Help Wanted: Thousands of job openings posted in New Mexico - By Susan Montoya Bryan Associated Press
There are tens of thousands of online job postings in New Mexico, and the head of the state labor department said Wednesday that the agency is trying to find creative ways to connect workers with employers to fill those vacancies.
Workforce Solutions Secretary Ricky Serna said during a briefing that more than 13,000 of those job postings are within the health care and social assistance field, where many employees have been working long hours to accommodate the demands of the COVID-19 pandemic and other medical care that was delayed as a result.
While about 99% of health care workers in New Mexico have either been vaccinated or have exemptions, there are still some who face being fired if they don't comply with the state's vaccine mandates.
In a state that has struggled for years to attract more jobs, Serna acknowledged that Workforce Solutions hasn't tracked any information on the impact that vaccine mandates and testing requirements might have on health care providers.
"It's definitely an interest of ours to understand where placement will occur not only immediately but following the public health orders," he said. "We certainly want to ensure that these workers, primarily in health care where the need is high and has been high for many, many years ... don't leave the state of New Mexico."
He added that it's becoming increasingly difficult to work in that field without being vaccinated or being tested on a regular basis.
Health care giant Kaiser Permanente announced Wednesday that it has put more than 2,200 employees nationwide — a little over 1% of its workforce — on unpaid leave for not getting vaccinated. Health care workers from California to New York have been protesting the mandates, saying they have worked throughout the pandemic only to be fired now.
In New Mexico, COVID-19 cases seem to have plateaued, but state health officials said Wednesday that community spread and pressure on the health care system remain high.
The latest data from the state Health Department also shows that the number of vaccinated people becoming infected consistently has risen over the past two months, with the most significant jump coming over the four week period that ended this week. Those numbers show 23% of cases are among vaccinated people.
Health and Human Services Secretary Dr. David Scrase said this is not unexpected as vaccinated people make up a large portion of the population. Still, he noted that it should be a reminder to take precautions since those who are vaccinated can still contract COVID-19 and spread the virus.
As for New Mexico's workforce, Serna said there has been some overall job growth since the height of the pandemic and that the number of people receiving jobless benefits has dropped significantly now that most federal extensions have expired. Still, he said it's difficult to tell if workers are returning to their same professions or pivoting to something new.
New Mexico prepares to resettle 400 Afghan refugees – Associated Press
About 100 of those refugees are expected to resettle in Las Cruces, according to officials with Lutheran Family Services Rocky Mountains, the state’s primary non-governmental refugee resettlement organization. The remainder are expected to relocate to Albuquerque and Santa Fe.
Andrew Byrd, the southern New Mexico coordinator for LFS, told the Las Cruces Sun-News that Afghan refugees are expected to relocate to the southern New Mexico city by March 2022. He said the numbers for the state and each city are projected capacities submitted by his group to the federal government.
Some Afghan refugees are being sheltered at nearby military installations as they are connected with resettlement organizations.
At Holloman Air Force Base, Fort Bliss’ Doña Ana Range Complex and other military installations around the country, officials have said refugees are tested for COVID-19 before arriving. Once on base, they undergo further medical screening and can apply for immigration status and work authorizations before resettlement organizations place them into communities.
The LFS Las Cruces office partnered with the Muslim Student Association at New Mexico State University to help refugees once they arrive. The groups have asked for volunteers who can serve as translators and to transport donated goods. They’ve also asked people to donate money, furniture, electronics such as phones and laptops and school supplies.
COVID-19 infections remain high day-to-day as NM hospitals feel the stress –KUNM News, Associated Press, New Mexico Department of Health
The New Mexico Department of Health today announced 1,025 new COVID-19 cases and fourteen additional deaths.
These bring the state’s total to 257,970 cases and 4,850 deaths since the pandemic began.
State health officials said yesterday that community spread and pressure on the health care system remain high. There are currently 349 people hospitalized in New Mexico with COVID-19.
