I am writing today to announce the closure of the New Mexico Independent. After three and a half years of operation in New Mexico, the board of the American Independent News Network, has decided to shift publication of its news…
While environmental activists played their part yesterday during demonstrations at the capitol building, going so far as to dress up as solar panels and to sing the tune of “You Are My Sunshine,” their counterparts, the anti-cap-and-trade contingency who has…
Roughly one quarter of University of New Mexico students are unimpressed with the state’s flagship public school, according to a survey that questioned college students about their higher education experiences.
The latest in a string of nationwide oil and gas industry-sponsored “Rally for Jobs” protests against government environmental and safety regulations is scheduled for Wednesday in Farmington. Sponsored by the American Petroleum Institute (API) and numerous other industry…
The liberal London daily Morning Star cited New Mexico’s cuts in Medicaid services as a cautionary tale Tuesday for proposed English health system cutbacks, arguing that New Mexico and other states are trying to balance state budgets by slashing medical services for the poor.
“New Mexico is expected to eliminate a number of Medicaid services that are not stipulated by federal law — including dental services, spectacles, emergency hospital services and inpatient psychiatric care,” The Star reported Tuesday. “In the US … the grim consequences are starting to emerge of the cutbacks driven by the recession which has left public-sector budgets drained even as it has made more low-paid and unemployed US citizens dependent on public support.”
New Mexico is not alone in cutting services for its most vulnerable populations, according to an August report by the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities. More …
Republicans across the country are savoring their coming opportunity to literally “remake the political map” with anticipated electoral gains that will put them in the driver’s seat during the legislative redistricting process, the Associated Press reported Tuesday.
The 2010 elections will determine which party controls legislative redistricting in light of data from the 2010 census. Governors play a central role in redistricting, the AP reports — and more than half of the 37 governorships up for election this year are open seats. Democrats are defending 19 of those seats, during hard economic times and mid-term elections, which traditionally disfavor the party in power.
“We are now tasked with remaking the political map,” the Republican Governors Association website recently declared. The RGA plans to spend an estimated $65 million on this year’s election races, according to the AP, compared to $50 million in planned spending by Democrats. More …
Decades of clear-cut logging, heavy livestock grazing and fire suppression efforts have left the Valles Caldera in poor ecological condition, according to a proposed 10-year restoration plan that calls for prescribed burns, forest thinning and stream bank restoration efforts. The board of trustees is now taking public comment on the plan.
Blue Cross and Blue Shield of New Mexico attorney Paul Bardacke spent much of his time at last week’s Division of Insurance hearing on his client’s latest health insurance rate hike attacking Allan Schwartz, the Attorney General’s office’s independent expert who testified…
After ten years of retirement at Holloman Air Force Base, more than 100 U.S. government-owned chimpanzees who were used for decades in NASA and federal medical studies, are now heading to a government lab in San Antonio, Texas, for new tests of…
The state Public Regulation Commission (PRC) has scaled down the Public Service Company of New Mexico (PNM)’s proposed renewable energy procurement portfolio, which depended heavily on traditional photovoltaic solar electric facilities to meet state-mandated renewable energy requirements.
The…
American Cement officials and the Greater Gardner Neighborhood Association met Tuesday night to create a community advisory panel (CAP) to foster communication between the company and neighbors of its cement transfer facility in Albuquerque’s North Valley. The group is to be the first of three in New Mexico and at least five nationwide, company officials said. Some residents expressed optimism that they will now directly engage the company, rather than relying on the City of Albuquerque Air Quality Division to address their community’s needs.
The Albuquerquer-Bernalillo County Water Utility Authority will add more sensitive lab tests for toxic fuel additive to its suite of water quailty tests for southeast city wells near Kirtland Air Force Base, authority and U.S. Air Force official have announced.…
New Mexico had one of the worst job loss rates in the nation for June, according to a new report by the New Mexico Voices for Children‘s Fiscal Policy Project.
“It used to be that New Mexico was not as deeply affected as the rest of the nation during a recession, but that’s not the case this time,” Fiscal Policy Project director Gerry Bradley said. “The run-up to this recession — the housing boom and high energy prices — had a significant impact on the state’s economy. Employment was up, revenue was up, and so was spending. But we ended up paying for the good times when those two economic drivers crashed.”
The state’s 8.2 percent unemployment rate continues to trail the national average of 9.5 percent, thanks to infusions of federal money — but New Mexico’s economy won’t improve until the national economy improves, the report says.
More …
The Public Regulation Commission (PRC) has fined Picacho Hills Utility Company owner Stephen Blanco $950,000 and the utility itself $50,000, for dozens of violations of state public utility law and PRC rules and orders.
The $1 million…
American Cement and the Greater Gardner Neighborhood Association in Albuquerque are holding a Community Advisory Panel meeting Tuesday to discuss air pollution at the cement transfer facility on Edith, facility operations, lab analysis data regarding cement dust and…
New Mexico has of the highest rates of suicide in the nation but improving rural access to the Internet might change that, according to Radford University psychologist James Werth Jr.
Suicide rates in New Mexico and across the nation are higher in rural areas than urban areas, Werth said in a recent story in Mental Health Law Weekly. Better access to broadband could provide better access to suicide prevention and behavioral medicine resources for both patients and rural physicians and school officials, Werth suggested.
“Even though people live farther apart, there may be stronger connections — they need to rely on one another,” Werth said. More …
A contentious all-day hearing Wednesday left many Blue Cross and Blue Shield of New Mexico customers saying they see little hope for relief from a controversial 21.3 percent increase in their health insurance premiums. Even though the company’s cash reserves have now reached $7.2 billion, an expert witness for the Attorney General’s office’s, who reiterated earlier testimony that Blue Cross had not sufficiently documented its claimed cost figures, and whose analysis found the insurer’s rate filing had exaggerated company losses, said the 21 percent increase was “reasonable, given the circumstances.”
Controversy has surrounded the state’s approval of a 21.3 percent rate hike on 40,000 Blue Cross and Blue Shield of New Mexico health insurance policyholders, but the state Division of Insurance approved Presbyterian Insurance Company’s even larger, 24 percent health…
The Public Regulation Commission (PRC)’s Division of Insurance will hold a public hearing Wednesday in Santa Fe on Blue Cross and Blue Shield of New Mexico‘s controversial health insurance rate hike.
Blue Cross will be asked…
New Mexico Oil and Gas Association President Steve Henke accepted gifts from an oil company and abused government travel funds when he was a U.S. Bureau of Land Management (BLM) official responsible for regulating oil and gas production…
The state’s new Superintendent of Insurance, John Franchini, began work Monday — just two days ahead of a public hearing scheduled for Wednesday on the controversial Blue Cross and Blue Shield of New Mexico health…
Citizen Action New Mexico is calling for a public hearing on Kirtland Air Force Base (KAFB)’s state hazardous waste permit for open burning and detonation of old munitions, but New Mexicans must request such a hearing by Friday evening.…
Gov. Bill Richardson has slated more than $1 million in federal stimulus dollars to a land grant council and six acequia (community irrigation ditch) associations in Mora, Rio Arriba, Santa Fe and Taos counties.
The…
