New Mexico marks record with massive wildfire - By Susan Montoya Bryan Associated Press
A monster blaze churning in northern New Mexico for more than a month has blackened enough acreage to earn a place in the state's record books.
Aside from being the largest wildfire currently burning in the U.S., the fire moving over the Sangre de Cristo mountain range is now the largest in the arid state's recorded history. It covers more than 465 square miles, or an area nearly one-quarter the size of Delaware.
More than 260 homes have burned and more evacuations were prompted over the weekend as the blaze moved through dry — and in some cases dead — stands of pine and fir trees. Huge columns of smoke could be seen from miles away, and fire officials and weather forecasts continue to refer to it as an unprecedented situation.
"We're trying to think bigger box, bigger picture," Nickie Johnny, an incident commander from California who is helping with the fire, said about efforts to find places miles ahead of the flames where crews can cut fire lines and mount a defense.
Fires also were burning elsewhere in New Mexico and in Colorado as much of the West has marked a notably hot, dry and windy spring. Predictions for the rest of the season do not bode well, with drought and warmer weather brought on by climate change worsening wildfire danger.
Colorado Springs enacted a fire ban after a series of fires have spread quickly due to hot and dry conditions, including a fatal one caused by smoking. Under a ban taking effect Monday, smoking and grilling will be prohibited in parks in Colorado's second-largest city and people grilling at home will be allowed to use only gas or liquid fuel, not charcoal or wood.
Burn bans and fire restrictions also have been put in place in cities and counties around New Mexico in recent weeks, with officials warning that any new fire starts would further stress firefighting resources.
More than 2,000 firefighters were battling the 5-week-old fire that threatened the small New Mexico city of Las Vegas for a time before being stopped just outside town in the past week. Still, numerous other small villages remained threatened Monday, including the resort communities of Black Lake and Angel Fire.
Nationwide, about 2,030 square miles have burned so far this year — the most at this point since 2018, according to the National Interagency Fire Center.
___ Associated Press writer Colleen Slevin in Denver contributed to this report.
In US, states struggle to replace fossil fuel tax revenue - By Morgan Lee And Mead Gruver Associated Press
Government budgets are booming in New Mexico: Teacher salaries are up, residents can go to an in-state college tuition-free, moms will get medical care for a year after childbirth, and criminal justice initiatives are being funded to reduce urban violence.
The reason behind the spending spree — oil. New Mexico is the No. 2 crude oil producer among U.S. states and the top recipient of U.S. disbursements for fossil fuel production on federal land. But a budget flush with petroleum cash has a side effect: It also puts the spotlight on how difficult it is to turn state rhetoric on tackling climate change into reality.
State governments in the nation's top regions for producing oil, natural gas and coal have by far the highest per-capita reliance on fossil fuels — led by Wyoming, North Dakota, Alaska and New Mexico. The revenue bankrolls essential public services, from highway maintenance to prisons. In Carlsbad, New Mexico, oil infrastructure property taxes are underwriting a high school performing arts center, expanded sports facilities and elementary school renovations.
None of that would be possible without oil revenue, said schools superintendent Gerry Washburn.
"We can't slow down in that area and what we do to fund schools until we have a legitimate replacement" for oil and natural gas income, he said. "Whether you're in the middle of the oil patch or in an area with no oil and gas drilling going on, those policies are going to impact revenue in every school district in the state."
Federal, state and local governments receive an estimated $138 billion a year from the fossil fuel industry, according to a study from the Washington-based nonpartisan economics group Resources for the Future, which does not advocate on energy policies. That's equivalent to the annual state spending of New York and Texas combined.
The cashflow is dominated by gasoline and diesel retail taxes in every state, but energy-producing states have the deepest dependence on fossil fuel income through a gamut of taxes, royalties, lease sales and fees. Because that revenue helps pay for government services, they tend to tax residents less, said Daniel Raimi, a fellow at Resources for the Future, and co-author of the study.
"That's a really challenging dynamic if you think about a shift away from fossil fuels," he said. "They're going to be faced with the question: Do we raise our taxes on our residents or do we reduce the level of services we provide?"
In New Mexico, oil and gas account for 42% of state government income, a share that is rising amid the war in Ukraine and record-setting oil production in the Permian Basin that stretches across southeastern New Mexico and western Texas. Additional oil income flows to a new interest-bearing trust for early childhood education.
