Serving Clovis, Portales and the Surrounding Communities
Serving Clovis, Portales and the Surrounding Communities
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New Mexico's COVID-19 fortunes — which seemed so promising only a few weeks ago — are beginning to darken, state health officials said Wednesday. Just as health care experts and hospital leaders exhaled in relief in July with a decline in the number of COVID-19 cases, an official with the state Department of Health said New Mexico is now following a national trend of increasing infections. "The trends will be the same with cases rising and hospitalizations ticking up slowly as well," Health Department spokesman David Bar...
It’s official: New Mexico will spend another year at the bottom of the Annie E. Casey Foundation’s 2023 Kids Count Data Book’s child well-being rankings. For the fourth time in five years, the state ranked 50th nationwide in the data set, an amalgamation of economic well-being, health, education and family demographic data released Wednesday from all 50 states. Despite the state’s poor showing, Amber Wallin, executive director of New Mexico Voices for Children — the statewide children’s advocacy organization that collects Ki...
Jerry Apodaca was a football player at the University of New Mexico, and that sense of competition never evaporated when he traded his shoulder pads for a real contact sport: politics. Determined and gritty, Apodaca parlayed his background in athletics, the insurance business and two terms in the state Senate into the highest office in New Mexico. A Democrat, he was elected governor in 1974, the first Hispanic to head the state in the modern era. Apodaca died Wednesday morning following what may have been a stroke at his...
SANTA FE -- As the state Taxation and Revenue Department prepares to start sending out the latest batch of tax rebates, thousands of New Mexicans are still waiting to receive last year’s checks. Some 16,000 rebate checks sent by mail bounced back as undeliverable, and an additional 18,000 have been sidelined by errors in 2021 tax returns. “We’re working really hard to get this money into the pockets of New Mexicans as quickly and as efficiently as we can because we know New Mexicans are struggling with inflation, high price...
SANTA FE -- Anti-abortion ordinances adopted by elected officials in two cities and two counties in a conservative region of southeastern New Mexico violate the state constitution’s Bill of Rights, making them invalid, Attorney General Raúl Torrez wrote in a legal brief. “The ordinances’ singling out abortion for licensure and other regulation, in contrast to other medical procedures, violates the Equal Rights Amendment’s protection against pregnancy-based discrimination,” Torrez wrote, according to a draft of the brief, file...
SANTA FE -- State District Judge Bryan Biedscheid granted a motion Monday to seal the settlement agreement and related hearings in a wrongful-death case related to the shooting death of Rust cinematographer Halyna Hutchins. The decision was based on defense arguments the privacy of Hutchins' minor son — a beneficiary — warrants confidentiality. Hutchins died and director Joel Souza was wounded Oct. 21, 2021, after a revolver held by Rust producer and star Alec Baldwin discharged a live round, striking both. Hutchins' hus...
It’s been a year since cash registers first started ringing up sales of adult-use recreational marijuana in New Mexico. They haven’t stopped. Commercial sales of recreational cannabis topped more than $300 million in their first year, generating more than $27 million in excise taxes, according to figures released Monday. “In just one year, hundreds of millions of dollars in economic activity has been generated in communities across the state, the number of businesses continues to increase, and thousands of New Mexicans are e...
Masks and physical distancing are no longer required in New Mexico courtrooms or jury assembly areas following the expiration of the statewide, pandemic-related public heath order, the state Supreme Court announced Thursday. Additionally, jurors will no longer be required to answer health screening questions to enter a courthouse. Courts will continue to make masks available to any juror who chooses to wear one, but they are not required, according to a statement issued by Administrative Office of the Courts spokesman Barry...
SANTA FE -- As Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham started her post-session news conference Saturday, she already knew the score. Of the roughly 40 public safety bills introduced this year, the governor said she championed 10. “We have about a handful up, and out of 40, it’s 10 [that passed], and not all of those would really constitute what I think are strong public safety measures,” she said. “I know that is an area that you want me to say I’m disappointed,” Lujan Grisham added. “I’m motivated. I am very motivated to find additio...
SANTA FE -- With just a little over a day to go in the 2023 legislative session, Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham signed a bill into law extending learning time for students in the state's public schools. House Bill 130 will mandate an increase in learning time in public schools to 1,140 hours, plus additional professional development time for teachers, while allowing districts some flexibility in when to add the hours. That means an extra 150 hours for students in first through sixth-grades. For secondary students, it’s 60 a...
SANTA FE -- The state Senate passed a nearly $9.6 billion spending plan for the upcoming fiscal year Sunday amid accusations the proposed budget was hijacked at the eleventh hour. Discussion on the proposed budget, which would increase spending by almost 14%, or more than $1 billion, also came with a warning from the chairman of the Senate Finance Committee: The level of spending is unsustainable. “New Mexico had better be prepared in our future for the plateauing of oil and gas, and that’s not too many years away,” said...
I used to say Portales was the only town in the world where the neutron bomb had been successfully tested. The buildings are intact, but no people walk the streets. Kidding, Portales! Just kidding. (Sort of.) Still, the sleepy little college town on New Mexico’s eastern plains had better get ready. Ray Birmingham is about to roll into a regent’s parking spot at Eastern New Mexico University. P-Ville, you might want to order a few hundred cases of Red Bull, just to prepare. The newest regent on campus is not the shy, ret...
A proposed overhaul of New Mexico’s public education system — eliminating the Cabinet secretary position and reestablishing a statewide board of education — is headed to its last stop, the House floor. The House Education Committee voted 9-2 Wednesday to support Senate Joint Resolution 1, which calls for a November 2024 general election ballot question asking New Mexico voters to decide on a constitutional amendment making the change. The Senate already has approved the resolution, which does not need the governor’s signatu...