The latest data from the state Health Department shows that the number of vaccinated people becoming infected consistently has risen over the past two months, with the most significant jump coming over the four week period that ended this week. Those numbers show 23% of cases are among vaccinated people.
DOH advised, if you are sick, stay home as much as possible.
EXPLAINER: What's behind the looming Hollywood strike? – Lindsay Bahr, Associated Press
Here we look at who is involved, what they're asking for and what's at stake.
WHAT IS THE IATSE?
The International Alliance of Theatrical Stage Employees (or IATSE for short, pronounced eye-AHT’-see) is a 128-year-old union representing over 150,000 artists, craftspeople and technicians in the entertainment industry in the United States and Canada. Comprised of cinematographers, costumers, set designers, script supervisors, hair and makeup artists, animators, stagehands and many, many more, the IATSE represents essentially everyone who works in any form of entertainment (including movies, television, theater, concerts, trade shows and broadcasting) who isn’t an actor, director, producer or screenwriter.
WHY ARE THEY IN THE NEWS?
The three-year contracts that cover about 60,000 of the union’s members — one that primarily covers film and TV production in Los Angeles and Hollywood and another that covers other production hubs including New Mexico and Georgia — expired in July. For the past four months the union has been negotiating new terms with the Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers (AMPTP). Those discussions fell apart on Sept. 20. The IATSE says that the AMPTP have failed to address their biggest workplace problems, and membership voted overwhelmingly to give the organization’s president, Matthew D. Loeb, the ability to authorize a strike.
WHAT ARE THE WORKPLACE PROBLEMS?
The IATSE says its members are subjected to excessive working hours, unlivable wages for the lowest paid crafts and failure to provide reasonable rest, including meal breaks and time off between marathon working days and weekend work. Further, they say that workers on some “new media” streaming projects get paid even less. The Instagram account @ia_stories has been sharing anonymous accounts of some harrowing personal workplace stories and the effects of the excessively long hours on everything from personal safety to mental health.
WAIT, WHAT’S THE AMPTP?
The Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers is a group that represents hundreds of entertainment companies, including the major Hollywood studios, streaming services and production companies, and negotiates essentially all industry-wide guild and union contracts.
WHY ARE THE STREAMERS PAYING WORKERS LESS THAN TRADITIONAL STUDIOS?
In 2009, the IATSE and studios mutually agreed that new media productions required greater “flexibility” because the medium was not yet economically viable. That has changed in a big way, but the expectation of flexibility from crews has not. They feel they are being taken advantage of while streaming budgets and profits have reached blockbuster levels.
WHO ELSE SUPPORTS THE IATSE DEMANDS?
Social media support has been significant and many prominent people in the film industry have spoken out in support of the crews, like Octavia Spencer, Mindy Kaling, Jane Fonda and Katherine Heigl. On Monday, the Directors Guild of America issued a statement of solidarity too, signed by the likes of Steven Spielberg, Christopher Nolan, Barry Jenkins, Ron Howard, Ava DuVernay and Lesli Linka Glatter. Congressman Adam Schiff (D-Calif.), Senator Alex Padilla (D-Calif.), and 118 Senators and members of the House have also sent a letter to the AMPTP urging good faith negotiations.
IS A STRIKE INEVITABLE?
No, and leadership on both sides have said they would like to avoid it if possible. On Tuesday, the IATSE and the AMPTP resumed negotiations.
WHAT HAPPENS IF THEY DO STRIKE?
With 60,000 workers covered under the expired agreements, most productions would have to shut down in the U.S., including network shows and Netflix productions. But not all are affected: The IATSE contracts for “pay tv,” including HBO, Showtime, Starz, Cinemax and BET, don’t expire until Dec. 31, 2022 so those will keep going. Same goes for commercials and low budget productions, which also have different agreements.
As far as long-term consequences, it all depends on how long the strike goes on. The 100-day 2007-2008 Writers Guild of America strike, which also came about when contracts failed to address “new media” realities and loopholes, resulted in scuttled projects, shortened seasons of popular television shows and an influx of reality shows to fill the schedule gaps. Most networks and streamers have content reserves to fill the gaps for a bit.