Soaring fossil fuel industry profits also allowed the Democratic-controlled New Mexico Legislature to try to tackle the highest-in-the-nation unemployment rate and persistently high poverty. Lawmakers provided $1.1 billion in tax relief and direct payments of up to $1,500 per household to offset inflation.
At the same time, legislators balked this year at climate initiatives that might restrain petroleum production. They rejected a bill to limit climate-warming pollution in the production and distribution of transportation fuels, a step taken by West Coast states. New Mexico also shunned a state constitutional amendment for the right to clean air.
Democratic Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham, up for reelection in November, said her administration is working to contain oilfield methane pollution and diversify the economy. New mandates call for electricity production from solar, wind and other renewable sources. But she has cautioned the federal government against significant restrictions on oil exploration and production, still the lifeblood of the state budget.
"We can work very effectively with oil and gas producers to both meet clean energy standards ... while still managing pretty incredible exploration of fossil fuels to meet the current energy demands of the world," the governor said in April.
Preserving income from oil, natural gas or coal production while acting on climate change can be especially tricky in blue states where Democrats often campaign on tackling global warming.
Colorado's Democratic Gov. Jared Polis is pursuing an ambitious clean-energy plan while trying to preserve $1 billion in annual oil and gas production tax revenue. To justify air pollution restrictions, Polis has cited real-time evidence of climate change, drought and fire.
But Polis, a wealthy tech entrepreneur, last year threatened to veto a proposal that might impose per-ton emission fees on polluters. William Toor, executive director of the governor's Colorado Energy Office, said the state's not targeting fossil fuel production — only the industry's emissions.
On Colorado's northeastern plains, Weld County Commission Chairman Scott James said state regulations stifle new drilling needed to support production and government revenue, especially for schools. The county is centered on a vast oil field stretching from the Denver area into Wyoming and Nebraska.
"I agree with the overall mission of reducing greenhouse gas, but there's an environment that exists at the state Legislature that we must electrify everything, we must mandate it, we must do it now," James said. "And these technologies are not yet ready for prime time. We simply don't have the capacity to do it."
Rural and economically isolated communities could find it hardest to adapt to a low-carbon economy, said Montana-based Headwaters Economics researcher and economist Kristin Smith, who studies public finances in North Dakota's Bakken oil region. She anticipates "very hard decisions" about cutting areas like public health care and policing.
Some major petroleum producing states are forging ahead with their climate agendas.
Pennsylvania in April became the first major fossil-fuel state to adopt a carbon-pricing policy, joining an 11-state regional consortium that sets a price and declining limits on carbon dioxide emissions from power plants.
Democratic Gov. Tom Wolf's initiative comes without approval from the Republican-controlled Legislature in the nation's No. 2 state for natural gas production — and a major exporter of gas-generated electricity. A per-well drilling fee on the state's booming Marcellus Shale gas industry has rained cash on rural counties and municipalities for nearly a decade.
South of Pittsburgh, Washington County reaped over $100 million in the past decade. That's equivalent to $500 per resident — a "game changer," said county board chairwoman Diana Irey Vaughan. The windfall paid for park and bridge improvements, among others.
Democratic state Rep. Greg Vitali, an advocate for stronger climate change action, said local governments relying on gas drilling money will simply have to use traditional tools such as property taxes to get by.
Republican-dominated Wyoming, the top coal production state, has bold goals to reduce greenhouse emissions to less than zero even while fossil fuels account for over half its revenue.
That vision relies on eventually capturing carbon dioxide from coal- and gas-fired power plants and pumping it underground, possibly to increase oil production in aging fields in the middle of the state. Wyoming leaders are also looking to alternative fuels like hydrogen and nuclear power, using reactors that produce less waste.
Meanwhile, a decade of declining coal demand has sapped government income. Republican Gov. Mark Gordon in March signed a coal tax reduction, forgoing about $9 million annually to help the coal industry stay economically viable.
The state — one of only two with no taxes on individual income, corporate income or gross receipts — must confront its dependence on fossil fuel money eventually, said Jennifer Lowe, executive director of the Equality State Policy Center, a government watchdog group.
"At some point, there's going to have to be a come-to-Jesus moment," Lowe said.
___
Gruver reported from Cheyenne, Wyoming. Associated Press writers Jim Anderson in Denver and Marc Levy in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, contributed to this report.
Albuquerque Asian-owned businesses getting boost in security - Associated Press
Albuquerque's Asian American community is testing a new way to bolster security for Asian-owned businesses in the wake of two deadly shootings.
