New Mexico allocates grants from $32M mine spill settlement - Associated Press
Six entities impacted by the 2015 Gold King Mine spill will share roughly $4 million in grants from a settlement, according to the New Mexico Attorney General's office.
Outgoing Attorney General Hector Balderas announced earlier this month that nearly $4.3 million will be divided among multiple municipalities and agencies.
The cities of Aztec and Farmington in San Juan County, the San Juan Soil and Water Conservation District, the state tourism department and the New Mexico State University Extension Service will all receive six-figure grants.
To be recipients of the grant program, they submitted a proposal to the New Mexico Attorney General's office.
"Out of tragedy comes hope, and I am honored to award these amazing applicants and their ideas to invest in their own communities," Balderas said in a statement.
The grant funds come from the overall $32 million settlement reached in June between New Mexico and the U.S. government over the spill that polluted rivers in three western states. The spill released 3 million gallons (11 million liters) of wastewater from the inactive Gold King Mine in southwestern Colorado, sending a bright-yellow plume of arsenic, lead and other heavy metals south to New Mexico, through the Navajo Nation and into Utah through the San Juan and Animas rivers.
Water utilities were forced to scramble and shut down intake valves — and farmers stopped drawing from the rivers as the contaminants moved downstream.
Under the New Mexico agreement, the federal government will make cash payments for response costs, environmental restoration and efforts to mitigate negative perceptions about the area's rivers following the spill. Money also will go toward monitoring water quality and other cleanup activities.
In 2021, the state also received $11 million in damages from the mining companies.
Under that agreement, $10 million will be paid to New Mexico for environmental response costs and lost tax revenue and $1 million will go to Office of the Natural Resources Trustee for injuries to New Mexico's natural resources.
14 candidates in line for BernCo DA appointment - Albuquerque Journal
14 attorneys are now shooting their shot to be the next head of Bernalillo County’s District Attorney’s office after Governor Michelle Lujan Grisham extended the application deadline to Friday.
As the Albuquerque Journal reports, new last-minute applicants include Alexander Flores, an assistant U.S. attorney; Brianne Bigej, general counsel for the New Mexico Department of Corrections; and Matthias Swonger, supervising attorney for the New Mexico Law Offices of the Public Defender.
According to the governor’s office, interviews are now taking place and an appointment is expected to happen swiftly.
Candidates are looking to replace outgoing 2nd Judicial District Attorney Raúl Torrez, who was elected to serve as the state’s attorney general in November.
Other prominent names in the hat include Sam Bregman, an Albuquerque defense attorney, and Damon Martinez, who served as U.S. attorney for the District of New Mexico and now serves as the Albuquerque Police Department’s chief policy adviser.
Cameraman hurt on New Mexico film set gets $66M in lawsuit — Associated Press
A Los Angeles cameraman who suffered a spinal cord injury while on a New Mexico movie set has been awarded more than $66 million in a lawsuit, among the largest settlements in the state's history, a news outlet reported.
The Santa Fe New Mexican quoted Jame Razo as saying that the jury's decision Friday was "a huge emotional relief."
"I can finally begin my healing journey," he said in a phone interview Tuesday, the newspaper reported.
The 55-year-old was a cameraman on the set of "Only the Brave," a film about elite firefighters starring Josh Brolin and Jeff Bridges, in June 2016. He was driving a mobile camera crane unit, which weighs over 3,000 pounds (1,361 kilograms) when fully loaded, up a steep road on Pajarito Mountain in the Pajarito Ski Area near Los Alamos, when the unit tipped over and fell on him, the newspaper reported.
Razo suffered crush injuries that left several areas of his body severely damaged. Since then, he has had over 1,000 medical appointments and nearly a dozen surgeries, according to the report.
In the suit, Razo says producers were negligent by denying him time to scout the terrain first or install tank treads on the vehicle.
It took a jury four hours to decide that Razo should receive $24.6 million in damages and his wife $6 million. In addition, production companies Black Label Media and No Exit Film are liable for $27 million and $9 million in punitive damages, respectively.
Attorneys for the California-based production companies did not respond to messages from the newspaper seeking comment.
New Mexico State to begin search for next chancellor — Associated Press
New Mexico State University is searching for its next chancellor.
The Las Cruces campus announced in a news release Wednesday that the university's Board of Regents has approved the administration to start looking for a new leader.
Current Chancellor Dan Arvizu's five-year contract is set to expire in June.
In a memo, the regents said it's crucial the process of finding a new chancellor start as soon as possible.
They also paid tribute to Arvizu for helping NMSU achieve increased enrollment and spending on research and development.
Clovis man arrested after allegedly putting feces through mail slot — The Eastern New Mexico News, KUNM News
New Mexico State police have arrested a Clovis man for allegedly putting feces through a mail slot at State police headquarters.
The Eastern New Mexico news reports Christian Cook was confronted by police while he was walking away from the building shortly after the unwelcome delivery was made, but was allowed to leave without incident at the time.
Police allege Cook made 14 calls to police within an hour, in which they say he threatened and harassed dispatchers, challenging them to fist fights, and threatened to throw dog feces.
