Albuquerque chief targets uptick in shootings by officers - By Susan Montoya Bryan Associated Press
The police chief in New Mexico's largest city wants to address an increase in shootings by his officers by better defining Albuquerque's policy on the use of less-lethal force.
Chief Harold Medina made the announcement Thursday. He said his department has been working with the U.S. Department of Justice and an independent monitoring team for the past year to update a policy that was first adopted as part of court-ordered reforms stemming from an agreement with federal officials.
Medina said officers will be trained on the updated policy once it is approved.
"I want to be sure that officers are empowered to use less-lethal force when it is necessary and when it can be used effectively to prevent an incident from escalating to the point where deadly force must be used," he said in a statement.
The Albuquerque Police Department presented data in November that reflected this year's record pace for shootings by officers. There have been 18 such shootings so far this year, compared with 10 or fewer for each of the four previous years.
Medina noted three common circumstances typically surround such shootings: when officers are attempting to apprehend violent suspects; when individuals are experiencing a mental health episode; and when people with little criminal history make bad decisions under the influence of drugs or alcohol.
The department's data showed there have been 54 police shootings dating back to 2018. Of the cases reviewed, 85% involved people who were armed with a gun or a weapon that appeared to be a firearm.
More than half of the cases involved people under the influence of drugs or alcohol, while there were only two cases in which intoxication did not play a role. Without toxicology tests, it was unknown whether drugs or alcohol played a role in the remainder of the cases.
While there have been fewer instances of use of force overall, Medina acknowledged again Thursday that the department has seen an increase in deadly force.
Top officials in the police department and the city attorney's office are conducting a review of this year's shootings with the aim of identifying trends that may be otherwise missed in the course of the year. The group will assign specific questions to subject matter experts and assign deadlines to address those concerns.
The department plans to conduct such reviews every six months.
Community organizations, civil rights advocates and individuals pushing for more changes have said the recent cases in Albuquerque and elsewhere around New Mexico underscore the need for a statewide use-of-force policy that includes clear and consistent protocols for deescalating interactions with the public.
Santa Feans gather to honor the city’s dead unhoused people – Santa Fe New Mexican, KUNM News
Activists and community members gathered in a church courtyard in Santa Fe yesterday in honor of National Homeless Persons’ Remembrance Day — a bell tolling out above them once for every one of the 37 members of the city’s unhoused community who died this year, and once more for all those whose deaths are unknown.
The Santa Fe New Mexican reports The New Mexico Coalition to End Homelessness, which has hosted the event for 18 years, has only counted one other year with more deaths: last year, at 39.
Nancy McDonald, executive Director for Santa Fe community services Inc. said the death toll has been climbing in recent years, and the reason why is not clear.
Some of those who were honored at the event died of old age, while others lost long fought battles with illness, or overdosed, victims of the ongoing opioid epidemic, and still others succumb to the elements.
An artic storm sweeping across the state has caused temperatures to plummet, prompting the city to activate a Code Blue protocol, making extra room in shelters and doubling up city workers efforts to get people out of the cold.
However, McDonald criticized a policy that ended the practice of handing out tents and sleeping bags, and she said she fears there will be even more deaths before the year is out.
Southern NM counties unclear on how to access millions of state dollars to fix disaster damage - Megan Gleason, Source New Mexico
The state set aside about $3 million months ago for small, rural counties damaged by the Black Fire, New Mexico’s second-largest wildfire in history. But after miscommunication and confusion, not one county has gotten a single dollar.
After the Black Fire and flooding that followed, counties repaired infrastructure that had to be fixed immediately, like washed out roads. But in some areas, work that should’ve already started — like cleaning up acequias before irrigation season comes in spring — has been left out of the mix until officials can clear up confusion surrounding the state disaster relief dollars.
Over summer and fall, Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham signed fire and flooding disaster declarations for Sierra, Grant and Hidalgo Counties so they can get reimbursed 75% of the money spent on repair work on public lands.
Sierra County is eligible for up to $1.5 million, and Grant and Hidalgo can each get up to $750,000. Any excess funds that aren’t used for the disaster go back to the state’s general fund.
The problem is that officials from Sierra and Grant Counties don’t entirely understand how to get and use that funding.