KOAT-TV reported Sunday that an Albuquerque start-up is trying out an online service that connects armed security guards with Asian-owned businesses.
Businesses would report suspicious activity to "toServo." The service then utilizes GPS-enabled mobile technology to put them in touch with a private security team. The security on call would respond within minutes.
It is part of an initiative established by the Asian Business Collaborative. The nonprofit started a "Good Neighbor Program" to check up on shops and restaurants. For now, four businesses will be chosen for the service. But there are hopes to expand its use by the end of the year.
Collaborative organizers say the city's Asian community has been on edge since shootings at two Asian-owned spas.
In January, the female owner of one spa was shot and killed during an attempted robbery. Two men have been charged in her killing. Less than a month later, another woman of Asian descent was killed inside another massage business during a robbery. The suspect was killed in a police pursuit 10 days later.
Hot takes: NM pols point fingers at the feds for megafire - Patrick Lohmann, Source New Mexico
U.S. Sen. Ben Ray Luján and co-sponsors of an act to compensate victims of what will soon become the biggest fire in New Mexico history would prefer you call the blaze simply the “Hermits Peak fire.”
The “Hermits Peak Fire Assistance Act,” introduced this week, seeks to compensate victims of the out-of-control fire. The blaze escaped from a Santa Fe National Forest crew conducting controlled burn on a small swath of dense ponderosa pine and mixed conifer near the watershed that serves Las Vegas.
Two weeks later, it joined forces with the nearby Calf Canyon fire, and, thanks to historically windy and dry conditions, became the monster that rages today.
“As the Hermits Peak Fire continues to leave a devastating impact on our state, the federal government must take responsibility for its role in this fire and remain active in providing relief to New Mexicans whose daily lives have been upended,” Luján said in announcing the bill.
The bill text itself even specifies that the fire be referred to only as the “Hermits Peak fire.” (Luján’s office had not yet responded to a request for comment on why that is as of Sunday evening.)
Meanwhile, Republican leadership in the New Mexico House of Representatives issued a letter Friday to Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham, raising concern about federal management of New Mexico forests and calling for an independent investigation into the federal government’s role starting the “Hermits Peak fire,” which they say is still causing damage in much of northern New Mexico.
“Because the United States Forest Service ordered the prescribed burn that became the Hermits Peak Fire, an investigation conducted solely by the federal government lacks fundamental guarantees of transparency and trustworthiness,” the letter reads, “and leaves northern New Mexicans without any confidence that a thorough and fair investigation will be conducted.”
While some experts have criticized the Santa Fe National Forest’s decision to light a prescribed burn on a windy April day this year, others also caution that giving the feds too much blame distracts from the broader conditions enabling such a devastating fire — mismanaged, overly dense forests and climate change that turns trees into matchsticks.
After all, though it’s the biggest, the fire was just one of 20 burning in the state in late April. Those other fires didn’t need a prescribed burn to consume chunks of forest, just the smallest of embers from a cigarette butt, a vehicle’s catalytic converter, a smoldering campfire.
“We’re basically ignoring or downplaying the risks that are truly out there,” said Matthew Hurteau, a forest management expert at the University of New Mexico. “The landscapes are primed to burn.”
The question, he said, should be: “How do we better manage the risk associated with prescribed burning such that it’s as effective a tool as it can be?”
What most experts and observers refer to as the “Hermits Peak-Calf Canyon fire” (or, in shorthand, “Hermit-Calf”) began in early April when a Santa Fe National Forest crew lit what was supposed to be a 1,200-acre prescribed burn in Las Dispensas, about 12 miles north of Las Vegas.
“Unexpected erratic winds” picked up shortly after, officials said, carrying lit embers outside of the burn area. It was declared the Hermits Peak wildfire shortly after.
It had burned through about 7,500 acres and was considered mostly contained by the time it merged with the Calf Canyon fire about three weeks later and became reinvigorated from high winds. The combined fire quickly approached the record for biggest fire in state history. It’s destroyed hundreds of homes, caused the evacuation of thousands of people and cost taxpayers tens of millions of dollars so far.
Tom Ribe, an author and wildland firefighter, said it was “extremely risky” for a crew to ignite a prescribed burn like the one that caused the Hermits Peak fire. But it looks to him like politicians in public statements are ignoring the existence of the Calf Canyon fire, a fire of undetermined cause engorged on historically high winds in the midst of a megadrought before merging with Hermits Peak.