Cook is charged with several misdemeanors, but records do not indicate what initially spurred Cook’s alleged actions.
A Marine came home for the holidays. Now he’s in jail charged with rape — The Albuquerque Journal, KUNM News
A marine who came home to New Mexico for the holidays walked off the plane to find police and handcuffs waiting for him — along with charges of criminal sexual penetration of child, among others.
The Albuquerque Journal reports the father of a 13-year-old girl reported to Albuquerque Police that Derek Stanley, 20 years old, had had sex with his daughter and had been communicating with her online, exchanging sexually explicit messages.
Detectives interviewed the girl, and gained access to her online conversations, during which she and Stanley allegedly discussed the illegality of their relationship, and she mentioned how she was too young mentally and physically for a sexual relationship — but Stanley said she was not too young physically, according to a criminal complaint.
Stanley then reached out to the girl again in November, and detectives worked with the attorney general’s office to reply to Stanley using a fake email address he thought belonged to the girl.
Stanley had gone to the same charter school as the girl and had acted as a mentor in a sport she played, though it’s unclear what sport that was.
Supreme Court rules to keep Title 42, pandemic-era policy to quickly turn away migrants, for now - Uriel J. García, Texas Tribune and Alexa Ura, The Texas Tribune via Source New Mexico
The U.S. Supreme Court ruled Tuesday to keep in place the emergency health order the federal government has used for more than two years to quickly turn away migrants, including those seeking asylum, at the southwest border.
The latest ruling replaces an order issued by Chief Justice John G. Roberts last week that halted the lifting of the health policy, known as Title 42, which the Biden administration had planned to wind down. Title 42 will remain in place for at least several more months. In its Tuesday order, the high court agreed to hear arguments in February on whether an Arizona-led coalition of 19 states, including Texas, can challenge a lower-court ruling that ordered the Biden administration to lift Title 42.
That lower-court ruling will remain blocked until the high court makes a decision on the more procedural issue of whether the GOP-led states can intervene in a lawsuit originally filed by immigrant advocates against the federal government.
The Tuesday ruling came down on a 5-4 vote, with Justice Neil Gorsuch joining the court’s three liberal justices in opposing the majority’s decision.
The Trump administration invoked the use of Title 42 in March 2020 as the COVID-19 pandemic began, calling it a necessary step to help stop the virus’s spread in immigrant detention centers. Dr. Anthony Fauci, the nation’s top infectious disease expert, has since said that immigrants are not driving up the number of COVID-19 cases.
Immigration officials have used the health order more than 2 million times to expel migrants, some of whom have been removed multiple times after making repeated attempts to enter the U.S. Under Title 42, the recidivism rate — the percentage of people apprehended more than once by a Border Patrol agent — has increased from 7% to 27% since fiscal year 2019.
The request from the coalition of states for the Supreme Court to weigh in came after Judge Emmet Sullivan of the U.S. District Court in Washington, D.C., ruled last month that the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s use of the order — which removes migrants from the U.S. without allowing them to access the asylum process — is “arbitrary and capricious” and a violation of the law because it was not implemented properly.
Sullivan ordered the Biden administration to immediately lift Title 42, then later agreed to give the federal government until Dec. 21 to prepare for the change.
Sullivan’s ruling stems from a lawsuit filed in January 2021 by the American Civil Liberties Union and two Texas-based immigrant rights groups that argued Title 42 violated U.S. asylum laws and that the Trump administration used the pandemic as a pretext to invoke Title 42 and use it as an immigration tool.
Another federal court also weighed in on Title 42 after Arizona and 18 other states filed a federal lawsuit on April 3 in Louisiana, asking a judge to stop the government from lifting Title 42. Texas filed a separate lawsuit on April 22 seeking the same thing, but dropped its lawsuit and joined the other states’ suit.
In May, U.S. District Judge Robert R. Summerhays blocked the Biden administration from ending Title 42. The administration appealed, and that case remains pending in the 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals.
This article originally appeared in The Texas Tribune, a member-supported, nonpartisan newsroom informing and engaging Texans on state politics and policy. It is republished here with permission under a Creative Commons license.
Proposal would professionalize only unsalaried legislature - Associated Press
Lawmakers in New Mexico — the nation's only unsalaried legislature — are looking for ways instill greater professionalism in their work that could result in a steady paycheck and lengthier legislative calendar.
Democratic state State Rep. Joy Garratt of Albuquerque told the Santa Fe New Mexican that she plans to co-sponsor a ballot initiative to create a commission with the authority to set salaries for legislators. Legislative approval is required to schedule the vote.
Members of the New Mexico House and Senate receive a daily stipend and reimbursement for travel that can add add up to more than $20,000 in some instances, with an optional pension plan for long-serving lawmakers.
New Mexico's Legislature meets for as few as 30 days a year, with 60-day sessions in odd-numbered years. There are more extensive duties and travel for members of year-round budget and policy committees.