LOCAL OFFICIALS REPORT DELAYS AND MISCOMMUNICATION FROM STATE ABOUT FUNDING PROCEDURES
David Lienemann is a spokesperson for the Department of Homeland Security and Emergency Management (DHSEM). He said in September, after the natural disasters had largely subsided, the state and the Federal Emergency Management Agency looked over damage in Sierra, Catron, Grant, Hidalgo, Luna and Cibola Counties.
Only Sierra, Grant and Hidalgo Counties had damage excessive enough to qualify for the emergency state funding, he said. The governor also originally signed flooding funds for Catron back in September, but Lienemann said that money isn’t an option anymore since damage wasn’t bad enough in the county.
“Catron County did not meet the county threshold to qualify for state funding,” Lienemann said. “If they identify additional eligible damages to meet that threshold, they would be eligible to receive funding.”
Another option to consider for those affected by the Black Fire is federal emergency funding. To get that, the total Black Fire damage would have to add up to about $3.4 million, but Lienemann said it only reached about $650,000 — which is $2.75 million short of a federal disaster declaration.
The Hermits Peak-Calf Canyon Fire reached that financial cap because the burn hit much more populated areas whereas the Black Fire damaged a lot of wilderness and rural areas.
Plus, northern New Mexico fire victims are getting money straight from Congress because the federal government is taking responsibility for starting the fire.
The Black Fire was also human-caused, but it’s unclear who started the blaze.
For the southern counties to access the state money, Lienemann said counties and DHSEM have to come to agreements first on work that needs to be done to repair specific damage as well as costs. Then projects can begin.
Flooding continued until September, delaying repair work in these counties. Confusion about state funding is creating even more delays to start more extensive repairs and reimburse the county expenses.
“I was told at the beginning that the process would be slow due to the amount of disasters in that state that were occurring or had occurred in the prior months,” Justin Gojkovich, Grant County emergency manager, said, “but now it does seem that the funding confusion has taken a large role in the timeline.”
Lienemann said DHSEM is in regular contact with counties all around the state recovering from disasters and is always looking for ways to provide better service.
“This has been an extremely difficult fire and flood season that has challenged our agency – which has a significant vacancy rate – and local governments in unparalleled ways,” Lienemann said.
Gojkovich said Grant County has already filed for reimbursement for repairs done to county roads. It wasn’t easy, he said. The county had to turn in its paperwork three different times and waited at least 45 days for a response from the state.
Lienemann said DHSEM is looking over those reimbursement requests now.
Jim Paxon is a county commissioner in Sierra County. He said he’s asked the state repeatedly about the status of the damage assessments but has only been told they’re in review.
He said Sierra County has been fixing up public roads damaged or destroyed by flooding and keeping track of expenses. But more extensive work will be done only once the state confirms the relief money will actually be coming through, he said.
“The county is not willing to make any commitment to contracts for flood repair without that funding being allocated by the state,” Paxon said.
Lienemann said DHSEM is currently helping Sierra County get construction equipment needed to get more repair work done.
Hidalgo County Manager Tisha Green said she expects to submit reimbursement forms to the state as early as next week. There’s no set timeline on when Hidalgo might get its money, either.
OTHER CONCERNS
Gojkovich said the counties need to be very careful about fixing up damage.
“We can’t do any upgrades. We can’t change anything,” he said. “We have to repair exactly how it was.”
This concerns the Grant County manager because he’s not sure exactly how or who at the state will monitor that aspect. If repairs are not done correctly, he’s afraid reimbursements won’t come through at all.
Stanley Brown is Catron County’s interim manager. He said Catron County hasn’t been offered any assistance since the state and federal officials did the fall damage assessment, despite some areas in the county being “overwhelmed with flooding damage” that he said will take years to recover from.
He also said the county is still trying to get state funding approved back last year for flooding. “We’re still trying to get them to turn the money loose from 2021,” he said via email.
He said he thinks DHSEM is just overwhelmed, too.
DO ACEQUIAS QUALIFY FOR FUNDING OR NOT?
Gojkovich isn’t sure how to get acequias funding. He said he’s been getting different answers from the state and the New Mexico Acequia Association on if the irrigation channels are eligible for the $750,000 pot.