Ribe, who has a cabin in the Pecos wilderness, wrote “Inferno by Committee,” the definitive book on the Cerro Grande fire — an escaped prescribed burn in 2000 started by the National Parks Service that burned hundreds of homes and cost $1 billion in damage.
If the fallout from Cerro Grande is any indication, he said, the federal employees who started the Hermits Peak fire could be vilified. After the fire, some of the crew needed police protection. Ribe sees the obfuscation as a way to maximize federal liability and also minimize the blame blast radius that occurs in a disaster like this.
“It may be political, just trying to get out ahead of the sort of anger we saw at Cerro Grande,” Ribe said. “People were really angry at the Parks Service. As they should have been.”
President Joe Biden has approved federal disaster aid for New Mexicans affected by the fire. But the governor has also said she expects there to be additional financial compensation due to the federal Forest Service’s role.
New Mexico’s full congressional delegation — Sens. Martin Heinrich and Luján, along with Reps. Teresa Leger Fernández, Melanie Stansbury and Yvette Herrell — sent a letter to Biden on Saturday. They’re joining the state in asking that the state not be required to chip in one-quarter of the costs during the disaster period and that the feds OK money for debris removal and emergency protective measures.
Lujan Grisham, at a news conference last week, said that New Mexicans should know that whatever disaster assistance comes via the Federal Emergency Management agency won’t be enough. That’s especially true for the type of rebuilding she said is required and hopes will become a model across the country for how to respond to a natural disaster of this magnitude.
It will cost hundreds of millions or even billions to do what the governor says is necessary, things like fixing or constructing homes, thinning forests, and restoring reservoirs and watersheds.
“When you think about rebuilding communities, it’s not an overnight process. So we should be thinking in terms of significant resources,” she said. “And those resources, in my view, should largely be borne by the federal government, given the situation.”
And the effort to drop the fire bill at the federal government’s feet might also be helped along by the tricky question of which of the two fires has done the most damage. By the time Calf Canyon and Hermits Peak joined forces April 22, both had burned less than 10,000 acres.
State Rep. Roger Montoya (D-Velarde) told Source New Mexico that he believes the two fires are “inextricably linked” when it comes to determining the damage done — and therefore where the liability falls.
Lujan Grisham, at a news conference this week, said it’s “really impossible” to determine which fire is most to blame for the devastation caused, given the intensity of recent windy and dry conditions and the federal government’s “negligence.”
“Here’s my position as the governor today: We were having to focus on Hermit’s Peak. Those embers could have flown over anywhere, caused (Cooks Peak, another nearby fire) and (Calf Canyon). How do you know?” she said. “I think we just focus with the federal government. A prescribed burn put us in the most dangerous situation.”
The governor said the escaped fire was an honest mistake but one for which she expects the federal government to accept “significant liability.” She also predicted that the feds will accept enough blame that the state won’t have to parse out which fire caused what.
“But if anyone wants a fight about that,” she said, “they’ll get one.”
Low winds may help crews control huge New Mexico wildfire - Associated Press
Crews fighting the second-largest wildfire in New Mexico's history are trying to take advantage of several days of mild winds to gain control over a fire that had charred more than 450 square miles by Sunday.
Fire officials said the wildfire grew by about 14 square miles since Saturday night but now was at 36% containment, up from 27% previously.
It was originally forecast that winds would pick up Monday, but fire officials said that likely won't happen until later in the week.
"We get a small reprieve," fire information officer Renette Saba said Sunday. "The winds are not strong enough to keep from getting air resources in there. The crews feel they can make good progress on contingency lines."
Saba said the fire was actively burning on one side only, with the north part going over an old scar area and producing a large smoke plume.
Nearly 2,000 firefighters were battling the 5-week-old fire that threatened the small New Mexico city of Las Vegas for a time before being stopped just outside town in the past week. The blaze has already destroyed at least 473 structures including homes and other buildings.
New Mexico Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham said Friday in a letter to President Joe Biden that New Mexico needs more help than is being provided under the president's recent disaster declaration.
The governor said the needed response, including immediate funding for debris removal and "a full range of emergency protective measures," exceeds the state's capabilities and the federal government should bear 100% of the costs because one part of the fire was ignited by wind-blown embers from a prescribed burn in the Santa Fe National Forest.
Wildfires have broken out this spring across multiple states in the western U.S., including California, Colorado and Arizona.
Predictions for the rest of the spring do not bode well for the West, with drought and warmer weather brought on by climate change worsening wildfire danger.