This unsalaried status has been a source of public pride in the "citizens' legislature." Critics of the system say legislative salaries would help younger candidates who hail from working households serve as lawmakers and alleviate conflicts between legislative advocacy and private careers.
A new study by University of New Mexico professors Timothy Krebs and Michael Rocca ranks the state near the bottom of legislatures in its capacity to perform a wide range of government oversight duties and acquire broad expertise.
Legislators from Connecticut to Oregon recently cited meager financial compensation in their decisions to resign or leave office without seeking reelection.
In several states, bills that would increase pay for legislators faltered in 2022 amid fears that lawmakers might anger voters by approving their own pay raises.
In New Mexico, money is currently no obstacle to expanding pay for legislators. State government is forecasting a multibillion-dollar windfall from surging oil production and robust energy prices.
Economists estimate state government income of nearly $12 billion for the fiscal year running from July 2023 to June 2024. That revenue would exceed current annual general fund spending obligations by 43% or $3.6 billion.
Pitino's No. 22 Lobos push their way onto AP Top 25 slate - By Aaron Beard Ap Basketball Writer
Richard Pitino took less than a day after his firing from Minnesota to jump at the chance to coach New Mexico. And like their second-year coach, the 22nd-ranked Lobos are moving fast.
New Mexico is one of three unbeaten teams left in Division I — the others being No. 1 Purdue and No. 2 Connecticut. And the Lobos (12-0) will play their first games in more than eight years with a national ranking as part of this week's AP Top 25 schedule, starting Wednesday against Colorado State to open Mountain West Conference play followed by Saturday's trip to Wyoming.
The program was last ranked during the 2013-14 season.
"You want to get to the stage, to the big stage where people know who you are individually as well as your program," Pitino said Monday in an interview with The Associated Press. "It's no different than an upstart band, a young rapper, that's trying to go on tour to sell tickets by the show that he puts on, so he gets more recognition and opens more doors for them individually as well as the program.
"But if you go and lay an egg when it's time for the concert, then the attention, the fan support, the all-eyes-on-you goes away."
Pitino inherited a six-win team and his first squad went 13-19. But a win Wednesday would give the Lobos their second 13-0 start in program history (the other came in a school-record 17-0 start in 1967-68).
Success has come with the return of high-scoring guards Jamal Mashburn Jr. (16.8 points per game) and Jaelen House (16.4), and the addition of transfer big men Morris Udeze (17.5 points, 7.3 rebounds) from Wichita State and Josiah Allick (9.3, 8.2) from Missouri-Kansas City.
New Mexico has won by getting the ball inside. Only 10 Division I teams average fewer attempted 3-pointers per game than the Lobos (15.9), who are taking 74% of their shots inside the arc.
That has also helped New Mexico get to the foul line — a lot. The Lobos are second nationally by averaging 27.8 free throws, and they're No. 1 by making 20.4 of those per game.
"We've done a really good job of being mature about, let's just go where our bread is buttered and not fight it, not try to prove to people, 'I can do this,'" Pitino said. "No, let's put you in a position to be at the spots you need to be at to shoot the highest percentages."
As a result, New Mexico has climbed from No. 294 in KenPom's Division I rankings when Pitino took over to No. 66 as of Monday. And more progress could be ahead.
BOILERMAKERS' WEEK
Purdue remained No. 1 in Monday's poll, marking the Boilermakers' third straight week at the top. Purdue (12-0, 2-0 Big Ten) hosts Florida A&M on Thursday, its final game before returning to league play next week.
INSTATE RIVALRIES
Fifth-ranked Arizona faces an interesting test with instate rival Arizona State on Saturday, though No. 19 Kentucky's matchup that day with Louisville doesn't look nearly as intriguing.
Arizona (12-1, 1-1 Pac-12) has won six straight and owns KenPom's No. 1-ranked offense (120.2 points per 100 possessions) as of Monday. The Sun Devils were ranked No. 25 last week before a blowout loss at San Francisco, though they still rank in the top 10% of Division I teams in KenPom's adjusted defensive efficiency (92.4 points allowed per 100 possessions).
As for Louisville-Kentucky, the Wildcats (8-3) first face Missouri on Wednesday in their Southeastern Conference opener before hosting the Cardinals (2-11), who are off to a miserable start under first-year coach Kenny Payne.
ACC MOVERS
North Carolina had a rapid fall from preseason No. 1 to unranked by early December after a four-game losing streak. But the 25th-ranked Tar Heels (9-4, 1-1 Atlantic Coast Conference) have regrouped to win four straight entering Friday's trip to Pittsburgh.
Meanwhile, No. 14 Miami (12-1, 3-0) is rolling with eight straight wins, including at home against highly ranked Virginia last week. The Hurricanes, up eight spots from last week's poll, host Vermont on Wednesday and then visit Notre Dame on Friday in league play.
WATCH LIST
College of Charleston is the headliner just outside the Top 25.
The Cougars (12-1) host Hampton on Thursday before visiting Towson in Colonial Athletic Association play, and their only loss came at UNC. They're within one spot of moving into the AP Top 25 for the first time since spending a week at No. 25 in December 2003.