New Mexico got one step closer to the possibility of a paid Legislature when the state House of Representatives on Saturday voted 40-24 to approve a resolution that would, if voters agree, open the door to lawmaker pay. House Joint Resolution 8 would create a citizens’ commission to study possibly paying the state’s 112 lawmakers beginning in 2026. The commission would also recommend salary ranges for the lawmakers. Even if the Senate, where the measure goes next, approves the resolution, it would not necessarily become law...
SANTA FE -- George W. Bush was serving his first term as president and the first season of American Idol premiered on TV the last time the governor of New Mexico received a salary increase. Not just the governor but the attorney general, secretary of state, auditor, treasurer and state land commissioner haven't seen raises in more than two decades. Three high-ranking Senate Democrats are championing a proposal to give them each a nearly $60,000 raise. Whether the five-figure salary increase should take effect immediately or...
SANTA FE -- A bill updating New Mexico’s high school graduation requirements for the first time in over 15 years has made its way halfway through the legislative marathon. The state House of Representatives on Wednesday voted 64-3 to approve House Bill 126. The bill’s sponsor, Rep. Andrés Romero, D-Albuquerque, told members of the House it is designed to keep students invested in high school and give them more options for classes that may speak to their post-school career needs. “We need to reengage,” said Romero, an Albuq...
SANTA FE -- After faltering last year amid pushback from district attorneys, a revised bill that would end life without parole as a sentencing option for juvenile offenders passed the Senate with bipartisan support Wednesday. “When children cause harm in our community, yes, we must hold them accountable. But we must hold them accountable in ways that leaves room for their potential to experience transformation, positive transformation,” said Sen. Antoinette Sedillo Lopez, D-Albuquerque, the lead sponsor of Senate Bill 64....
SANTA FE -- Actor Alec Baldwin pleaded not guilty Thursday and waived a virtual first appearance hearing scheduled for Friday in New Mexico’s First Judicial District Court. The actor is charged with involuntary manslaughter in connection with the October 2021 fatal shooting of cinematographer Halyna Hutchins at Bonanza Creek Ranch while filming the movie Rust. Judge Mary Marlowe Sommer set Baldwin’s conditions of release Thursday, which include a stipulation stating the actor cannot consume alcohol or possess firearms. How...
SANTA FE -- First Judicial District Attorney Mary Carmack-Altwies has abandoned her attempt to apply a five-year sentencing enhancement to the charges against actor Alec Baldwin and Rust armorer Hannah Gutierrez-Reed. Both still face a charge of involuntary manslaughter in the shooting death of cinematographer Halyna Hutchins, who was killed by a bullet from a pistol Baldwin held during an October 2021 rehearsal on a movie set south of Santa Fe. The bullet also struck and wounded director Joel Souza. The change reduces the...
SANTA FE -- At the halfway point of the 60-day legislative session, New Mexico’s proposed budget is halfway to the governor’s desk. The $9.43 billion spending plan, which includes average 5% pay raises for state government employees and leaves room for rebates for taxpayers, is headed to the Senate Finance Committee after passing the House 52-17 on Thursday. Seven Republicans joined all 45 Democrats in the House in voting to advance House Bill 2. During a three-hour discussion and debate on the spending plan — the highe...
BERNALILLO — Cars manned by anxious parents lined the edges of Bernalillo High School on Thursday after local law enforcement received a false report of a fatal shooting inside the cafeteria. The report may have been a hoax — one of many throughout the state and the nation in the past several days — but that didn’t stop mothers like Miranda Armijo from fearing the worst. “I just needed to get my kids out,” Armijo said as she waited for her son and daughter to emerge from the campus in the small town north of Albuquerque...
The New Mexico State University men's basketball season is officially over as the troubled program deals with an internal hazing incident that had sexual overtones, according to a police report. Just before 4 p.m. Sunday, NMSU chancellor Dan Arvizu issued a statement declaring the cancellation of the remainder of the team's games pending an investigation into allegations of hazing among Aggies players. "This action is clearly needed, especially after receiving additional facts and reviewing investigation reports related to...
SANTA FE -- Alec Baldwin's lawyers are seeking to have state Rep. Andrea Reeb, R-Clovis, disqualified as a special prosecutor in the criminal case tied to the 2021 fatal shooting on the set of the movie “Rust,” claiming the role conflicts with her position as a legislator. Three lawyers representing the Hollywood actor and producer filed a motion Tuesday in state District Court requesting a judge disqualify Reeb based on a clause in the state constitution they say bars individuals from simultaneously exercising powers in mor...
SANTA FE -- The first court hearings in the criminal cases against actor Alec Baldwin and two other people involved in the ill-fated production of the Western film Rust are scheduled Feb. 24, the New Mexico Administrative Office of the Courts announced Wednesday. The First Judicial District Court proceedings will be conducted remotely, with separate hearings for Baldwin and film armorer Hannah Gutierrez-Reed — both charged with involuntary manslaughter in the October 2021 fatal shooting of cinematographer Halyna Hutchins ...
SANTA FE -- Some 875,000 New Mexicans would get a cut of the state's record revenues under a bill that received unanimous approval during its first legislative committee hearing Thursday. Senate Bill 10, a priority of Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham, would appropriate $1 billion to provide a one-time tax rebate of $750 for single filers and $1,500 for joint filers. "Taxpayers' budgets are stretched thin due to inflation that includes a higher cost of food, heating, gas and other basic necessities," one of the sponsors, Sen....