Nationwide, more than 2,000 square miles have burned so far this year — the most at this point since 2018, according to the National Interagency Fire Center.
In Colorado, a fire burning in ponderosa pine and grass southwest of Colorado Springs had grown to 1.8 square miles by Sunday and remained 10% contained, fire officials said.
The High Park Fire broke out Thursday about 4 miles west of the former mining town of Cripple Creek. The cause of the fire remains unknown.
On Sunday morning, the evacuation area included 134 homes while another 463 residences were under pre-evacuation notices, said fire information officer Maribeth Pecotte.
Crews were doing mop-up work on the northwest and west-southwest edges of the fire on Sunday. At least four helicopters were aiding fire crews on the southeastern edge of the fire, which was burning in steep, rocky terrain with heavy fuels, Pecotte said.
Report: Significant gains seen in Albuquerque police reforms - By Elise Kaplan Albuquerque Journal
In a marked departure from his recent findings, the independent monitor overseeing the Albuquerque Police Department reforms wrote in his latest report that he saw — "perhaps for the first time" — a serious willingness to identify and correct behavior that is counter to the effort.
Also for the first time, the chief and his top brass have articulated an end date to the process.
In an interview with the Albuquerque Journal, Police Chief Harold Medina said their goal is that the department will be in full compliance with the Court Approved Settlement Agreement in two years. The agreement made between the city of Albuquerque and the U.S. Department of Justice in 2014 lays out the requirements for reforming APD after federal investigators found officers had a pattern and practice of using excessive force.
"We may not meet that goal, and we could get criticized later that we didn't meet our goal," Medina said. "But we're going to set the goal … . We're going to believe in ourselves and we're going to try our best. If, two years from now, we recognize we need one more period, well, you know what, it's a whole lot better than anybody else has done."
In the latest reporting period — which spans from August 2021 through January 2022 — independent monitor James Ginger found APD has attained the highest levels of compliance yet and improved over recent years in which it had backslid. The latest Independent Monitor Report was released Wednesday.
"APD has shown significant performance increases in training effectiveness, and performance in the field has improved somewhat," Ginger wrote in the report. "In the monitor's experience, training nearly always leads the way in organizational development and planned change processes."
APD is now at 99% secondary compliance regarding the training of officers and 70% operational compliance regarding whether officers are following policies and being corrected when they don't. That's an increase over the previous reporting period.
The paragraph involving supervisor training is the only one still lacking in secondary compliance.
APD has been at 100% primary compliance since October 2019, meaning all of required policies and procedures are in place.
The monitor had been harshly critical of the department in 2020 and 2021, saying it was failing to police itself and conduct thorough investigations into officers' use of force.
The Internal Affairs Force Division allowed a backlog of 667 cases to form, meaning that, even if investigators found officers hadn't followed policies, they couldn't be disciplined because the deadlines had passed.
That changed in July 2021 when an outside group called the External Force Investigation Team, or EFIT, was brought on to train APD's force investigators and ensure cases were being investigated within 90 days. Since the team started its work, no new cases have been added to the backlog. A federal judge has signed off on a plan to allow the team to continue its work and also to review the backlog cases.
Medina said the latest monitor's report was "great news" and he was very happy about it.
"I think that it goes to show that, you know, sometimes you've got to give a team a little bit of time to transition and to change," Medina said.
Both Medina and Ginger pointed to new leaders at the police academy who were hired in the spring and summer of 2021. Medina also said he thought the department had done a better job recently of delegating aspects of the reform effort to different staff.
"One of the things that always hurt us is the lack of resources, and you run out of time in the day," he said. "The way this has been developed by the administration is giving specific tasks and not overloading people so that they're able to accomplish more."
As for gains in operational compliance, Deputy Chief Cori Lowe said that, after the monitor provided a draft report, APD provided feedback on paragraphs it thought should be considered in compliance according to the settlement agreement. She said the monitor took that into account, thought about it and gave them more paragraphs in operational compliance.
"We will continue to stand up for our department where we think it's necessary and, you know, to explain ourselves," Medina said. "We don't want to be confrontational about it … but it is imperative that we explain ourselves and they take into account our explanations."
While the tone of the latest report was much softer than in previous ones, Ginger cautioned that critical issues remain.
"Supervision continues to be a significant problem with APD's compliance efforts," he wrote. "Further, APD's disciplinary practices continue to show artifacts of disparate treatment, indicating that personnel at times receive dissimilar discipline instead of based on offense and prior history, which should be the touchstone of effective discipline."
