New Mexico AG releases blistering report, announces lawsuit against state child welfare agency - by Danielle Prokop, Source New Mexico
New Mexico Attorney General Raúl Torrez on Wednesday excoriated the state’s child welfare agency for prioritizing “family reunification” over the safety of the children in its care, and said his office will be suing the agency over allegations it misused state confidentiality laws to hide systemic failures.
During a news conference in Albuquerque, Torrez outlined a 214-page report from the state Department of Justice that documented its investigation of the New Mexico Children, Youth and Families Department. He was flanked by the surviving aunt of 16-year-old Jaydun Garcia, who took his own life last year while in state custody. Torrez said Garcia’s death served as “a wake-up call” for the agency and sparked the NMDOJ investigation.
The NMDOJ’s key finding stated that CYFD has prioritized “family reunification at virtually any cost—returning children to dangerous caregivers with histories of substantiated abuse or chronic neglect.”
Torrez said that 14 children died while in state custody in the last two years.
“They should have been protected by the state, and if we had an effective system, they would be with us today,” Torrez said.
The report details numerous cases of such abuse. In the news conference, Torrez highlighted the starvation death of a blind and non-verbal 16-year-old girl, who was the subject of seven CYFD referrals in five years. The girl’s mother was ultimately sentenced to 15 years in prison, but CYFD staff, in July 2025, petitioned to release her from jail and take custody of her four surviving children, according to the report.
“That is unconscionable,” Torrez said. “That is inexcusable and unfortunately, that is not the only example of reunification taking priority over safety.”
Overall, the report identified eight areas it described as “systemic failures” at CYFD. In addition to prioritizing reunification at the expense of safety, it said ineffectual leadership and an unstable workforce; gaps in protecting drug-exposed infants; undermining law enforcement; devaluation of foster parents; unsafe and traumatic office stays; along with problematic congregate care facilities have contributed to a child welfare landscape in New Mexico that is in “crisis.”
Torrez called for the state’s next governor and Legislature to prioritize redesigning the agency “from the ground up.”
“I am looking for a legislatively led comprehensive initiative to reexamine the structure of this entire agency,” he said.
In recent years, lawmakers and others have increasingly criticized the agency for a range of issues such as rising costs of settlements for child death and maltreatment while in state custody, as well as legal probes into children injured by private security guards.
In 2025 lawmakers passed House Bill 5, which established the Office of the Child Advocate, housed by the New Mexico Department of Justice, to respond and investigate complaints brought on behalf of children in CYFD custody.
The state Senate Republican Caucus on Wednesday responded to the NMDOJ report with a list of legislation it said its members had tried to introduce to address problems at CYFD, and issued a statement saying that every New Mexican “should be enraged and disgusted by the harrowing details brought to light by today’s report. This report is a devastating indictment of failed leadership and misplaced priorities all at the expense of the safety, security, and well-being of our state’s most abused and neglected children.”
Torrez on Wednesday also announced a new lawsuit brought by NMDOJ against CYFD and its use of confidentiality laws meant to protect the identities of children in its custody.
He said CYFD failed to hand over reports to the NMDOJ during its investigation and alleged it used confidentiality laws to “intimidate employees, advocates and families” from speaking out.
“The department has been misapplying, misinterpreting and abusing confidentiality as a way to shield adults in the positions of power and as a weapon of retaliation,” Torrez said. “That is going to come to an end.”
Albuquerque mayor signs immigrant safety law - Gillian Barkhurst, Albuquerque Journal
Amid a nationwide federal immigration crackdown, Mayor Tim Keller signed a law restricting immigration enforcement in Albuquerque.
The law returns to a Biden-era policy scrapped by President Donald Trump just days into his second term. The “protected areas” policy forbade Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers from arresting people at sensitive locations like churches, schools and hospitals.
The bill-signing at City Hall on Tuesday afternoon was met with tears and chants by immigrant rights groups, for whom family separation is a constant anxiety.
“Now, I can drop off my kids at school and know I will be able to pick them up,” Mirna Lazcano said, in Spanish, before the bill-signing. Lazcano, originally from Chihuahua, Mexico, paused to shed a tear and her voice grew hoarse.
“Thank you for listening to the people,” she added.
While immigration rights advocates, local politicians and city staff applauded the bill- signing, some leaders and residents say the law undermines public safety and invites retribution from the Trump administration.
The “Safer Community Spaces Ordinance” passed the City Council in March on a 5-4 vote, with a core of conservative-leaning councilors voting no, including Councilors Brook Bassan, Dan Champine, Renée Grout and Dan Lewis.