In Grant County, it would cost around $50,000 to $60,000 to clean up the silt-filled ditches and fix the broken headgate infrastructure. Gojkovich said the acequias don’t have that kind of money, but the county can’t afford to pay for it unless officials know they’ll get the money back.
Repairs on acequias in Grant County have not started, despite a tight deadline to get work done by spring. An acequia steward in Mimbres, N.M. said repairs should’ve started last month and need to be done by February at the earliest when it’s time to irrigate fields.
There’s some confusion about which acequias exactly can get the money. Only public acequias can get state or federal disaster funding, Lienemann said.
How do private acequias get help?
Paxon said private irrigation district associations in Sierra County are looking for financial help through non-state agencies, like the Sierra County Flood Commission, Sierra County Soil and Water Conservation District and the Natural Resources Conservation Service.
“Those requests are by the individual landowners and require applications to the appropriate agency,” he said.
But Gojkovich said the New Mexico Acequia Association told county officials they’ll need documented collaboration agreements to move forward in allocating the recovery funding to irrigation systems. This means more documents to file. After he gets memorandums of understanding, he said he’s going to potentially move forward with work on acequias.
Meanwhile, Hidalgo County Manager Green isn’t worried about it. She said she’s already met with people who use acequias and doesn’t have a fear that the state won’t help out with repairs to the irrigation channels. “There’s no reason that any of that should not be reimbursed,” she said.
Gojkovich said a lot of aspects of the disaster recovery process are confusing. The fight to get financial help isn’t new, he added. After prior disasters, he said the county had to fight tooth and nail trying to get aid, too.
“We do want to help people. It’s not like we’re just going to leave them to fend for themselves,” Gojkovich said. “It’s just the red tape that we’ve got to go through is just inflexible right now. And it’s insane how many hoops we’ve been having to jump through.”
Huge $1.7 trillion spending package passes in U.S. Senate, backed by both parties – By Jennifer Shutt, States Newsroom
The U.S. Senate passed a massive $1.7 trillion funding package Thursday that carries emergency aid for natural disaster recovery and the Ukrainian war effort, pushing past disputes over immigration policy and barely meeting a Friday deadline when current funding runs out.
The bill, supported by both Democrats and Republicans, now goes to the U.S. House, which could act yet Thursday. The overwhelming majority of Republicans there are expected to vote against sending the measure to President Joe Biden after unsuccessfully trying to hold over negotiations until next year when they’ll control that chamber. Biden has said he would sign the omnibus bill.
The package, approved on a 68-29 Senate vote just hours after an address to Congress by Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, includes $45 billion in new military and humanitarian aid to assist Ukrainians in their fight against Russia’s invasion. That brings the U.S. investment in the war to more than $111 billion. Sixty votes were needed for passage.
It would also make notable changes, negotiated by lawmakers, in the state-federal Medicaid health insurance program for low-income Americans and people with disabilities. The package would allow states to begin removing some millions of residents from Medicaid as soon as April and would phase out the bump in federal funding states got during the COVID-19 pandemic to keep people on the health care program.
The measure was the last Senate vote of the current Congress; lawmakers will reconvene in January.
PREGNANT WORKERS, TITLE 42
Before approving the bill, senators voted to reject seven amendments and adopt eight during a four-hour vote series. The modifications to the package included provisions dealing with standards for pregnant workers; state use of COVID-19 funding; and protections for nursing mothers. Senators rejected amendments dealing with Title 42, a controversial public health policy used to turn away migrants at the border.
Among the votes:
- Senators voted 73-24 to adopt an amendment from Louisiana Sen. Bill Cassidy that added the Pregnant Workers Fairness Act to the package. Pennsylvania Democratic Sen. Bob Casey Jr., a primary sponsor of the bill, said the amendment would set a standard for “reasonable accommodations” to ensure “that if a woman is pregnant in the workforce, she can do her job and have a healthy and safe pregnancy.” Cassidy argued the measure would do “what we want for ourselves, our wives, our sisters and our daughters.” Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer also backed its inclusion, saying “the Pregnant Workers Fairness Act is one of the most significant improvements to workplace protections in years. Tens of millions will be covered under this legislation, especially millions who work low-income jobs, long hours and get little support.” The measure is extremely close to a version of the billapproved by the Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee, though lawmakers strengthened “protections for religious employers,” according to Cassidy’s office.