He said that the quality of writing and accuracy of investigations has improved greatly since EFIT came to town, which, in turn, streamlines reviews of use of force and investigations by upper-level staff.
"However, optimism should be tempered by recognition of administrative and cultural obstacles that persist," Ginger wrote. "Eventually, EFIT will pass oversight responsibilities back to APD, which will test APD's ability to sustain the obvious progress made with day-to-day external oversight."
Barron Jones, senior policy strategist with the American Civil Liberties Union of New Mexico, reiterated this sentiment and pointed out that APD was able to improve so much because it had outside help. ACLU is a member of the APD Forward coalition of advocates for police reform.
"While we really appreciate and applaud the progress made during this reporting period, we do want to highlight that this progress came after a huge amount of additional resources had to be put into APD so they could bring up the use-of-force investigations," Jones said.
Grandma gets honorary degree for aiding New Mexico community - Santa Fe New Mexican
An 84-year-old woman has received an honorary degree from Northern New Mexico College for her contributions to the small community north of Española.
The degree was awarded Saturday to Socorro Herrera.
"I'm not the type that likes to show off, but they gave me that honorary degree, and I'm glad," Herrera told the Santa Fe New Mexican in an interview after the ceremony.
According to the newspaper, Herrera is a great grandmother and is known for feeding the elderly, singing at weddings and running Socorro's Restaurant, a staple of the little town that has drawn customers including former President Barack Obama and famed actor John Travolta.
Herrera was born in the same house in Hernández where she operates the restaurant for the past 28 years.
She married at 16, had the first of her four children by the time she was 17 and didn't graduate from high school back then.
But now, Herrera is on her way to holding a diploma from the Peñasco Independent School District.
She has six grandchildren and 10 great-grandchildren.
Nuclear downwinder reparations bill clears US House - By Adrian Hedden Carlsbad Current-Argus
When America's first nuclear weapons were tested in south-central New Mexico they set off generations of strife as nearby communities struggled with cancers and other health problems many feared were a direct impact of associated radiation.
Those downwinders living in remote communities like Carrizozo now have two more years to fight for reparations after a federal bill passed the U.S. House this week, following its Senate passage, and was headed to President Joe Biden's desk to be signed into law, the Carlsbad Current-Argus reported.
The bill will extend the Radiation Exposure Compensation Act that creates a structure for cash payments to nuclear workers and those living near nuclear activities that could be exposed to radiation.
The bill was set to sunset this summer, ending the payments, but with the recent bill's passage RECA will stay active until May 2024.
New Mexico's uranium miners in northern portion of the state are included in the funding and eligible for up to $100,000 while other nuclear workers can get payments up to $75,000 depending on their health issues.
There are 10 other sites identified by the federal government to have uranium workers eligible for payments, but only counties in Arizona, Nevada and Utah have eligible downwinders that can get up to $50,000 in reparations.
Those communities are believed to be "downwind" from the Nevada Test Site, which began to test nuclear weapons in 1951, but do not included any affected by the Trinity Site where the first bombs were tested in 1945.
Tina Cordova, founder of the Tularosa Basin Downwinders Consortium, said the extension will not only allow more impacted people apply for the payments but also give New Mexico's congresspeople more time to advocate that RECA be expanded to include her state's downwinders.
"We're American citizens too. We just ask when we will be acknowledged," Cordova said. "I don't know if people fully understand the impact of all this on New Mexico. The negative economic of people being sick is devastating.
"People are left literally destitute at the end of their life, because they have spent everything they had to try to save their life."
Those health impacts, Cordova argued, lead to an economic depression in small communities like Carrizozo, population about 800, as residents struggle to afford medical bills throughout their life.
The payments that could be available through RECA's expansion she said, if given to even a small number of New Mexico downwinders could uplift desolate, forgotten places like Carrizozo and lead to a financial boon for the state.
"No generational wealth is ever developed. We see that as part of the narrative in our communities," she said. "This is essential to make people's lives whole again and give them resources they need."
The RECA Extension Act of 2022 was cosponsored by both New Mexico's Democrat U.S. Sens. Martin Heinrich and Ben Ray Lujan.
Lujan said Congress must now work to expand law so his constituents can get the reparations they deserve.
"This two-year extension of RECA is a victory for radiation exposure victims in New Mexico and it gives Congress the necessary time to act on a long-term extension and expansion of benefits and eligibility," Lujan said.
