1,200-acre fire near Jemez Springs forces evacuations

From KOAT-TV.com - The Thompson fire was first reported Friday afternoon. Fire officials said the fire has reached 1,200 acres in size. The fire started on private land and has burned onto some federal Forest Service property. Crews report fire is creeping along the ground with occasional tree torching.
     Resident Lisa Yost said the fire started next door to her home. "My husband, Craig, said it was a power line between our house and the neighbor's house, and it went down and caught the grass on fire," said Yost.
     Strong winds and dry conditions quickly fanned the fire, prompting firefighters to force evacuation in 40 homes. "We just went in and got as much out of the house as we could, and they told us we need to leave because the helicopters were coming in and they wouldn’t dump while we were there," said Yost.
     Officials said no homes have been lost. Nearly 100 fire personnel were fighting the fire into the evening Friday. Read more

1,200-acre fire near Jemez Springs forces evacuations

Swickard: The age’s most uncertain hour

© 2013 Michael Swickard, Ph.D. “We come on a ship they call the Mayflower, we come on a ship that sailed the moon. We come in the age’s most uncertain hour and sing an American tune.” Paul Simon
     In these most uncertain hours some Americans wonder how our nation got to this point politically and as a society. They wonder with concern where America is headed. The question is: are things in our country going to get better or worse? The problem is even agreeing on what is better or worse.
      One definition of better or worse involves the freedom of citizens to make their own decisions. This measures the intrusive reach of government into our lives. Some citizens give up their personal freedoms in trade for being in the care of our government. Others are afraid that at some point the government will have no more use for them. The Government might literally kill those citizens who do not allow the government to get stronger. It has happened in other societies.
     So there is a divide in our country of citizens very worried and other citizens, in fact, most citizens who seem to be paying no attention at all to the desperate clouds on our horizon. They pray to the God Media and do not believe anything the propaganda Media does not endorse.
     It is a most uncertain hour for America. I personally have been through decades of uncertain hours but these hours seem very dangerous. When I was a child our whole world was minutes away from everyone perishing in a nuclear cloud of debris. We practiced nuclear attack drills in schools: under our desks.
These concerns are not as pernicious a threat as complete annihilation. But if I had died decades ago, I would have died a free person. Is it better to die young and free than live long and enslaved? Optimism seems out of place in a society that controls neither its borders nor its currency.
     Perhaps what makes this the most uncertain hour is there are no leaders of either party who grasp the dangers to our country. They are still jousting with each other for their own political power and do not face these potential disasters unless they can use the potential disasters as a political stick to strike their opponents. Read column

Swickard: The age’s most uncertain hour

Tim Keller for State Auditor in 2014, not Governor

From Capitol Report New Mexico - You can count state Sen. Tim Keller, D-Albuquerque, out as a potential rival to Gov. Susana Martinez in 2014.
     The 35-year-old who won a second term in what’s known as the International District in north-central Albuquerque in 2012, told New Mexico Watchdog Thursday afternoon (May 30) he’ll run for State Auditor in 2014.
     “I think it’s a good fit for my background,” Sen. Keller, who earned a master’s in business administration from Harvard. “I think that I have enough experience that I know where to look” to investigate agencies and oversee the audits the office mandates that entities who accept and/or receive state dollars turn in each year.
     Keller had flirted with the idea of challenging Gov. Martinez, a Republican who will run for a second term next year and has enjoyed poll numbers showing her at 60-plus percent approval ratings.
      “I think the biggest issue is timing,” Keller said, citing the fact that his wife is eight months pregnant with the couple’s first child.
     “To run for governor, you have to be ‘all in’ yesterday,” Keller said. “The timing is not right.” Read more

Tim Keller for State Auditor in 2014, not Governor

Census: more people leaving NM than coming in

According to the latest census numbers, more people are leaving New Mexico than moving in. 

This might be a result of fewer jobs in the state. Those same census numbers show that a number of recent grads are heading to cities in Texas such as Austin, Houston and Dallas, all of which had a surge in population last year. 

Between July 2011 and July 2012, 5,200 people moved out the Land of Enchantment, nearly the entire population of Tucumcari, per census data.

 Paralleling the overall decline is what officials call a “very slow growth.” Jobs from the oil industry and newborns have contributed to this growth. 

New Mexico has lost 43,000 jobs since the recession began six years ago, according to a local economist.  

Census: more people leaving NM than coming in

New meeting notice and agenda law to take efffect

School boards, city councils, state agencies and other governmental groups must soon start giving New Mexicans greater notice of scheduled meetings and their planned agenda. 

A state law taking effect on June 14 requires governmental organizations to make their meeting agendas available to the public 72 hours in advance and post it on their web site. Current law requires a 24-hour public meeting notice. 

For governmental groups that meet more than once a week, a draft agenda must be provided 72 hours in advance and the final agenda has to be posted at least 36 hours before a meeting. 

New meeting notice and agenda law to take efffect

New NMSU pres. wants other finalists for provost

Garrey Carruthers

New Mexico State University President-designate Garrey Carruthers may hire one of the other finalists for president of the university as its next top academic administrator.