- The Senate adopted by voice vote an amendment from Texas GOP Sen. John Cornyn and California Democratic Sen. Alex Padilla that would give local, state and tribal governments more flexibility in how they use unspent COVID-19 funding from the federal government.
- Sen. Lindsey Graham, a South Carolina Republican, and Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse, a Rhode Island Democrat, had their amendment adopted by voice vote. It would allow the U.S. Justice Department through the Secretary of State to transfer proceeds seized from Russian oligarchs under sanctions or other Russian entities under sanctions to Ukraine.
- The Senate, 92-5, adopted an amendment from Oregon Democratic Sen. Jeff Merkley and Alaska Republican Sen. Lisa Murkowski that added the Providing Urgent Maternal Protections for Nursing Mothers Act to the package. Merkley said the amendment broadens a bill Congress passed in 2010 to allow nursing mothers time and space to pump breast milk while at work. Murkowski said the provision is “good for babies, it’s good for new mothers, it’s good for employers to get these women back into the workforce.” HELP Chair Patty Murray, D-Wash., said in a statement the measure would “help close loopholes that leave nearly nine million working moms uncovered by federal protections to ensure they have reasonable break time and a private place to pump.”
- The Senate rejected an amendment from Arizona independent Sen. Kyrsten Sinema and Montana Democratic Sen. Jon Tester that would have addressed Title 42. The pandemic-era policy, originally put in place during the Trump administration, allows the border patrol to turn away migrants under the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s public health authorities. Title 42 was set to expire Wednesday, but the U.S. Supreme Court intervened in an ongoing court case, temporarily keeping the program in place until the justices can take further action. “This amendment keeps Title 42 until a permanent plan is in place, boosts desperately needed border funding for security, invests in our agents and officers, and stops the flow of dangerous drugs,” Sinema said. Tester said the provision would have approved additional funding “for judges and legal officials to ensure orderly processing” as well as providing resources for law enforcement at the Southern border and overriding the Biden administration’s decision to sunset Title 42. The 10-87 vote on the Sinema-Tester amendment, which would have provided $8.7 billion, fell short of meeting the 60-vote threshold set for adoption.
- The Senate rejected a separate Title 42 amendment from Utah GOP Sen. Mike Lee that would have extended Title 42 by preventing the federal government from spending any money to end the designation. The vote was 47-50. Illinois Democratic Sen. Dick Durbin spoke against Lee’s amendment, saying “this is not about public health anymore. It is our excuse for not tackling the very real challenge and coming up with a border policy on a bipartisan basis.”
HOUSE AND SENATE GOP SPLIT
The decision by House Republican leaders to sit out the bipartisan negotiations on the funding package and whip against the bill marked a stark contrast with Senate GOP leaders, who helped shape the legislation and voted for the measure.
Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, a Kentucky Republican, said Wednesday morning that the bill is “imperfect but strong” and lauded a large boost in defense spending.
“Senators have two options this week: We will either give our armed forces the resources and certainty that they need, or we will deny it to them,” McConnell said.
He noted that a failure to pass the omnibus would lead Congress to instead have to pass additional stopgap spending bills that would give the “military real-dollar funding cuts because of inflation, and give Defense Department leaders no certainty to plan and invest.”
McConnell also backed the investment in Ukraine, saying it’s “morally right.”
“But it’s not only that. It’s also a direct investment in cold, hard American interests,” McConnell added.
Schumer hailed the domestic spending increases in the legislation during a Wednesday morning floor speech, noting it would boost federal child care assistance funds by 30% and make permanent a program that allows kids to access school meals during the summer months.
The package would also allow states to keep providing one year of postpartum health care coverage for patients within Medicaid or the Children’s Health Insurance Program, a change Schumer said is “a great breakthrough.”
“Discrimination in maternal care and at birth is a real blot on our country, and the fact that people of color have higher rates of mortality is a disgrace,” Schumer said. “This goes a good way toward trying to rectify that blot on our country’s pride.”
