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.
Governor-elect Susana Martinez has named former state Senator Lee Rawson to chair the search for cabinet positions in the General Services Department and Department of Information Technology. Other members of the committee include:
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Blaming competing demands like college midterms and the Balloon Fiesta, UNM organizers acknowledged a smaller-than-expected turnout for Sunday’s 10/10/10 “Take the Next Step” climate policy summit.
Despite live reggae and jazz music, and vendors offering pastries and locally-grown organic…
Former Republican state legislator Ben Hall and former Democratic Doña Ana County commissioner Bill McCamley both want to clean up the powerful and scandal-plagued state Public Regulation Commission. The men, who are fighting over outgoing Commissioner Sandy Jones’s District 5 seat, both told The Independent they want to see increased PRC scrutiny of utility and insurance companies’ rate hikes, and increased accountability at the PRC’s semi-autonomous Division of Insurance. But the candidates differed on how they would achieve those goals.
A piece of land on Albuquerque’s west side that’s large enough to hold a mid-sized city was sold yesterday on the Bernalillo County Courthouse steps for $148 million. The land was purchased by SunCal Corporation in 2007 for $250 million from…
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.
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That’s the intriguing notion Albuquerque Journal’s John Fleck set out in a post on his personal blog over the weekend.
Fleck, who covers water issues pretty darn closely and always conscientiously for New Mexico’s largest newspaper, says that he’s…
New Mexico should shift its state fleet to high-efficiency vehicles, increase the number of tax credits available to clean energy companies and make a priority out of starting a green-job business incubator, according to a green jobs plan Lt. Gov.…
In a packed room with tight security Wednesday, San Miguel County commissioners approved actor Val Kilmer’s application to run a guest ranch on his Pecos River Ranch.
The county planning and zoning commission had approved his application…
Michael A. Rivera of Corrales has been appointed as the state Public Regulation Commission (PRC)’s new Chief of Staff. Rivera will oversee a PRC staff of more than 270 employees. His position pays $130,000 a year.
Rivera arrives at the…
Education Secretary Veronica C. García has decided not to create a new school district on the city’s west side. Secretary García said she made the decision based on opposition from the community, difficult economic conditions and legal constraints.
It sounds like something you’d read in a history book: a community with no running water and no electricity; residents who carry water to wash dishes and take showers; unnamed dirt roads instead of paved thoroughfares that residents use.
And yet there Pajarito Mesa sits, on the ridge overlooking a modern American city; in this case, Albuquerque. The community’s plight was enough to draw the interest of the New York Times, which profiled Pajarito Mesa in today’s paper.
After a controversial system failed to bring Bernalillo’s tap water into compliance with federal regulations, the town’s new contract water engineering firm has received approval from the state Environment Department to begin using iron treatments to reduce levels of arsenic in the water. But tackling a problem with aluminum sludge, caused by the old system, is too difficult and expensive to tackle just yet.
Bernalillo has suspended plans to construct a $9.2 million arsenic treatment system at two of the Town’s four wells, Mayor Jack Torres announced this week. Town engineers are now attempting to fix problems at new treatment facilities already installed at the two other wells, he said.
Contract water system engineer Ramesh Narasimhan’s firm, NCS, was fired Tuesday and the Town will seek undisclosed damages, Mayor Patricia Chavez announced. The move followed news that the state Environment Department would issue a second drinking water violation for high arsenic levels.
The town of Las Cruces got approval in the final hours of the legislative session Thursday to issue tax increment financing bonds for redevelopment of its downtown area. Known as a TIDD in shorthand, the Las Cruces tax district will…
Arsenic levels at both of Bernalillo’s active wells have jumped over the past three years, and the New Mexico Environment Department announced Tuesday it will issue the Town a second arsenic violation notice by next week. The town’s project engineer, Ramesh Narasimhan, is now considering supplementation of the Town’s aluminum-based arsenic removal system with iron treatments — an approach recommended in a 2006 engineering report scuttled by former town manager Stephen Jerge. At Narasimhan’s recommendation, Jerge opted instead for the Town’s no-bid purchase of the aluminum-based system, which is produced by a Bernalillo firm.
Two years after Bernalillo spent at least $4.9 million building new arsenic filtration systems for the Town’s drinking water, lab tests suggest they are not working. The state Environment Department issued a violation letter Tuesday, stating that water from one of the Town’s two active wells exceeds federal and state water standards for arsenic. The violation notice came just a week after the Town council voted to spend another $9.2 million to install the system on its remaining two wells — lest it lose $4 million in federal stimulus funding for the water system improvements.
Over three weeks ago Governor Bill Richardson handed a full plate of initiatives to the Roundhouse. So with just about one week left, how much are lawmakers listening?
When Bernalillo’s contract engineers wrote a report describing the Town water system’s arsenic filtration options in 2006, they refused to assess, let alone recommend, equipment produced by the Bernalillo-based firm ARS-USA. So former Town manager Stephen Jerge hired Narasimhan Consulting Services (NCS) to write a new report that recommended the ARS system and neglected even to mention alternative technologies, prompting a rebuke by the state Environment Department.
On Tuesday voters overwhelmingly defeated a multi-year effort to create a new municipality in Bernalillo County’s unincorporated South Valley. Had South Valley residents approved the idea, the proposed “Valle de Atrisco” would have had a population of about 50,000. Proponents…
