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Redistricting session to start Monday
The special legislative session re-drawing New Mexico’s political maps will begin Monday, Dec. 6, said Sen. Mimi Stewart, the Senate’s president pro tempore. Stewart told Source New Mexico that there’s been no formal announcement yet about the session as a “courtesy” to legislators who are fundraising. A state law effective in January 2020 prohibits lawmakers from […]
Tribal coalition left in the dark as redistricting nears, member says
A New Mexico group is raising concerns about under-representation of Native Americans as lawmakers prepare to shape the political landscape here for at least another decade. Austin Weahkee (Cochiti, Zuni, Navajo), political director for New Mexico Native Vote, said some of the maps proposed by a nonpartisan committee last month don’t adequately reflect the sizeable […]
Dolores Huerta comes home to New Mexico to push for Build Back Better
Legendary labor activist Dolores Huerta visited workers on a construction site and in a university classroom Tuesday, a homecoming to New Mexico in which she pushed for the Build Back Better legislation and reflected on nearly 70 years of activism. Huerta, 91, was born in Dawson, a small mining town in Northeastern New Mexico before […]
Bernalillo County squeaks past federal requirement to spend rent relief money
Officials in Bernalillo County just barely met a federal deadline for the spending of emergency rental assistance funds, staving off the clawback of millions of dollars. Renters in the county outside of Albuquerque get rent assistance from the county government, not the state government. That’s a choice county officials made early in the pandemic. Doña […]
With Rittenhouse acquittal, activists hear echo close to home
Activist Lisa Christopherson said that the day news first broke of a fatal shooting in Kenosha, Wisc., she couldn’t help but see the similarities. Since then, she’s followed the arrest, trial and, as of Friday, acquittal of Kyle Rittenhouse as a potential template for what might happen here in the case of Steven Ray Baca. […]
Labor shortage leaves chile unpicked so NM boosts wages
The state Agriculture Department extended a program that helps chile farmers and contractors pay their workers more per hour amid a labor shortage that threatens harvests of New Mexico’s signature crop. Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham first announced a $5 million first program in August that chipped in taxpayer money to help recruit and retain seasonal […]
Driving in Central NM dropped 20% during pandemic, report states
Motorists in central New Mexico reduced their daily driving by more than 20% in 2020, according to data released last week by the region’s planning organization. The traffic reduction is attributed to the pandemic, and it’s not yet clear how traffic volumes and patterns might be permanently changed. Some data so far suggests that traffic […]
91 years old and voting: Why one South Broadway resident got out to vote in the 2021 city election
Joan Jones, 91, has spent more than 60 years in her house in the South Broadway neighborhood. In that time, she’s come to see a pattern. Albuquerque mayors, often when they face re-election, tout flashy development projects that they promise will benefit her and her neighbors. “They want something that’s going to put them on […]
Report: Traffic in ABQ area nears pre-pandemic levels, but Downtown ABQ lags
The way people move around New Mexico’s biggest metropolitan area is beginning to bounce back following the coronavirus pandemic, but some areas are slower than others, according to new data released last week. Vehicular traffic in the metro area is beginning to return to pre-COVID travel conditions, according to the Mid-Region Council of Governments’ annual […]
Investigators suspect it was a metal bullet, not a blank, that killed cinematographer
Santa Fe County Sheriff’s Office spokesperson Juan Rios confirmed with Source New Mexico in a phone call after the news conference Wednesday that investigators suspect it was a real metal bullet that killed Halyna Hutchins, 42, last week on the set of “Rust.” Sheriff Adan Mendoza said there was “complacency” on the set of the […]
‘Rust’ cast member: Production was rushed, crew overworked before fatal shooting
Local actor Ian Hudson's character was shot and killed on set using antique, functional guns. He's shaken to his core, he said, about what happened to his colleague.
Flow of cash
When New Mexico farmer Ron Moya looks out at the 10 acres of dead and dying alfalfa on his field near Tome, N.M., he sees green. Specifically, he sees $2,750. That’s the cash he’s being paid for the simple act of not watering the field this year. Moya is one of 44 farmers paid to […]