WHAT NOW?
We wait.
Free lunches earn business access to New Mexico lawmakers - By Cedar Attanasio Associated Press / Report For America
Companies clamoring for contracts on internet services and student testing are buying legislators free lunches at meetings about education policy. It’s a legal and a frequent practice that some people find unappetizing.
On Tuesday, Democratic and Republican state legislators and their policy staff enjoyed enchiladas, roast beef sandwiches, steak salads, and other entrees with soft drinks and sides “Sponsored by Comcast," according to an agenda released by the Legislative Education Study Committee.
The New Mexico Foundation for Open Government says that as long as they are disclosed, it’s legal for companies to buy legislators lunches and give gifts.
“And then the public needs to ask ‘Why are they doing that?’ ” said Melanie Majors, the foundation’s executive director.
“If the industry didn’t want anything from the legislators, then why would they be providing them with lunches?” New Mexico Ethics Watch executive director Kathleen Sabo said. “It’s just human nature. If somebody gives you something, (...) you’re going to react more favorably to them.”
Comcast's name also appeared before the committee on Monday in a budget comparing cost estimates from internet vendors collected by a school district in southern New Mexico. The Comcast estimate district was around $1.6 million.
Around two dozen districts are required to prepare plans to provide internet to students due to a state court ruling, and legislators are deciding if they will provide additional support to districts when they meet in February for a 30-day lawmaking session.
Legislators don’t award internet or testing contracts and can't enrich companies directly.
But they have considered legislation that would make it easier and cheaper for Comcast to expand its costly internet delivery system, which involves the laying of a physical cable, sometimes along trenches controlled by the state or public utilities.
Republican Sen. Gay Kernan, of Hobbs, said sponsored lunches have been common practice in her 19 years serving the legislature, and that a sandwich can't buy her vote.
“It doesn’t influence me one way or the other,” said Kernan, adding that she doesn’t decide which companies the education department selects for contracts.
A former state legislator who says he refused to accept as much as a bottle of water from lobbyists believes there is a problem.
“The appearance of impropriety is always there when you accept something free, number one. Number two is only the legislator themselves know whether or not they’re being influenced,” said retired Republican representative Jim Dines, a former attorney who now lives in Lubbock, Texas.
Dines lost his seat to a Democrat in 2018, after serving in the state House for three years.
More recently, lawmakers have called for tightening disclosure laws. Two proposed this year never got a vote, however.
As committee chair, Democrat Sen. Bill Soules of Las Cruces, has final authority over which businesses get to pay for lunch, which can earn them a few minutes to pitch their products to legislators. Soules said that he delegates the decision to staff. He echoed colleagues who said the lunches don’t affect their votes.
Many legislators including Kernan say they are happy to accept free lunches in part because they are some of the few legislators in the country who don't get a salary. They are eligible for a pension after 10 years of service and receive a daily stipend to offset travel costs. Kernan says the stipend is not enough to pay for lunches.
Sabo, of New Mexico Ethics Watch, is a former legislative aide who says staff and legislators depend on food during the legislative sessions and interim committee hearings.
She estimates it could cost around $50,000 to provide legislators with meals, and has drafted a law that would pay for their food. She has shopped it around to legislators for the past two years and is still looking for one to sponsor it.
Monday’s lunch was sponsored by Amplify Education Inc, a competitor of New Mexico’s current vendor for standardized testing among grade school students, called Istation.
Amplify currently has contracts for some science education curriculum but wants to do more business with the state, according to Kernan’s account of their presentation.
She said she likes Istation and wouldn’t advocate for Amplify to replace its annual testing. But she welcomed “the opportunity to learn from Amplify” about mid-semester testing service.
Amplify began lobbying in New Mexico this year and is required to disclose Monday's lunch in a tri-annual disclosure due Thursday. In North Carolina, Amplify Education lost a bid for testing to Istation and complained to state officials in what became a lengthy administrative dispute itultimately won.
