0VU) that Officer Ben Chavarria became the focus of an internal investigation in February for his alleged affiliation with the Bandidos Motorcycle Club.

A 13-year veteran, he says he has ridden motorcycles most of his life but has never been affiliated with a biker gang.

A group that advocates for the protection of free-roaming horses in Placitas has asked federal officials for assistance in confronting public safety concerns arising from the animals straying on the roads.

The Albuquerque Journal reports (http://bit.ly/ZVqHqT) that the Wild Horse Observers Association also has offered to assist in administering a contraceptive to curb the growth of the horse population and removing and relocating horses that are at risk of a high-speed collision.

Last month, a vehicle collision killed a horse on N.M. 165 in Placitas.

Alamogordo officials are scheduled Tuesday to take another try at passing a proposed ban on using cell phones while behind the wheel.

The Alamogordo Daily News reports (http://bit.ly/ZSfofF) that the city commission has struggled to pass the proposal for the past two months as members have added and deleted prohibitions on talking while driving and exceptions for law enforcement officers and other emergency personnel.

New Mexico Republican Rep. Steve Pearce has introduced legislation to expand the mission of the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant in Carlsbad.

Pearce says that because the plant is only tasked with handling radioactive waste generated by the Department of Energy as part of a defense mission, it is running out of material to process. And that will mean a loss of jobs.

A Native American leader from Nevada recently named to a national tourism advisory board says tribes need to learn to better tap into the keen interest so many travelers have in their heritage and the culture and history of the West.

Nevada Indian Commission Director Sherry Rupert says there's really nothing quite like the opportunities awaiting visitors to tribal lands. She says most of those cultures and traditions remain alive.

Rupert is of Paiute and Washoe descent. She says her elders taught her how to garden and make baskets and cradleboards.

An industry report says New Mexico's housing market is seeing fewer signs of distress.

The Albuquerque Journal reports (http://bit.ly/15X97qz) that the report by the Mortgage Bankers Association shows 9.2 percent of homes in the state were either delinquent on mortgage payments or somewhere in the foreclosure process during the first three months of the year.

That's an improvement from 10 percent in the preceding fourth quarter and 9.7 percent in the first quarter of 2012.

Moving into a new home is an exciting event, but for people who have experienced homelessness, the joy is especially poignant. In Santa Fe, the renovated Stage Coach Motor Inn is preserving its classic nicho and viga architecture and working to preserve a sense of permanency for some new tenants.

KUNM's Poverty and Public Health reporter Deborah Martinez has the story. 

The Institute of American Indian Arts will launch its first graduate program this summer. The Masters of Fine Arts degree in creative writing will be the first program of it’s kind at any tribal college in the nation.

The two-year program will focus heavily on writing in a number of genres, and the Institute of American Indian Arts, or IAIA, says there are nearly 30 candidates admitted for the program, which officially opens at the end of July.

A New Mexico utility plans to use some of the water it gets from Colorado to test the idea of pumping water underground for use later during times of drought or high demand.

Starting next week, the Albuquerque Bernalillo County Water Utility Authority for about a month will inject the water underground by using a currently idle well that has been used in the past to pump water from the ground.

According to the Albuquerque Journal (http://bit.ly/18xM6JF ), the water will come from the utility's allotment from the San Juan-Chama Project.

  Major stretches of river have already gone dry, farmers are leaving their land fallow and cities are clamping down on water use, but things in New Mexico just went from bad to worse Thursday.

The latest drought map put together by federal forecasters shows New Mexico — the nation's fifth largest state — is in the worst shape of any state. Nearly 40 percent of New Mexico is grappling with exceptional drought.

In just a week, that percentage jump from nearly a quarter. A year ago, it was less than one-tenth.

New Mexico is establishing a state-run health insurance exchange that's subject to open government laws.

Legislation enacted this year makes clear the exchange and its governing board must comply with New Mexico's Open Meetings Act and the Inspection of Public Records Act.

Those laws will require board meetings to be open to the public and that records, such as the exchange's contracts and other expenditures, are available for inspection by the public.

The owners of a coal-fired power plant on the Navajo Nation are objecting to changes made by the tribe in approving a lease extension.

Under legislation signed by tribal President Ben Shelly last month, the lease for the Navajo Generating Station near Page would expire in 2044. The agreement also boosts yearly payments to the tribe to $43 million.

The plant's operator, Salt River Project, told tribal officials this week that amendments dealing with water rights and having the federal government sign on as a lessee are unacceptable.

A federal agency is offering about $2 million to health clinics in New Mexico to help uninsured residents obtain medical coverage.

The Health and Human Services Department said Thursday that said 15 community health centers were eligible to apply for the funding (http://1.usa.gov/10l9e6P).

The clinics are in communities ranging from Albuquerque, Las Cruces and Santa Fe to Lordsburg, Hatch and Portales.

A New Mexico tourism official has been named to the Commerce Department's national travel advisory board.

Sherry Rupert, who is vice president of the American Indian Alaska Native Tourism Association in Albuquerque, was one of six new members appointed Thursday to the Travel and Tourism Advisory Board.

The board advises the commerce secretary on travel and tourism issues. Its members represent a broad cross-section of the industry, including transportation and financial services and hotels and restaurants.

With drought affecting much of the southwest, the Navajo Nation is working to bring water to it's citizens with the tribal government recently approving over $8-million dollars for water infrastructure projects.
The Navajo Nation is roughly the size of West Virginia, has a population of around 170,000 people, and much of the Nations citizens are in need of water.

In what's thought to be the first housing program of it's kind brought to a tribal community, the Pueblo of Zuni in western New Mexico has broken ground on a series of homes financed by the U.S. Department of Agriculture.

The "Self-help housing" program works like this: the USDA gives your community a grant to finance housing, delivers supplies to build a home, provides blue prints, then - with the help of technical volunteers - oversees community members build their own homes.

The Census Bureau reports a larger share of New Mexico's Hispanic voters participated in last year's presidential election than in 2008 when President Barack Obama was first elected.

About 56.2 percent of eligible Hispanic voters cast ballots in November, up from almost 53.7 percent in 2008.

Turnout among non-Hispanic white voters, what in New Mexico often are called Anglos, was 70.5 percent last year compared with 71.5 percent in 2008.

The Santa Fe Police Department is going with the classic colors of black and white.

The department on Thursday plans to unveil its new fleet of police cruisers, which includes two new Dodge Chargers, 18 Ford SUVs and five Ford Tauruses.

Gone are the red, white and blue logos that residents have become familiar with. The department says statistics show that the switch to black and white can help curb crime.

Other New Mexico police departments have already made the switch, including Albuquerque and Rio Rancho.