Serving Clovis, Portales and the Surrounding Communities
Serving Clovis, Portales and the Surrounding Communities
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CLOVIS — Former Clovis schools superintendent Jody Balch was appointed to Curry County’s Labor-Management Relations Board in a brief commission meeting Monday morning. “What this does is keep local control,” County Manager Lance Pyle said of the appointment, since otherwise the state would fill the management representative position. Pyle doesn’t expect the role to entail too much work, since the county “has no unions in place or anything related to collective bargaining.” Commissioners were in full attendance at the specia...
CLOVIS — Attorneys agreed Tuesday morning to commit the suspect in last year’s killing at a Texico dairy to the state’s mental institution in Las Vegas, finding he is not competent to stand trial. Juan Flores Espana, 33, was charged June 14, 2018 with an open count of murder for the shooting death of co-worker Mairon Franco Rodriguez, 23, of Texico, that afternoon at the Route 77 Dairy. Flores Espana has been in custody since the incident and spent the past nine months undergoing a competency evaluation at the facility in La...
CANNON AIR FORCE BASE — A court martial for the July 4, 2018 shooting death in Clovis of a Cannon Air Force Base airman ended Monday with an involuntary manslaughter conviction and dishonorable discharge, according to base officials. Airman First Class Sean Harrington was charged Jan. 3 with murder, assault with an unloaded firearm, communicating a threat, and marijuana and cocaine use in connection with the death of A1C Marcus Jimenez at a residence in northeast Clovis. Officials said at the time that an airman called and s...
CLOVIS - Wednesday evening, Ronnie Jones danced with his mother Patsy beside his father Cletis' glistening red 1950 GMC outside Clovis' Twin Cronnie Drive-In. A few minutes later, Ronnie's son Kade pulled his silver 2014 Genesis Coupe beside his grandfather's truck to bring home the contrast and the continuity across the generations. The Jones' are keeping up with each other. Cletis enjoyed draggin' main back in its mid-century heyday, and his grandson, who starts college...
CLOVIS — Police on Friday were investigating the theft that afternoon of a city vehicle from Hillcrest Park. Assistant City Manager Claire Burroughes told The News she does “not recall this ever happening before” in her 20 years with Clovis. “It’s such an unusual thing to happen,” she said. “We are doing everything we can to locate and recover the vehicle.” The vehicle stolen was a 1995 Ford Ranger single-cab pickup used by the city’s Parks and Recreation Department. Burroughes said the truck was taken from the east side of t...
CLOVIS — Brent Aguilar, the embattled veteran Clovis police officer, “has left the department at his own accord to pursue other career opportunities,” Police Chief Doug Ford said on Saturday. Ford declined to provide additional information, referring questions to Aguilar. Aguilar could not be reached for comment. “He’s had enough media go through him in the past two years,” said Dan Aguilar, chief investigator for the 9th Judicial District Attorney and Brent Aguilar’s father. Dan Aguilar declined additional comment in a...
PORTALES — The former police officer and his co-defendant in a 2016 lawsuit against the city of Clovis and its police department have a couple of weeks now to find new counsel, following approval Wednesday of the withdrawal of their previous attorney. In a brief hearing, Judge Donna Mowrer approved a motion to withdraw filed June 7 by Tye Harmon, who previously represented Stephen Borders and Samantha Jara. A lawsuit filed on behalf of Michael Green alleged assault, battery, wrongful detention and false imprisonment, among o...
CLOVIS — Commissioners on Thursday approved a notice of intent to consider an ordinance regulating television and film production in Curry County, welcoming public input on the matter in their forthcoming Aug. 6 meeting. Per the ordinance, proposed regulations would not apply to news productions, personal or charitable films or county-produced government access films, among others. It is focused on the sort of professional productions seen in past years in eastern New Mexico and across the state, not intended to discourage t...
PORTALES — On his entry June 12 to the Roosevelt County jail, Manuel Silva, Jr., 23, was “classified as a maximum security detainee” and “housed in a single occupancy cell.” Officials found him in that cell two days later unresponsive. They declared him dead less than an hour after that. According to an in-custody death report submitted Monday by Jail Administrator Justin Porter and obtained Tuesday by The News through a public records request, Silva was found around 3:45 p.m. June 14 in his cell. His body was “leaning...
PORTALES — Alcohol sales in Roosevelt County? Voters will get to decide as much come November. That follows the approval Tuesday morning of a resolution calling for an election that could allow Roosevelt County to adopt the local option provisions of the Liquor Control Act, “allowing for the sale, service or public consumption of alcoholic beverages” within the unincorporated areas of the county. Commissioners voted 4-1 in favor of the resolution, with District V Commissioner Paul Grider voting against the initiative. Grider...
CLOVIS - If you're on fire the advice is to stop, drop and roll. If your groundwater is contaminated, one consultant's advice is to stop, isolate and clean up. That was the recommendation Thursday afternoon of King Industry's Tom Blaine, presenting recommendations to the Eastern New Mexico Water Utility Authority as to how the chemical contamination originating from Cannon Air Force Base might be best addressed. ENMWUA hired Blaine on a $15,000 scope of work contract for the...
PORTALES — It’s yet to be determined if the old building will stay or go. But a location for the Eastern New Mexico University president’s new residence and “public event venue” was selected Tuesday as “in the general area” of the existing residence at 1600 W. Cherry St. in Portales. Further detail on the project — funded by a state appropriation of $650,000 — and a more specific site will follow consultation between a committee of five and whatever architect is selected next month from among six still being evaluated b...