Officials at the Department of Homeland Security and ICE could not be immediately reached for comment Tuesday.
‘A strong consensus’
This legislation is just the latest in a series of laws at the city, county and state levels attempting to protect immigrant communities from the federal government.
In November, the Bernalillo County Commission enacted a similar law that applies across the county, including in Albuquerque. Months later, during the 30-day legislative session, New Mexican lawmakers passed a bill to prohibit counties and municipalities from contracting with ICE in an attempt to shutter immigration detention centers in the state.
“I think in New Mexico there is strong consensus,” Keller said after signing the bill into law. With the law on the books, he said that the next step, actually enforcing it, may prove more difficult.
ICE is currently embroiled in thousands of wrongful detention lawsuits. As of mid-February, judges ruled that ICE unlawfully detained someone in 4,400 cases, according to an analysis by Reuters.
Despite surges of ICE operations in cities like Minneapolis and Los Angeles, Keller said he believes the constitution and legal system will ultimately prevail.
“The courts are going to outlast this president,” Keller said.
Working with a coalition of other cities across the nation, Albuquerque is prepared to take any violations of the new law to court, he said.
“In many ways, cities are at the front line in America holding our democracy together,” Keller said.
Route 66, a quintessential American road trip heavy on kitsch and history, turns 100 - By Susan Montoya Bryan, Associated Press
There are faster ways to get from Chicago to Los Angeles, but none have the allure or cultural cachet of Route 66.
To John Steinbeck, it was the Mother Road that led poor farmers from Dust Bowl desperation to sunny California. To Native Americans along the route, it was an economic boon that also left scars. To Black travelers, it offered sanctuary during segregation. And to music fans, it was the place to get their kicks.
Route 66 marks its 100th anniversary this year. Despite losing its status decades ago as one of the nation's main arteries, people from around the world still flock to it to take perhaps the quintessential American road trip and soak in its neon lights, kitschy motels and attractions, and culinary offerings.
Each town has its own history and magic, said Sebastiaan de Boorder, a Dutch entrepreneur who, with his wife, breathed new life into The Aztec Motel in Seligman, Arizona.
"It's an essential part of American culture and history," he said of the highway. "The historical aspect is just a very big important part of American culture, with its influence and its character."
The dream
Route 66, which runs for roughly 2,400 miles (3,860 kilometers) from Chicago through Missouri, Kansas, Oklahoma, Texas, New Mexico and Arizona before ending in Santa Monica, California, was stitched together a century ago from a collection of Native American trading routes and old dirt roads with the goal of linking the industrial Midwest to the Pacific coast.
Oklahoma businessman Cyrus Avery, known as the Father of Route 66, saw it as more than just a way to cross the country efficiently. It was a chance to connect rural America and create new pockets of commerce.
Avery knew the number 66 would be ripe for marketing and could be seared into drivers' minds, and he was right: Route 66 has been immortalized in movies, books, including Steinbeck's "The Grapes of Wrath" and Jack Kerouac's "On the Road," and songs such as Bobby Troup's "(Get Your Kicks on) Route 66," which served as an anthem for post-World War II optimism and mobility.
Waves of migration
Since its November 1926 designation as one of the nation's original numbered highways, the onetime Main Street of America has embodied the promise of prosperity.
It became a literal path of hope for migrants escaping drought-ravaged farms and poverty during the 1930s Dust Bowl and the Great Depression. And during World War II, it was used to move troops, equipment and workers out West.
The postwar boom of the 1940s and 1950s were Route 66's heyday, as it became a popular vacation route. Cars became more affordable, disposable income increased, and people began chasing freedom on the open road.
"People generally have a sense of adventure, a sense curiosity. And you can find that on Route 66. This is the road of dreams," author and historian Jim Hinckley said.
Going mainstream
Roadside diners and motels thrived, as crafty entrepreneurs dreamed up ways to part motorists from their money. There were rattlesnake pits, totem poles, trading posts, caverns where Old West outlaws purportedly hung out, and modern engineering marvels like St. Louis' gleaming steel arch.
Barns were painted with larger-than-life ads, billboards teased local attractions, and neon was everywhere.
The cherry on top? The food.
There were places to grab and go, but also to sit down and relish a slice of home. The Cozy Dog Drive In — famous for its breaded hot dogs on a stick — has fit both bills since 1949. Inside the dining room in Springfield, Illinois, travelers tell tales of life on the highway.
