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Groups announce energy summit in Santa Fe
Several organizations plan to host an energy summit in Santa Fe later this month, amidst unresolved questions regarding implementation of New Mexico’s Energy Transition Act (will there be summer blackouts being a main one). PNM, Avangrid, the United States Hispanic Chamber of Commerce and the Albuquerque Hispano Chamber of Commerce over the weekend announced a 2022 Energy Summit April 21-22 to be held at La Fonda on the Plaza. According to a news release, “the summit aims to spark dialogue on the critical issues affecting the energy sector, focusing on how the demands of a 21st century economy can be sustainably balanced with the supply of various natural and renewable resources.” While the conference schedule has yet to be posted, a news release says the two-day affair will include multiple guest speakers from PNM and Avangrid, as well as Oncor, Edison International, Chevron, NV Energy, Sandia National Laboratory, the Department of Energy and others. “There will be robust discussions and collaborative opportunities focusing on solutions, policy, and cutting-edge technology as our energy industry transitions along the continuum of fossil fuel to more renewable resources,” the news announcement says. The summit occurs amidst a flurry of activities related to the state’s transition to renewable energy. PNM, Avangrid, environmental groups and state regulators continue to await a state Supreme Court decision on the companies’ appeal of the Public Regulation Commission’s rejection of a proposed merger between the companies. The PRC also is revisiting PNM’s costs in abandoning its coal-fired San Juan Generating station following outcry in February over those costs from several environmental and civic organizations. Finally, the PRC last week completed a nearly year-long process of community solar rulemaking.
Green weekend
New Mexico raked in the green during the first weekend of recreational adult cannabis sales, which kicked off Friday. Day one saw approximately $2.7 million in sales, with about $1.9 million of that from recreational sales. By mid-day Saturday—the last figures provided by the Cannabis Control Division—total sales of medical and recreational cannabis had topped $3.6 million, with close to 68% coming from recreational sales. In Santa Fe, R. Greenleaf dispensary opened at 7 am on Friday, with Steve Sanderson making the first transaction here. “I just think it’s cool, because now everybody can get some,” he told SFR. Visitors, along with locals, visited local dispensaries on Friday. Minerva Canna Manager Leroy Roybal said “tons of people” from Texas and Arizona stopped in for the morning rush.”Their exact words were, ‘Thank God we don’t have to go to Colorado now,’” he said. Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham, who has touted the cannabis industry’s projected job creation and economic stimulation (11,000 jobs and roughly $300 million annually), visited with customers waiting in line at a dispensary in Albuquerque, tweeting: “Recreational cannabis sales have begun and New Mexicans are EXCITED!” The state’s transportation department also launched a safe-driving campaign Friday with videos targeted at cannabis users, and plans to mount billboards reading, among other messages, “You’re too drive to high.”
County senior centers reopen partially today
Santa Fe County will begin reopening its senior centers today with a staggered schedule and adherence to state COVID-19 protocols for senior centers: masking; sign-in sheets; and screening for all seniors and visitors coming into the center. “Staff has begun to contact the seniors with the good news, and they are very excited to come back!” Senior and Community Relations Division Director Anna War said in a statement, adding that the county expects to reopen the centers fully starting in May. According to a news release, activity coordinators and staff have prepared the senior centers for reopening, including organizing and distributing hygiene and vaccination information and stocking up on supplies such as hand sanitizer and thermometers. Any senior who is not comfortable returning to a senior center can continue to have a home meal delivered to them by the county. Find the staggered schedule here.
COVID-19 by the numbers
New cases: 94; 517,951 total cases
Deaths: five; Santa Fe County has had 264 deaths thus far; there have been 7,279 total fatalities statewide. Hospitalizations: 76; Patients on ventilators: 13
Breakthrough cases: According to the weekly vaccination report released, over the four week period of Feb. 28-March 28, 40.1% of COVID-19 cases in New Mexico were among people who had not completed a primary vaccination series; 24.8% were among those who had completed the series but had not received a booster; and 35.1% were among those who were fully vaccinated and boosted. For hospitalizations, those figures change to 65.1%, 16.7% and 18.2%. The percentages shift to 57.7%, 21.1% and 21.1% for fatalities.