AMARILLO — The former Parmer County Sheriff deputy charged last month with child sex crimes in Curry County was indicted this month on a federal charge of criminal sexual activity with minors. On Thursday a grand jury in the U.S. District Court in Amarillo returned an indictment on Davin Waters, 25, of Farwell, for one count of transportation of minors with intent to engage in criminal sexual activity. The charges followed reports from multiple children interviewed May 31 and June 3, just days after Waters was first arrested...
CLOVIS — Police on Friday arrested a man after following his bloody footprints on an alleged early morning rampage that started at a Clovis gun shop. Derrick Morales, 34, is charged with felony aggravated burglary, larceny and numerous counts of criminal damage to property, including over $1,000 in damage to an interview room following his arrest. The incident started just before 2:30 a.m. with reports of a burglary to the gun shop on the 500 block of North Prince Street, and a Clovis police officer ultimately located Morales...
PORTALES — There may well be “rumbling” on and concerning some roads in Portales, but city councilors hope to address the issue in time with repair work. In a brief meeting Tuesday evening the Portales City Council authorized funding agreements for various repairs to city roads, hoping in the process to address issues previously voiced to representatives. Councilor Oscar Robinson noted “a lot of rumbling about streets being in deplorable condition” and hoped the public would take note of the work in progress to correct p...
PORTALES - Recent funding for raises helps, but recruiting and keeping teachers is not all about money. In discussions Thursday morning before the New Mexico Legislative Finance Committee, state and local officials spoke to those challenges and the efforts they make to address them. Superintendents for both Clovis and Portales municipal school districts noted a decline in student enrollment in recent years and spoke to different approaches toward serving the needs of both...
PORTALES — It’s yet to be determined if the old building will stay or go, but a location for the Eastern New Mexico University president’s new residence and “public event venue” was selected Tuesday as “in the general area” of the existing residence at 1600 West Cherry Street in Portales. Further detail on the project – funded by a state appropriation of $650,000 — and a more specific site will follow consultation between a committee of five and whatever architect is selected next month from among six still being evaluated b...
PORTALES — For state officials with the money, and for any in the public with the interest, representatives of the Eastern New Mexico Water Utility Authority will present this afternoon on their hopes with the Ute Water Project and the Interim Ground Water Project (IGWP) to supply water to member communities in coming years. “We’re going to talk about past, present and future, so it’s a really good opportunity for the authority to tell its story,” ENMWUA Chairman and Clovis Mayor David Lansford told The News. “It isn’t often...
PORTALES - Myra Abeyta and Ray Medrano still have far more questions than answers about what happened to their son, Manuel Silva Jr., 23, who died last week in the Roosevelt County Detention Center. Abeyta said she last spoke with her son Thursday, a day after authorities transported him from the Curry County Detention Center in advance of an August court date and one day before he was found unresponsive the following afternoon. She said he would "never, never, never" end his...
CLOVIS — Issuing court summons to four offending parents, 9th Judicial District Attorney Andrea Reeb announced Thursday the latest push in a campaign to forestall crime by cracking down on truancy. Four parents will be summoned to magistrate court on petty misdemeanor charges of “Failure to Enforce Compulsory School Attendance from the 2018-2019 school years,” according to Reeb’s news release. A first-time conviction carries no jail time, but subsequent offenses are “punishable by six months in jail and/or a $500 fine.” St...
PORTALES — The board of regents for Eastern New Mexico University hopes to select a site for the president’s new residence during a special meeting Tuesday afternoon in Portales. A state appropriation of $650,000 will be used for the construction of “a president’s residence and public event venue” for the university, Regent Lance Pyle wrote in a message to The News. A committee of six is still in the process of reviewing, evaluating and ranking six requests for proposals and their decision on that is not expected until ear...
MULESHOE - Maria Ruvalcabo said "it sounded like an explosion." When a cattle truck collided with a Muleshoe school bus on Tuesday, Ruvalcabo said the impact made a large cloud of dust. When it settled, she saw a distraught bus driver and a little boy crying outside for his mother. "The kids were real scared," said Ruvalcabo, who lives at the northeast corner of the intersection where the accident happened at Texas 214 and Bailey County Road 1028. A report will be available...
CLOVIS — You could call it a “Landers’ Dozen”— first, five children from a mixed family when Sanford Landers married his wife Cynthia in 1982, followed by a total of eight more the couple adopted in the years following. “We thought that was a good number,” Landers told The News on Thursday in a phone interview from Coyote Creek State Park in Mora County, where he was camping with his wife and two grandchildren. “My birth date is on the 13th (of December), and I was born in ’39 (a multiple of 13).” Landers was born in the ups...
PORTALES - It was a hot one but the crowds in Portales found plenty to keep it cool Saturday with candy, cars, country music and plenty more during the city's 35th annual Heritage Days celebration. "It seems to be getting a little better each year," Don Massey said of the increasing turnout in Saturday's car show, which featured 65 entries in the shaded south end of City Park. The same could be said of the programming overall. The parade, touted as the celebration's feature...
PORTALES - A long-standing summer choir camp wraps up this week at Eastern New Mexico University with a public performance Thursday afternoon. Dating back to the 1950s and now in its 14th year under the leadership of ENMU music faculty Jason and Kayla Paulk, the camp this year brings 157 high school students from across the state for a jump-start on their all-state choir auditions. The camp is supported by 30 faculty and ENMU student counselors instructing attendees in solo an...