"The road wouldn't be alive without the stories of all the places along it that kept it going from town to town," third-generation owner Josh Waldmire said. "We just survive off each other. The road feeds us, and as long as we put our feelings and love back into the road, it will reverberate with the travelers and the stories of the people."
A divided highway
Route 66 was an economic boon to the Native American tribes along the way. But although it brought tourists, it also left scars of eminent domain across tribal land and perpetuated stereotypes.
More than half of the highway crossed through Indian Country, and vendor signs often made casual references to tipis and feathered headdresses — symbols easily appropriated for marketing but not always representative of the distinct cultures found along the route.
At Laguna Pueblo west of Albuquerque, restaurants and service stations sprang up, some operated by military veterans from the pueblo who were masters at fixing everything from flat tires to busted radiators.
Pueblo women adapted too, turning utilitarian pottery vessels into works of art coveted by tourists. Homemade bread and pies sealed the deal.
Laguna leaders have long considered the road — or he-ya-nhee' in the tribe's language of Keres — as "the corridor of commerce," said businessman and tribal member Ron Solimon. Capitalizing on that potential, the tribe has built a multimillion-dollar empire of casinos, burger stands and other businesses.
There were also dangers along the route, particularly during the Jim Crow era, when Black travelers had to rely on guides like the Green Book to find safe lodging and services.
"Especially for long-distance travel, segregation was a fact of life," said Matthew Pearce, state historian for the Oklahoma Historical Society. "And so Black motorists needed to know a safe place to go."
The Threatt Filling Station near the central Oklahoma community of Luther wasn't listed in the Green Book, but it did serve as a safe haven between two sundown towns, where people who weren't white needed to leave by sunset. The station offered barbecue and even baseball.
Edward Threatt, whose grandparents opened the station around 1933, recalled a TV program about travelers getting their kicks on 66. "By and large, the Black traveler didn't get a lot of kicks on Route 66," he said. "And if they got some kicks, it wasn't the kind you would think of."
A new direction
President Dwight Eisenhower's vision for a modern interstate highway system eventually led to Route 66 being decommissioned as a federal highway in 1985. Some towns along the route died, and it fell to local governments, state historical societies, and private businesses to preserve their sections of the famed road.
A driving force was Angel Delgadillo, a barber who lobbied the Arizona Legislature to designate the road as a historic highway. He saved Seligman from turning into a ghost town and set the bar for preservation elsewhere.
In New Mexico, original sketches for neon signs have been preserved, Route 66-themed murals abound and developers in Albuquerque have restored motor lodges along the longest urban stretch of the road still intact.
More than 90% of the road is still drivable in California. Cadillac Ranch in the Texas Panhandle offers the chance to spray-paint half-buried cars. And at the Mississippi River, travelers can walk or bike across the old Chain of Rocks Bridge.
More than 250 of the route's buildings, districts and road segments are listed on the National Register of Historic Places. But it's more than bricks and asphalt that fuel the fascination.
"Some of the most interesting and fun things that happen to people when they travel the route is running into somebody they know or some happenstance thing that comes totally unexpected," said author and historian Jim Ross. "And that's a great part of the Route 66 experience."
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Associated Press writers John O'Connor in Springfield, Illinois, and Sean Murphy in Oklahoma City contributed to this report.
Meow Wolf names former Epic Games executive as CEO - Justin Horwath, Albuquerque Journal
Meow Wolf, the arts and entertainment company that opened its immersive “House of Eternal Return” in Santa Fe in 2016, said Tuesday that it has hired Matthew Henick as its CEO.
Since the Santa Fe installation opened 10 years ago, Meow Wolf has established its quirky installations in cities across the nation, with permanent locations in Texas, Nevada and Colorado. It is currently working on installations in New York and Los Angeles.
“Matthew brings a remarkable combination of media, technology and immersive experience leadership at exactly the right moment for Meow Wolf,” said Christopher Sobecki, chair of Meow Wolf’s board of directors. “With the company expanding both its geographic footprint as well as its new media presence beyond the four walls, the board is confident he is the right leader to build on Meow Wolf’s artistic foundation while guiding its growth in a rapidly evolving entertainment landscape.”
Before joining Meow Wolf, Henick worked as the senior vice president of consumer products for The Trade Desk, a California-headquartered digital marketing company. Before that, he was the CEO of Deep Voodoo, an AI and visual effects studio founded by the creators of the animated television series “South Park,” Trey Parker and Matt Stone.
Henick also led metaverse development at Epic Games, “where he drove strategy for Fortnite’s immersive digital world,” Meow Wolf said in a news release.