 The NMSU Faculty Senate on June 6 will consider allowing Carruthers to waive normal search procedures if he hires one of the finalists as provost. 

Faculty Senate Chair Dennis Clason says the finalists were carefully vetted during the presidential search process. 

Carruthers was named NMSU president May 6 and officially begins those duties Saturday. 

The other finalists were Guy Bailey, David Ashley, Elsa Murano and Daniel Howard.

New NMSU pres. wants other finalists for provost

Hospital considering Las Cruces Country Club location

Part of the site of the former Las Cruces Country Club is being proposed as the site for a new hospital that would specialize in cardiac medicine.

  If rezoning of the 30-acre site is approved, the 42-bed Park Ridge Medical Center project proposed by Galichia Hospital Group LLC would help fill an area that is the largest open space within the city limits of Las Cruces. 

The entire former country club property is 110 acres, and other development could include a hotel, a small office park, multi-family housing and a combination assisted-living center and rehabilitation hospital.

Hospital considering Las Cruces Country Club location

Alamogordo judge resigns to avoid disciplinary action

Judge William Brogan

New Mexico's highest court has allowed a state district court judge in Alamogordo to resign to avoid disciplinary action for alleged misconduct and failing to carry out his duties. 

District Judge William Brogan resigned Friday under an agreement approved by the state Supreme Court, which released a copy of its order on Tuesday. 

The Judicial Standards Commission had started disciplinary proceedings against Brogan for violating the Code of Judicial Conduct since 2011, including repeatedly failing to follow rules for handing criminal cases. 

The commission said the judge "failed to maintain competence in the performance of judicial duties" or was "unable to perform judicial duties competently and diligently."

Alamogordo judge resigns to avoid disciplinary action

Meteorologist replies to Rhode Island Senator Sheldon Whitehouse on the Moore, OK. tornado

Commentary by Bob Endlich, News New Mexico - On 20 May 2013 a devastating tornado struck Moore, Oklahoma with the loss of 24 lives, including 10 children, injuring hundreds of victims, and with damage estimates over $1.5 Billon.

     Within hours Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse was on the floor of the US Senate with a placard, “Time to Wake Up,” in a theme stating the cause of the wildfires in Texas, and tornadoes, was directly tied to man-caused CO2-fueld Global Warming. Sen. Sheldon’s speech included the phrase “the damage that your polluters and Deniers are doing…”

     He would include me on the list of “Deniers,” but I would like to include in this note some Science, where Senator Whitehouse desperately needs education.

     First, CO2 is not a pollutant, it is absolutely essential for life as we know it, because it is plants which turn CO2 into the food upon which we and all animal life on this planet depend for our sustenance. The level of CO2 in the atmosphere today, some 400 parts/million, is precariously low when compared over geologic time. During the previous glacial, the Wisconsin, 22,000 years ago, deciduous tree life collapsed in Georgia, and pine trees collapsed from CO2 starvation during the latter part of the Wisconsin as evidenced at the La Brea Tar Pits in California. 

     Second, the 2011 fires in Texas and the accompanying drought were caused by the large multi-year climate fluctuations over North America, El Nino-La Nina, also called ENSO, El Nino - Southern Oscillation, not CO2. Sen. Whitehouse should see the map at
http://www.cpc.ncep.noaa.gov/products/analysis_monitoring/ensocycle/nawinter.shtml
from NOAA’s Climate Prediction Center, which shows the dry conditions from Arizona to Florida during La Nina conditions.Read column

Meteorologist replies to Rhode Island Senator Sheldon Whitehouse on the Moore, OK. tornado

Specialists addressing high rate of preschool expulsions in NM

From KOB-TV.com - By: Heather Mills, KOB Eyewitness News 4 - New Mexico has one of the highest rates of preschool expulsion in the country. Specialists in UNM's Department of Psychiatry say there are several reasons for that. One, there's a high percentage of parents or caregivers with a history of substance abuse or mental illness. Two, there's a high number of immigrant families with one or both parents missing. Specialists are working on intervention and say it starts in the womb.
     Rocio Quintana and her husband have their hands full with four daughters. She says being a mom is rewarding, but it's not easy. "I don't know how to be a mom, I don't know if I'm doing a good job or not," Quintana said.
     Concerned when her 7-year-old started becoming more withdrawn, she brought her daughter to UNM's Young Children's Health Center in Albuquerque. "She started working closely with Dr. Anilla Del Fabbro. Quintana added, "At first it was really hard for both of us and now the help they've given me, it's teaching her how to do it and teaching myself how to do it."
     "Really child psychiatry should start as early as, when moms are pregnant." Dr. Del Fabbro says that's because, whether she knows it or not, a mom can harbor emotions from her childhood and pass them down. She says behavior modification is sometimes needed, but mostly she observes and teaches parents that they already have the tools they need to make their children happy.
     Dr. Del Fabbro received a grant through UNM. This summer she's establishing a group for moms and caregivers, for both support and parenting education. Read more

Specialists addressing high rate of preschool expulsions in NM