U.S. Rep. Teresa Leger Fernandez introduced legislation last year to add New Mexico downwinders to the list of those eligible for the payments and raise the payments to $150,000. That bill was approved by the House Judiciary Committee in December and awaits a vote on the House floor.
"Unfortunately, decades later, many New Mexicans continue to fall ill due to radiation exposure," Leger Fernandez said. "This two-year extension of RECA is a step in the right direction to secure a long-term extension and expansion of benefits and eligibility, but we have more work to do; we can't turn our backs on our communities."
Among the 68 co-sponsors from both parties of Leger Fernandez's RECA amendment bill, U.S. Rep. Yvette Herrell, R-New Mexico, in rare bipartisan move, signed on and supported the legislation.
The Trinity Site falls within in Herrell's Second Congressional District and she said expanding RECA was needed to make exposed New Mexicans whole.
"This legislation is vital to ensuring that the men and women who were harmed by the development and testing at the dawn of the nuclear age are compensated by the government that put them in harms way," she said of the extension bill.
"My constituents — the uranium miners, mill workers, uranium ore transporters, and those who lived downwind of atmospheric nuclear tests — deserve our thanks and assistance and I am proud to have fought for this legislation," Herrell said.
US report details church-state collusion on Native schools - By Peter Smith Associated Press
A new Interior Department report on the legacy of boarding schools for Native Americans underscores how closely the U.S. government collaborated with churches to Christianize them as part of a project to sever them from their culture, their identities and ultimately their land.
The role of churches forms a secondary part of the Federal Indian Boarding School Initiative Investigative Report, released Wednesday after a yearlong review sparked by the 2021 discoveries of hundreds of potential graves at former residential schools in Canada. Most of it focuses on the government's responsibility for its own officials' actions and policies.
But it details how the government provided funding and other support to religious boarding schools for Native children in the 19th and early 20th centuries to an extent that normally would have been prohibited under rules on separation between church and state. Churches had clout with the government as well, it adds, and were able to recommend people for appointments to federal positions on Native affairs.
While this church-state collaboration is well known to specialists in the field and was the subject of federal reports in past generations, the latest one brings it to a wide audience at a time when many Americans are only beginning to learn about the boarding schools.
The Interior Department report, quoting a 1969 Senate investigation, acknowledges that "federal policy toward the Indian was based on the desire to dispossess him of his land. Education policy was a function of our land policy."
A core part of that was training Native Americans in vocations that were less land-intensive — though often ill-suited to available jobs — in addition to breaking down tribal ties.
Christian conversion was also key, the report says, citing an 1886 Commissioner for Indian Affairs document that disparaged Native spiritual traditions and said the government should provide "encouragement and cooperation" to missionaries.
"The government aid furnished enables them to sustain their missions, and renders it possible ... to lead these people, whose paganism has been the chief obstacle to their civilization into the light of Christianity," the commissioner wrote at the time.
This week's report also says the government funded the schools with money held in trust for tribes as compensation for land they ceded. A 1908 Supreme Court ruling held that "the prohibition on the Federal Government to spend funds on religious schools did not apply to Indian treaty funds," it notes.
And it says, citing the 1969 Senate investigation, that the U.S. military "was frequently called in to reinforce the missionaries' orders" in the 19th century.
The report identifies 408 boarding schools for Indigenous children in 37 states and former territories that were either run or supported by the government between 1819 and 1969. While it doesn't say how many were church-run, an earlier report by the National Native American Boarding School Healing Coalition found that more than 150 were, about half each by Catholic and Protestant groups.
At a congressional hearing Thursday on a bill that would authorize a truth-and-healing commission to investigate the boarding schools, modeled on a similar one in Canada, witness Matthew War Bonnet testified about his childhood experience at the St. Francis Boarding School in South Dakota. Priests who ran the facility sought to alienate him from his parents and culture, and at times subjected him to sadistic abuse.
"The boarding schools were sanctioned by the United States Government," said War Bonnet, 76, a Sicangu Lakota from the Rosebud Sioux Reservation. "The government gave the churches our lands to Christianize us, modernize us and civilize us. But the churches treated us wrong. ... The government and the churches need to be held accountable."
The Rev. Bradley Hauff, the Episcopal Church's missioner for Indigenous ministries, who is Lakota and a member of the Oglala Sioux Tribe, said faith groups must confront their history of collaboration on the schools.