A lobbyist registered on behalf of both Comcast and Amplify, Joe Thompson, declined to comment.
Comcast spokeswoman Julianne Phares said the company didn’t present any products at Tuesday’s lunch. She declined to comment on what the company hopes to gain by sponsoring the lunch, or how much it cost.
Amplify Education denied sponsoring the lunch, calling the listing of the company on the committee's agenda an “error.”
“We showed up, and we were surprised to see that our name was on the agenda, to see that we were listed as a sponsor,” said Amplify spokeswoman Kay Moffett. “It’s not our typical practice to entertain legislators.”
About 15 minutes before the initial publication of this story on Wednesday, Thompson filed a disclosure for Monday's lunch listing himself, and not Amplify, as the sponsor, according to documents filed with the New Mexico Secretary of State. Amplify Education is Thompson's only education client, according to disclosures.
Moffett said that another of the company's lobbyists met with Sen. Kernan for 15 minutes in the Senate lounge, but did not give a formal presentation.
Because the lunch was reported on Oct. 4, on the first day of a three-times-per-year reporting window, the Comcast disclosure won’t be public until Jan. 15, after legislation is beginning to be filed for the 2022 legislative session.
Dines, the retired legislator, said disclosure laws don't fully inform voters of the influence money has over elected officials. State law limits lobbyists to giving $1,000 to anyone legislator or state employee but doesn't require them to report gifts, including who accepts a lunch.
“What the public doesn’t see is how much does that all amount to over a period of a year from a dollar or value standpoint,” Dines said.
___
This version corrects that the internet budget listing Comcast was an estimate, not a bid; that Amplify Education's dispute over a state testing contract was in North Carolina, not South Carolina; and that Amplify's science product in New Mexico is a curriculum, not a test.
New Mexico audit finds gaps in ADA compliance at state sites - Associated Press
An audit of a sampling of state government parking lots found numerous shortfalls in compliance with requirements of the Americans with Disabilities Act but remedial steps, officials said.
State Auditor Brian Colon on Tuesday released findings from the audit that included checking 23 sites in Santa Fe, Albuquerque, Las Cruces and other sites across the state.
"All New Mexicans should have equal access to their government, and that means physical spaces such as buildings owned by the state of New Mexico," Colon said.
Anna Silva, a General Services Department administrator who overseas state facilities, said changes that included restriping and other work have already been made at the sites examined by auditors.
Department spokesman Thom Cole said the agency plans to ask the Legislature for $275,000 to hire three building inspectors and $5 million to make state buildings ADA-compliant.
Ankle monitor GPS used to find wife's body, arrest husband - Associated Press
A New Mexico man on probation who had to wear an ankle bracelet to monitor his movements has been arrested in the fatal beating of his wife with an ax after authorities used data from the bracelet to find her body in a national forest where the couple went to cut firewood, state police said Wednesday.
Armando Zamora, 35, was charged with murder after being arrested and jailed last Sunday on suspicion of killing Erica Zamora, 39, after her body was found in the Gila National Forest, a New Mexico State Police statement said.
Erica Zamora was reported missing Friday after she had not been heard from since Sept. 26, the day the couple went to the nearby forest, the statement said.
After learning that Armando Zamora wore an ankle monitor because of a 2019 conviction for sexual contact with a minor, investigators checked GPS coordinates to see where for he had been recently. including the wood cutting site, the statement said.
"A sergeant searched the area and located a deceased female matching the description of Erica Zamora," the state police statement said.
Armando Zamora had told investigators he last saw his wife on Sept. 28 when he dropped her at her separate residence but on Sunday after her body was found, he "admitted to beating Erica to death" with an ax, the statement said.
According to a police report, Armando Zamora told investigators the couple argued on the drive to the forest and that he killed her after she punched him at the wood cutting site, KOAT-TV reported.
The couple had a pending divorce case that was initiated by Armando Zamora in June, according to court records.
Court records for the criminal and the divorce cases did not list an attorney who could comment on behalf of Armando Zamora, who is from the small community of Santa Clara.
