Charter Commission Considers Changes to City Governance

Charter commission considers changes to city governance

Should Santa Fe’s mayor have less voting power? Should the city manager have specific qualifications? Should it be easier for voters to propose changes on local ballots? These are some of the questions the City of Santa Fe’s Charter Review Commission has been parsing for the past few months in advance of sending recommendations to Mayor Alan Webber and the Santa Fe City Council for possible inclusion on the November municipal ballot. As SFR staff writer Andrew Oxford reports in this week’s cover story, the commission has been meeting every two weeks for the last few months and has thus far received suggestions from approximately two people. That’s at least partially due to a lack of outreach by the city to engage the public in the charter commission’s work. Fortunately, it’s not too late. The commission meets at 5 pm today in City Council Chambers, and the agenda includes a discussion of proposals from the governance subcommittee on those mayoral and council roles, as well as proposals from the Subcommittee on Human Rights and Social Issues to establish an Office of Equity and Inclusion and to amend the charter to declare access to food a human right and commit city government to making land and water available to ensure the sustainable local production of food.

Heinrich, Lujan join legal efforts to stop mifepristone ruling

US Sens. Martin Heinrich and Ben Ray Luján, D-NM, have joined more than 240 other members of the US Congress in filing a friend of the court brief in the federal government’s challenge to US District Judge Matthew J. Kacsmaryk’s April 7 ruling in Texas that suspended the Food and Drug Administration’s 20-year-old approval of mifepristone, a key drug used in medical abortions. A federal appeals court late yesterday ruled the FDA approval could remain, but allowed other portions of Kacsmaryk’s ruling to hold. Kacsmaryk’s “misguided stay” of the FDA’s approval, the amicus brief reads, “will reduce access to abortion, exacerbating an already significant reproductive health crisis. The consequences of the district court’s remedy could extend far beyond mifepristone, for it undermines the science-based, expert-driven process that Congress designed for determining whether drugs are safe and effective.” A conflicting April 7 ruling out from Washington State by US District Judge Thomas O. Rice ruled that mifepristone is safe and blocked restrictions in the 17 states where attorneys general had filed the lawsuit—New Mexico included. In the aftermath of both rulings late last week—the first by a former President Donald Trump-appointed judge; the second by a judge appointed by former President Barack Obama, Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham—who recently signed into law multiple bills codifying abortion access in the state—issued a statement underscoring that “medication abortion remains legal and available in New Mexico. I also want to state, unequivocally, that medication abortion is an effective, safe option, and the Texas decision is an affront to the FDA approval process and the extensive scientific and medical evidence upon which it is based.”

Spring runoff floods Jemez Springs

The Santa Fe National Forest is discouraging fishing and drinking water at all points south of the wastewater treatment plan for the Village of Jemez, after flooding from spring runoff reached the wastewater treatment plan and overflowed into the Jemez River. The Albuquerque Journal reports Jemez Springs Police Chief Felix Nunez said yesterday afternoon the river had risen by at least 4 to 5 feet by Wednesday afternoon and approximately a dozen riverside homes and other structures would be endangered if it continued to do so. According to Nunez, as of yesterday actual sewage water had not contaminated the river, but was excreting through manholes into the village. New Mexico Homeland Security and Emergency Management spokesman David Lienemann tells the Journal the state environment department is working with the regional US Environmental Protection Agency division, which holds the permit for the wastewater treatment plant, “to identify solutions,” and that the full extent of the wastewater leakage is not yet known. The Sandoval County Board of Commissioners yesterday issued issued an emergency/disaster declaration.

NM to receive $17.1 million in vaping settlement

New Mexico Attorney General Raúl Torrez announced yesterday the state will receive close to $17.1 million through a settlement with JUUL Labs Inc. over youth vaping. In addition to the financial agreement, the company has agreed to advertising rules that prohibit targeting youth, including an agreement not to show anyone under the age of 35 in any promotion that could be shared on social media; not to use any cartoons; and not to place ads anywhere within 1,000 feet of K-12 schools or near playgrounds. “I will fight to protect children from harmful advertising and products and ensure that companies who target and sell products to children through social media platforms are held accountable for their dangerous messaging,” Torrez said in a statement. The agreement also requires the company to keep its products behind retail store counters and verify the age of consumers. The AG’s office says funds from the settlement will proceed youth e-cigarette prevention and reduction programs. In total, JUUL is paying six states and Washington, DC $462 million. In a news conference yesterday, New York Attorney General Letitia James, who led the 2019 suit with California Attorney General Rob Bonta, said in a statement “JUUL lit a nationwide public health crisis by putting addictive products in the hands of minors and convincing them that it’s harmless—today they are paying the price for the harm they caused.”