He holds a master’s degree in fine arts from the University of Southern California. He also holds a master’s degree in digital media studies and a bachelor’s degree in science, technology and society from Stanford University.
Henick co-founded the first and largest ringtone company in the U.S. in 2000, MobileSmarts.
Meow Wolf described Henick as a Los Angeles resident who is “deeply embedded in the creative and technology communities that will be central to Meow Wolf’s continued growth.”
“His experience building entertainment platforms at the intersection of content, technology, and audience, most recently in the television and streaming space, dovetails with Meow Wolf’s vision for where the experience economy is headed,” the company said in the news release.
Henick replaces former CEO Jose Tolosa, who stepped down last year after leading the company for more than three years. Tolosa, who led Meow Wolf’s expansion into Texas, had also led the company when it cut more than 200 workers across operations to reduce expenses in 2024.
In a statement, Henick said the first time he walked through a Meow Wolf exhibition that he “felt wonder and connection — to the art, to the strangers around me and the artists who create these miracle places.”
“My job is to make sure millions more people get to feel that, whether they walk through our portals or encounter Meow Wolf in entirely new ways,” Henick said.
PNM, private equity firm contend $400M stock sale didn’t violate state law - Joshua Bowling, Source New Mexico
Officials for New Mexico’s largest electric company and the private equity firm looking to acquire it told state regulators this week that they stand behind their $400 million stock sale. Critics, including environmental advocates and the New Mexico Attorney General, had previously questioned whether the sale violated state law and state regulators opened a formal investigation into the matter.
The state investigation was the latest development in the controversial proposed sale.
PNM’s parent company TXNM Energy Inc. and private equity firm Blackstone Infrastructure first announced their plans for an $11.5 billion acquisition in 2025, setting in motion regulatory approval by the state Public Regulation Commission. Opposition to the sale emerged in both procedural filings and public hearings.
In February of this year, the Albuquerque anti-poverty nonprofit Prosperity Works and New Mexico Attorney General Raúl Torrez raised concerns that a mid-2025 $400 million stock sale between TXNM and a Blackstone affiliate had violated the state Public Utilities Act, which charges the PRC with overseeing stock sales. The law states in part that stock sales can only happen “with the prior express authorization of the commission.”
The state Public Regulation Commission in March opened a formal investigation and gave PNM and Blackstone until this week to submit proof that the deal did not violate any laws.
The utility and the private equity firm have contended that the $400 million sale was necessary to support TXNM’s operations while the merger is pending.
“The stock sale was for the purpose of funding TXNM’s operating and capital budgets and did not benefit or support our efforts to acquire TXNM,” a Blackstone spokesperson wrote in an email to Source NM.
In a Monday filing, PNM and Blackstone argued that their opponents’ arguments rely on an interpretation of a law that “appears beguilingly simple at first blush” and wrote that the state Supreme Court has not relied on a simple interpretation of this law when it would lead to an “absurd” result.
In the filing, the companies also proposed an alternative. If the commission finds that the stock sale required prior authorization, the companies proposed an alternative arrangement that would allow the utility to hold on to the money and bar Blackstone from being a shareholder until the PRC made a final decision.
“The stock issuance was done in good faith, communicated publicly with advance notice, and with no intent to circumvent any rules or regulations,” a PNM spokesperson wrote in an email to Source NM, adding that the stocks were not sold in exchange for control.
Critics, however, say the alternative proposal would make the existing law little more than window dressing.
“They want the commission to ignore the law so they can keep the benefits of an unlawful stock acquisition,” Mariel Nanasi, executive director of the Santa Fe clean energy advocacy organization New Energy Economy, told Source NM. “That’s a textbook attempt to do indirectly what the law forbids directly. You can’t take an unlawful transaction, rename it and keep the money. That would render the statute meaningless.”
In a Monday filing of its own, Torrez’s New Mexico Department of Justice countered that the merger hinged on the stock sale and violated state law because the PRC did not get a chance to approve the sale before it took place.
Target officially set to anchor Lobo Crossing project in Southeast Albuquerque - Kylie Garcia, Albuquerque Journal
The sale of a major piece of property on the University of New Mexico’s South Campus is complete, moving the area one step closer to welcoming a major retail hub.
Arizona-based developer SimonCRE is officially the new owner of roughly 38 acres of land previously owned by UNM after a transaction that began last year closed on Tuesday, founder and CEO Josh Simon told the Journal.
Simon also confirmed a portion of tenants slated to join Lobo Crossing Shopping Center — a 363,000-square-foot, open-air food and retail development planned for the land SimonCRE has acquired.