According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s “community levels” tracking system—which uses case rates along with two hospital metrics in combination to determine the state of the virus on a county level—31 of New Mexico’s counties—including Santa Fe County currently have “green”—aka low—levels, whereas McKinley and Harding counties have yellow, or medium, levels. The CDC updates its map every Thursday.
Vaccinations: 91% percent of adults 18 years and older have had at least one dose of a COVID-19 vaccine and 77.6% have completed their primary series; 45.5% of adults 18 years and older have had a booster shot; 12-17-year-old age group: 71.2% of people have had at least one dose and 61.6% have completed their primary series; Children ages 5-11: 39.3% have had at least one dose of the Pfizer vaccine and 31% have completed their primary; Santa Fe County: 99% of people 18 and older have had at least one dose and 87.2% have completed their primary series.
Resources: Vaccine registration; Booster registration Free at-home rapid antigen tests; Self-report a positive COVID-19 test result to the health department; COVID-19 treatment info: oral treatments Paxlovid (age 12+) and Molnupiravir (age 18+); and monoclonal antibody treatments. Toolkit for immunocompromised individuals. People seeking treatment who do not have a medical provider can call NMDOH’s COVID-19 hotline at 1-855-600-3453.
You can read all of SFR’s COVID-19 coverage here.
Listen up
Brian Brett’s Artist with Brian podcast’s fourth season is well underway, and let’s just say Brett knows how to ask good questions and steer interesting conversations. Catch the latest episode featuring cartoonist Will Schreitz, and then catch up on the last few weeks of interviews with artist Erin Currier, comedian Ryan Lawless, music video director Shotby2.0 and many other New Mexico creatives.
Badlands awe
National Geographic takes to the badlands, specifically New Mexico’s Bisti/De-Na-Zin Wilderness, writing that it “looks like the most desolate place on Earth, an inhospitable expanse of sky, sand, and oddly shaped rock formations called hoodoos.” Travelers visit for the rock formations, the result of millions of years of erosion from what was once coastal swamp in an inland sea. The Navajo (Diné) named the area and for them and other Indigenous people, the “lands served as a seasonal migration path, sacred grounds, and even a playground of sorts. ‘My cousins and I would come out here and camp and explore,’” Kialo Winters, founder of Navajo Tours USA, tells NatGeo. “‘It was a great place for hide-and-go-seek.’” Spencer Lucas, curator of paleontology at the New Mexico Museum of Natural History and Science, explicates the area’s history, which once was “a jungle with lots of dinosaurs.” Back to the rock formations, or hoodoos, “the erosional features are quite amazing, like natural art forms,” Lucas notes. But walk softly when visiting—on foot or horseback: “Be mindful to step only on firm ground,” Winters advises. “The softer ‘feathered’ ground near the bases of hoodoos represents ongoing natural erosion, and you don’t want to disturb their balance.”
Ode to the relleno
Upon moving to Las Cruces last fall, food writer Maggie Hennessy soon became hip to one of the best ways to partake of New Mexico chile: rellenos! Hennessy pays tribute to chile rellenos in a recent story for Bon Appétit magazine, after a bartender steered her toward a chile rellenos burrito from the Tacos Romero food truck parked at Elephant Ranch Bar. “For me, this unfussy yet perfect meal embodies all the best parts of my lower-key, high-desert home,” writes Hennessy, who relocated here from Chicago: “a metaphorical salve for the harried soul that reminds us it’s the simple things—a great meal, the last drops of daylight—that make for a rich life.” Hennessy expounds on the dish’s provenance; talks with Danny Hernandez, owner of Nellie’s Cafe in Las Cruces about the secret to delicious rellenos (good chile); and ventures north to Santa Fe’s Cafe Pasqual’s, where Chef Katharine Kagel offers the classic version and, from May to October, “stuffs fragile squash blossoms with herbed cream cheese then sautés and sprinkles the flowers with panko before plating them with roasted tomato salsa.” But for Hennessy, Tacos Romero’s relleno burrito has become her “edible emblem of these New Mexican borderlands—to savor with a cold beer as I stare at the smoldering sky.”
The calm before the blowing dust
Today should be partly sunny with a high near 62 degrees and southeast wind 10 to 15 mph becoming west in the afternoon. If that sounds too civilized for early April weather, worry not. A glance a the week’s forecast from the National Weather Service indicates tomorrow may include “areas of blowing dust.”
Thanks for reading! The Word thinks Monday is a good day for a five-finger breathing exercise.