"As much as we in the church might not want to acknowledge that, it is the truth, and we have to acknowledge and reckon with it. We did work hand in hand with the government in the assimilation process," he said. "Most if not all the Christian denominations that had a presence in America in the late 19th century operated at least one Indigenous boarding school."
At its General Convention in July, the Episcopal Church plans to vote on probing its role with the schools and acknowledging its responsibility for causing trauma in generations of Native Americans.
Maka Black Elk, executive director of truth and healing at the Red Cloud Indian School, founded in 1888 by Jesuits in Pine Ridge, South Dakota, agreed that faith groups must reckon with their past. Lakota staffing, language and ritual are central to the modern Red Cloud school, which serves Christians as well as followers of Native spiritual traditions.
"While today we recognize there are many Native people who identify as Christian ... and value that part of their identity, we have to engage deeply with that history," he said.
Any evangelism must be "rooted in people's agency and (be) nonviolent," added Black Elk, who is Oglala Lakota. "That is a big part of our discussion today. That's a broader question for the greater Catholic church, not just us."
In April, Pope Francis apologized at the Vatican to Indigenous delegations from Canada "for the deplorable conduct of those members of the Catholic Church" in operating the schools, where many children were abused and died from disease and other causes. Francis plans to apologize again on Canadian soil in July.
The Friends Committee on National Legislation, a lobby affiliated with the Quaker movement, which operated multiple boarding schools, said in a statement that this week's Interior report should spur congressional approval of the truth and healing commission.
"Further, we call on the faith community at large to share records and accounts of their administration of these schools," the committee said. "Only through complete honesty and transparency can we begin moving towards a more just future."
Proposed revision of Mexican wolf management plan draws fire - By Susan Montoya Bryan Associated Press
U.S. wildlife managers want to see at least 320 Mexican gray wolves roaming the Southwest within the next several years as they try to recover an endangered species that for decades has been the focus of political strife and litigation.
While a population cap would be eliminated under a proposed management rule, environmentalists say the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service isn't going far enough to ensure the recovery of the endangered species. They're pushing for the release of more captive wolves — specifically bonded pairs with pups.
Federal officials on Friday released their draft decision on the management plan for the wolves and a related environmental review. Among other things, the plan outlines when and how wolves can be removed from the wild or released from captivity.
The changes were prompted by a lawsuit filed by environmental groups. A federal judge had ordered that a revised plan be in place by July 1.
Michael Robinson with the Center for Biological Diversity said rising wolf numbers and a broader geographic distribution across New Mexico and Arizona should signal more security for the population in the short term. Still, he said the loss of genetic diversity will be a problem for the predators in the future.
"The government is pretending to conserve genetic diversity because of its court loss but refuses to release family packs with high survival rates," he said, noting that independent scientists also have pushed for the integration of underrepresented genes from captivity into the wild.
Robinson said failing to address genetic issues is at odds with the spirit of the Endangered Species Act and may violate the letter of the law.
New Mexico ranchers have their own concerns, noting that removing the population cap will result in more wolves on the landscape and ultimately more confrontation with livestock.
"On a daily basis ranching families contend with unpredictable weather, fluctuating markets and increasing regulations. Now, the federal government is moving the recovery plan 'goal posts' once again," said Craig Ogden, president of New Mexico Farm & Livestock Bureau. "Our state's ranchers are being sacrificed to achieve an ever-changing goal with no real finish line in sight."
It's unclear whether the Fish and Wildlife Service's latest effort will result in another legal challenge by either ranchers or environmentalists.
Officials with the agency did not immediately return a message seeking comment on the groups' concerns.
The rarest subspecies of the gray wolf in North America, the Mexican wolf has seen its population increase over the last six years. A survey done earlier this year showed at least 196 Mexican gray wolves in New Mexico and Arizona.
The management rule would place restrictions on permits issued to ranchers or state wildlife agencies that allow the killing of wolves if they prey on livestock, elk or deer. In its draft decision, the Fish and Wildlife Service stated that by doing so, demographic and genetic threats to Mexican wolves would be significantly reduced in a decade or less.
Federal officials hope to reach their overall population objective as soon as 2028, and they expect to boost the survival rate of captive-bred wolves that are released into the wild in the coming years.
Officials also said that the revised plan for the first time puts into regulation a genetic objective, and meeting that goal along with the population objective would result in a 90% likelihood of the Mexican wolf population persisting over the next century.