The sweeping $1.7 trillion spending package would fund the departments and agencies that make up the federal government, including the Federal Emergency Management Agency, public lands and the Pentagon, through the end of the fiscal year on Sept. 30.
Negotiators released the 4,155-page omnibus government funding bill early Tuesday morning, following months of back-and-forth between Democrats and Republicans about how much in additional money to provide during the fiscal year that began on Oct. 1.
The bill includes $40 billion to help communities recover from natural disasters, including $5 billion for the Federal Emergency Management Agency’s disaster relief fund, $3.7 billion for crop and livestock losses and $75 million for Interior Department wildland fire suppression activities.
The package carries along with it several bills that lawmakers have been negotiating for months, including legislation that would update the Electoral Count Act of 1887 to clarify the vice president’s role as ceremonial and increase the threshold for objecting to a state’s electors from one member from each chamber to one-fifth of each chamber.
The measure wouldban federal employees from having the social media app TikTok on work phones.
Lawmakers wrapped in a bill that would allow the Food and Drug Administration to have oversight of cosmetics for the first time.
MEDICAID PLANS, AFGHAN RESETTLEMENT
The shifts in Medicaid come after 25 GOP governors wrote to Biden earlier this week, calling for an end to the COVID-19 public health emergency in April and arguing the designation is “negatively affecting states” by increasing the number of residents on Medicaid.
“This is costing states hundreds of millions of dollars,” the governors wrote in the letter.
“Since the beginning of the pandemic,” they wrote, “states have added 20 million individuals to the Medicaid rolls (an increase of 30%) and those numbers continue to climb as the PHE continues to be extended every 90 days.”
Democrats have emphasized other changes in the omnibus that will benefit children.
“I’m ecstatic that Medicaid and CHIP will now offer 12 months of continuous coverage for children to ensure that the 40 million children on Medicaid and CHIP have uninterrupted access to health care throughout the year,” said House Energy and Commerce Chairman Frank Pallone, a New Jersey Democrat, in a statement.
“Thanks to this provision, and the additional two years of funding secured in this agreement for CHIP, our kids will no longer be subject to fluctuations in coverage that endangers their health and well-being.
“The omnibus also makes the option for states to offer 12 months of postpartum coverage permanent, which I hope all states will adopt to ensure new moms have access to health care in the critical first year after delivery.”
On other issues affecting families, the omnibus government funding package doesn’t include the expansion of the child tax creditthat Congress approved during the pandemic, but had since lapsed amid disagreement about how it should be structured.
The measure also doesn’t include the Afghan Adjustment Act, a bipartisan billthat would have helped provide a pathway to permanent legal residency for certain Afghan evacuees.
Schumer said Tuesday that GOP leaders prevented the bill from going into the catchall spending package.
“It was a very high priority. It had some good Republican support, but unfortunately the Republican leadership blocked it,” Schumer said. “These are people who risked their lives for our soldiers and for our country.”
McConnell said the bill was left out, in part, because of the time crunch to negotiate the government funding measure in the last days of the 117th Congress.
“It is an important issue, but there were many things that one could argue were important that didn’t make it into the bill,” McConnell said. “That ought to be addressed. I think it’s important.”
Several former ambassadors to Afghanistan wrote a letter to Congress, as did three former chairmen of the Joint Chiefs of Staff and several other retired military officers, urging lawmakers to pass the bill.
Without the Afghan Adjustment Act, the former ambassadors wrote, “tens of thousands of recently arrived Afghans will have to find an existing immigration pathway to remain lawful once their parole expires.”
“That will mean tens of thousands of new asylum claims, when the current affirmative asylum backlog is more than 400,000 cases with a broader immigration backlog of 1.4 million cases.”
New Mexico education funding tied to the fate of the omnibus bill in Congress - Shaun Griswold, Source New Mexico
New Mexico is one step closer to expanding funding for public schools and meeting the demand of voters in the state.
Congress is doing its year-end negotiations to draft a spending bill to keep the federal government operable and pay for projects nationwide. Earlier this week, lawmakers unveiled a $1.7 trillion spending package that includes a very important sentence for public education in New Mexico.