COVID-19 by the numbers

Reported April 12: New cases: 413; 677,231 total cases. Deaths: three. Santa Fe County has had 403 total deaths; 9,155 total fatalities statewide. Statewide hospitalizations: unavailable at press time; patients on ventilators: unavailable at press time

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s most recent April 6 “community levels” map shows improvement for New Mexico, with just one county—Union—yellow with medium levels, down from two the prior week, none red and the rest of the state with green—aka low—levels. Corresponding recommendations for each level can be found here.

Resources: Receive four free at-home COVID-19 tests per household via COVIDTests.gov; Check availability for additional free COVID-19 tests through Project ACT; CDC interactive booster eligibility tool; NM DOH vaccine & booster registration; CDC isolation and exposure interactive tool; COVID-19 treatment info; NMDOH immunocompromised tool kit. People seeking treatment who do not have a medical provider can call NMDOH’s COVID-19 hotline at 1-855-600-3453. DOH encourages residents to download the NM Notify app and to report positive COVID-19 home tests on the app.

You can read all of SFR’s COVID-19 coverage here.

Listen up

El Palacio Editor Charlotte Jusinski takes on a topic she knows well in the most recent episode of the Encounter Culture podcast she hosts: El Palacio magazine, the official magazine of the New Mexico Department of Cultural Affairs, which began in 1913 as a pamphlet. Jusinski talks with one of the magazine’s most regular contributors, writer Emily Withnall, about “the writer’s path to El Palacio, the significant role nature plays in her writing, and her ability to sift through the ephemera that often complicates discussions about art. "

Saving NM’s acequias

The Guardian examines the history of New Mexico’s acequias, along with the threats they face and the efforts underway to preserve them. The story opens in Holman, where Mayordormo Jimmy Sanchez’s ancestors in 1882 constructed a 24-mile-long ditch to bring water from the headwaters in the mountains in order to cultivate crops and sustain livestock. “They celebrated down here at the churches that there was water, and water is life,” Sanchez tells The Guardian, “and here we are.” Last year’s devastating Hermits Peak/Calf Canyon Fire, however, imperiled the state’s acequias, damaging more than 70; the Black Fire endangered another 30. While acequias’ role in the state dates to the 1600s, the repair efforts underway now are unprecedented. “We’ve grown up with fire,” New Mexico Acequia Association Executive Director Paula Garcia says. “But to this extent, over such a wide area, it really is a big catastrophe.” Acequia advocates say neither federal nor state funding is sufficient for the high cost of repairing the types of damages these acequias now face from the fires. Moreover, the clock is ticking with spring run-off happening earlier and earlier, driving demand to repair and clean the acequias now lest they be abandoned. “If we don’t get the water down this year, we’re never gonna get it down,” Sanchez says. “It has to happen now.”

Calling all Capricorns

With April halfway spent, recommendations for May travel are nigh upon us. To wit: PureWow includes Santa Fe in its roundup of the six best places to visit next month, trailing number one pick Oslo, Norway; and ahead of San Miguel De Allende, Mexico; Louisville, Kentucky; Indianapolis, Indiana; and Tokyo, Japan (yes, this list is mystifying). In the case of Santa Fe, its draw, PureWow posits, comes from its art walks, incredible spas and “proximity to nature.” The “art walk” referenced is Canyon Road, though Virgil Ortiz’s work at Meow Wolf also gets a nod (as does his show at the Museum of Indian Arts and Culture, although it ended on April 1), along with the store Mountain Standard Time (504 Galisteo St.). If art, spas and nature don’t seem like sufficient reasons to visit, Sunset magazine has another: astrology. In its guide on spring and summer travel recommendations based on the Zodiac, the magazine recommends Santa Fe for the tenth sign: “Capricorns are some of the most responsible people out there, always succeeding and achieving,” Sunset attests. “Luckily, the sky will create space for them to have fun and reconnect with their creativity this season. Famous for its art scene, historic architecture and rich Native American culture, Santa Fe, New Mexico is Capricorn’s go-to destination right now.” That is lucky. Lastly and, remarkably, even less comprehensibly, The Travel includes Santa Fe on its list of 10 affordable vacations, describing New Mexico as “an affordable alternative to Texas for travelers who want to visit a big city on a budget,” and Santa Fe as a place where “accommodation is relatively cheap, and the Pueblo-style architecture creates a unique charm.” One of those things is true, at any rate.

Return of the winds

The National Weather Service forecasts a mostly cloudy day with a high temperature near 72 degrees and “breezy,” with a southeast wind 5 to 10 mph becoming southwest 15 to 25 mph in the afternoon. Winds could gust as high as 35 mph both today and tonight.

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