Navajo leaders seek hearing on oil and gas drilling dispute - By Susan Montoya Bryan Associated Press
Top officials with the largest Native American tribe in the United States are renewing a request for congressional leaders to hold a field hearing before deciding on federal legislation aimed at limiting oil and gas development around Chaco Culture National Historical Park.
The Navajo Nation has struggled for years with high poverty rates and joblessness, and the tribe's legislative leaders say individual Navajo allottees stand to lose an important source of income if a 10-mile buffer is created around the park as proposed. They're calling for a smaller area of federal land holdings to be made off limits to oil and gas development as a compromise to protect Navajo interests.
Navajo Council Speaker Seth Damon and other council members recently sent a letter to House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Republican Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy outlining their concerns about pending legislation and the need to fund a comprehensive study of cultural resources throughout the region.
They said a field hearing would allow congressional leaders to "'hear directly from the Navajo people who face a real threat" under the current version of legislation. While the measure wouldn't directly affect tribal or allottee land, allottees fear their parcels would be landlocked by a federal ban, making them undesirable for future development.
A World Heritage site, Chaco is thought to be the center of what was once a hub of Indigenous civilization. Within the park, walls of stacked stone jut up from the bottom of the canyon, some perfectly aligned with the seasonal movements of the sun and moon. Circular subterranean rooms called kivas are cut into the desert floor.
Outside the park, archaeologists say there are discoveries still to be made.
Other tribes, environmental groups and archaeologists have been pushing to stop drilling across an expansive area of northwestern New Mexico, saying sites beyond Chaco's boundaries need protection and that the federal government's leasing program needs an overhaul.
The Navajo Nation passed its own legislation in 2019 recognizing the cultural, spiritual and cosmological connection that Navajos have to the Chaco region. The measure expounded on the need for protections, but it also called for respecting and working with Navajo allottees.
The fight over development in the region has spanned several presidential administrations on both sides of the political aisle. Past administrations — including the Trump and Obama administrations — put on hold leases adjacent to the park through agency actions, but activists are pushing for something more permanent that won't be upended by a future administration.
U.S. Interior Secretary Deb Haaland, the first Native American to hold a cabinet position, was among the sponsors of legislation calling for greater protections during her tenure in the U.S. House. A member of Laguna Pueblo in central New Mexico, Haaland has referred to the area as a sacred place.
She's now under growing pressure to use her administrative powers to establish a buffer around the park pending the outcome of the federal legislation.
Several New Mexico pueblos, Navajo Council Member Daniel Tso and environmental groups also have sent letters to U.S. Rep. Teresa Leger Fernández, voicing their support for the Chaco legislation. The first-term Democratic congresswoman also has spoken with Navajo leaders about her position on the matter.
Leger Fernández said Wednesday she's committed to cultural preservation. She said once those resources are lost, they're gone forever.
"We've been engaged in tribal consultation throughout and will continue conversations with Navajo Nation and the pueblos, as well as the Navajo allottees to protect allottees' rights to develop their land as they see fit," she said.
Navajo Nation: 65 new COVID-19 cases and 1st death in 7 days - Associated Press
The Navajo Nation on Wednesday reported 65 more COVID-19 cases and one death.
It was the first time in seven days that the tribe reported a coronavirus-related death.
The latest numbers pushed the tribe's totals to 34,260 confirmed COVID-19 cases from the virus since the pandemic began more than a year ago.
The known death toll now is 1,448.
The tribe's reservation is the country's largest at 27,000 square miles and it covers parts of Arizona, New Mexico and Utah.
Navajo officials still are urging people to get vaccinated, wear masks while in public and minimize their travel.
Officials said all Navajo Nation executive branch employees had to be fully vaccinated against the virus by the end of September or submit to regular testing.
The new rules apply to full, part-time and temporary employees, including those working for tribal enterprises like utilities, shopping centers and casinos.
Any worker who did not show proof of vaccination by the deadline must be tested every two weeks or face discipline.