Passage of the bill would give congressional approval to pulling more money from New Mexico’s Land Grant Permanent Fund each year for “enhanced instruction for at-risk students, extending the school year, teacher compensation and early childhood education” in the state.
Seventy percent of N.M. voters approved a change to the state constitution in November to boost education spending, but pulling more from that fund still needs a rubber stamp from D.C.
Once approved by Congress, New Mexico will add an additional 1.25% from revenues on state land — estimated to be more than $200 million for the first year the money becomes available — to help fund public school initiatives
Congressional leaders are expected to vote on the spending package by the end of this week.
House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer (D-Maryland) advised his colleagues that they will meet on Thursday and won’t end their session until the omnibus spending bill “is completed.”
Meanwhile, New Mexico’s Democratic federal delegation is beaming at the accomplishment of rolling the Land Grant Permanent Fund approval into the spending bill before the end of the year.
The funding could be vital to keeping educators in classrooms with a salary that can support them working with children, according to Vanessa Rogers. She runs a day care in the South Valley and said most employees make minimum wage and often find better pay outside the school.
“We have good teachers that are staying because we don’t want to leave,” she said. “We shouldn’t have to. We’re not asking for much. We’re asking for living wages, we’re not asking for much.”
The effort, known as the New Mexico Enhancement Act, was passed through a Senate committee by Sen. Martin Heinrich in July. It was introduced in the House by Rep. Melanie Stansbury in December following the overwhelming victory in the general election.
“Investing in our children at the level they have long deserved will help change the trajectory of our state. New Mexico families will soon benefit from universal early childhood education and care, programs to help students most in need, and invest in our invaluable teachers and students in our K-12 schools,” the New Mexico delegation said in a joint statement.
Rep. Yvette Herrell, a Republican, is the only member of the delegation who didn’t publicly support congressional approval of investing more money in public schools in the state. Still, she could still vote for the spending bill in one of her final acts before leaving Washington D.C. after losing her seat to Democrat Gabe Vasquez last month.
In New Mexico, education officials and parents are preparing projects that will spend this new investment in areas that can boost education outcomes for a state at the bottom in math and reading scores, entwined in several lawsuits directing school spending and tasked with reforming a historically bad public school system.
Last week, early childhood education leaders asked for a “bridge loan” to help fund projects until the federal government approved changes to the Land Grant Permanent Fund.
If Congress passes the omnibus bill, New Mexico lawmakers are expecting to include any new money for schools into the next fiscal year forecast, meaning they could potentially start negotiating how the money is spent during the 60-day legislative session that begins on Jan. 17.
Man linked to 5 killings in 2 states sentenced for murder - Associated Press
A man accused of killing several people in two states has been sentenced in New Jersey to 35 years in prison for the beating death of a former mentor.
Sean Lannon, 48, had pleaded guilty in October to first-degree murder in the March 2021 slaying of Michael Dabkowski, 66. Gloucester County prosecutors have said Lannon broke into the victim's East Greenwich home and beat him to death with a hammer.
Dabkowski had served as a mentor to Lannon and his twin brother when they were children in the 1980s and involved in a youth program. Lannon told investigators Dabkowski had sexually abused him as a child and that he had gone to the home to retrieve sexually explicit photos, but no evidence was ever presented in court to support that claim.
Lannon, who was sentenced Wednesday, still faces murder charges in New Mexico stemming from the killing of his ex-wife and two of her friends whose decomposed bodies were found in a pickup truck parked at an Albuquerque airport in March 2021. Police have said the three were lured to their deaths over a period of weeks before they were dismembered and their remains stuffed into plastic bins.
Lannon is also charged in the death of another man in New Mexico who authorities say agreed to help him move the bins, unaware of what they contained.
Santa Fe conflicted over gun ban in some city buildings - Associated Press
Officials in Santa Fe are divided over the mayor's proposal to ban guns in some city buildings.
The Santa Fe New Mexican reports that at least two councilors at a meeting earlier this month questioned whether Mayor Alan Webber's resolution is even enforceable.
Webber is calling for signs prohibiting firearms at locations like City Hall, the Santa Fe Community Convention Center and other sites used for school-related or sanctioned events. Anyone caught with a gun on these properties would be charged with a fourth-degree felony.