The tenants officially leased so far include Sierra, HomeGoods, Marshalls, Michaels, Burlington, Boot Barn, Five Below, Spencer’s and Jersey Mike’s Subs.
Target will headline the list, according to a memorandum of lease document reviewed by the Journal on Tuesday.
“This is a pretty powerful lineup,” said Tom Neale, chief operating officer of UNM’s real estate arm, Lobo Development Corp. “This is also the first major retail center in Albuquerque in over two decades, and we’re really proud that it’s in the South Campus and it’s helping out the southern tier of the city.”
The Target lease document ends months of speculation and years of conversations — the first of which were made public when university officials revealed talks to potentially incorporate a Target into UNM’s South Campus Tax Increment Development District, or TIDD, in 2023.
Simon could not comment on Target but said the project’s anchor tenant “does offer grocery” and will help to address UNM South Campus’ current existence as a food desert.
Target’s inclusion marks a significant moment for the project, which Simon called “by far the biggest thing that’s been built in Albuquerque, from a retail standpoint, in decades.” As Lobo Crossing’s anchor tenant, Target is the national, large-scale food and general merchandise retailer that SimonCRE had to secure for the deal with UNM to go through.
“I think a lot of people in town were doubting if this thing was even going to happen,” Simon said. “We’ve been working on this project for several years, and there’s been plenty of times where I thought the same. So I think it’s great to finally see this first hurdle pass, now that we’ve closed on it.”
The sale comes several months after UNM announced last year that its Board of Regents had approved a transfer of ownership for the vacant South Campus property, located east of Interstate 25 in Southeast Albuquerque near the UNM Lobo Sports Complex, Lobo Village and the Science & Technology Park.
Lobo Development Corp. had been working with SimonCRE on the project for about two years prior to last year’s announcement.
SimonCRE agreed to purchase the property for $11.75 million, which Simon said is roughly where the final acquisition cost landed. With the sale finalized and the project almost fully permitted, the developer currently plans to break ground this month with the aim of opening the majority of Lobo Crossing next fall.
The milestone is especially meaningful for Neale, who said the university’s efforts to get a project like Lobo Crossing underway in the South Campus stretch even farther back than SimonCRE.
“This was a decade in the making,” Neale said, citing an unsuccessful attempt to get a project similar to Lobo Crossing off the ground several years ago before the creation of UNM’s TIDD. That attempt is what made the need for a TIDD evident, Neale said.
UNM’s TIDD sets aside up to 75% of incremental gross receipts and property taxes from the state, city and county for public infrastructure projects. It was created in 2023 to incentivize development and transform UNM’s largely undeveloped South Campus into a hub of activity.
Lobo Crossing — expected to be the South Campus TIDD’s single largest revenue generator — “wouldn’t have happened” without the district, Simon said.
When all is said and done, Simon said Lobo Crossing will cost “probably in excess of $150 million” to develop. SimonCRE will fund the majority of the project, with support from the TIDD.
Other tenants slated to join the shopping hub are Old Navy, Ross and Skechers, with those leases currently pending. Leases are also in the works with a national cellular company, dental office and cable provider, while a national dessert company and a breakfast tenant have submitted letters of intent, a flyer for Lobo Crossing shows.
“For the big-box spaces, the pre-leasing that we’ve done is incredible,” Simon said. “Being (more than 90% leased) before closing is very rare. It speaks to just how there has been just a dearth of (new development) activity and high demand for retail space in the Albuquerque market.”
Neale said that paucity of activity has been particularly dramatic for UNM’s South Campus due to “challenging site conditions,” including the presence of a major drainage structure and uneven terrain. These challenges have left the area “completely underserved” and lacking in retail services, Neale said.
To see Lobo Crossing reach this hurdle after years of conducting analysis and trying to justify why a TIDD was needed is “rewarding,” Neale said. The COO said Lobo Crossing is an example of people and entities across the city, county and state working together to make a project happen.
“I think this is going to be a real big benefit to the community, as well as UNM and our aspirations for really creating a vibrant sports entertainment and technology district,” Neale said.
The milestone comes as the university moves forward with other efforts to revamp one of the area’s major complexes, University Stadium. UNM announced in October that it had retained Albuquerque architecture firm Dekker for a planning and feasibility study to renovate the stadium, and it asked the Legislature for $50 million to help fund the project in January.
SimonCRE will now turn its attention to finding local and regional businesses and restaurants to fill the remaining space — an undertaking that local brokers with Albuquerque’s Base 5 Retail Partners will assist with.
“It’s been a long road to get to this point, and we’re excited,” Simon said.