Councilor Michael Garcia says the New Mexico Attorney General's Office recently determined a similar ban in a Bernalillo County building was not legal. The office pointed to an amendment in the state constitution that states no municipality can regulate the right to bear arms.
Councilor Lee Garcia says the ban could unintentionally penalize hunters who unknowingly have their weapons in the car.
Amanda Chavez, a co-sponsor of the resolution, says it follows a state law that allows enforcement of deadly weapons on a school campus or any property used for public school-related activities.
The Santa Fe Police Department is in discussions with the city on how to enforce the proposal, which is up for a vote Jan. 11.
New Mexico city ends bid to retrofit coal-fired power plant - Associated Press
City leaders have ended their bid to retrofit a shuttered coal-fired power plant in northwestern New Mexico as a way to preserve jobs and tax revenue for Farmington and surrounding communities.
The city of Farmington announced Tuesday it had ended the effort began years ago to acquire the San Juan Generating Station and run it with partner Enchant Energy as part of a carbon capture project.
The announcement came hours after a closed meeting with city councilors, the city's legal team and the head of Enchant Energy, the Daily Times reported.
City officials said a recent decision by an arbitration panel to allow Public Service Co. of New Mexico and other plant owners to dismantle and auction key parts of the plant was a "catastrophic blow" to the partnership with Enchant. The city had hoped the panel would instead put on hold the auction.
"For a region already facing economic challenges, we have worked diligently to keep SJGS open with carbon capture," Farmington Mayor Nate Duckett said in a statement. "Unfortunately, profit and the (Energy Transition Act) have taken precedence over the livelihoods of real people and families."
PNM, the state's largest electric utility, demanded the matter go to arbitration after the city sued in September to stop the auctions and get talks underway with other plant owners.
The case was moved to federal court and arbitration followed. The three-member arbitration panel on Dec. 14 rejected the city's second try to halt auctions of electrical components.
PNM on Monday threatened legal action against the city if it continued to delay the plant's decommissioning.
Enchant Energy CEO Cindy Crane said Tuesday the company is still part of the Farmington community and will remain so. Enchant and the city joined forces in 2019 in an effort to keep open the San Juan plant, which produced its last bit of electricity in September before going offline.
Crane said work done to reopen the power station included a successful engineering and design study related to plans for large-scale decarbonization.
"It was a tough decision by the city," Crane said. "Unfortunately, it's the outcome that occurred."
Crane said Enchant has other projects in the works but declined to provide details due to non-disclosure agreements.
Duckett said work will continue to strengthen the local economy.
"I deeply regret that the arbitrators' decision means we are not able to help our dislocated workers support their families and can only offer as consolation that we will continue our efforts to help mitigate these devastating impacts," Duckett said.
PNM did not comment on the city's announcement.
The utility, which is overseeing the decommissioning, argued in a filing made as part of the arbitration process that everything to be sold was replaceable and that the city would have enough time to do so since the carbon-capture project would not be operational until September 2027.
PNM also argued that much of the equipment is over 30 years old and would need to be replaced as part of any proposal to operate the plant in the future.
The arbitrators noted the potential for PNM and the other owners working to decommission the plant to face increased costs if the process was stopped.
Son of former Taos mayor dead in truck rollover crash - Associated Press
The grown son of former Taos Mayor Daniel Barrone has died in a car crash.
Media outlets report authorities identified 36-year-old Daniel Barrone Jr. as a truck driver who was killed Monday in a rollover crash.
Taos County deputies responded around 2 p.m. to U.S. Highway 64 and found the logging truck on its side.
Investigators say the younger Barrone was the only one in the truck and the crash happened on a curve.
Sheriff Jerry L. Hogrefe says neither speed nor impairment appear to be factors. An investigation into the cause remains ongoing.
Mayor Barrone was the mayor from 2018 up until this year. He also served in the state Legislature between 2020 and 2021.
In a message on the Town of Taos' Facebook page, current Mayor Pascualito Maestas said the entire town was sending prayers and condolences to his predecessor and his family.
Maestas said Barrone Jr. was known for his his big heart and helping hand.