artdirector@sfreporter.com
COVID-19 by the numbers
New Mexico health officials yesterday reported 9,445 new COVID-19 cases for the three-day period of Jan. 29-31, bringing the statewide total so far to 480,087; DOH has designated 343,160 of those cases as recovered. The statewide test positivity rate dropped from 29.9% to 28.5% (the target is 7.5%).
Bernalillo County had 2,487 cases, followed by Doña Ana County with 1,389 and San Juan County with 820. Santa Fe County had 516 new cases.
According to the state’s most recent vaccination report, over the prior four weeks (between Dec. 27 and Jan. 24), 53.8% of COVID-19 cases were among those not fully vaccinated, as were 77.8% of hospitalizations and 93.3% of deaths.
The state also reported 37 additional deaths, 30 of them recent, including four females from Santa Fe County: one in her 60s who had underlying conditions; one in her 70s who had been hospitalized and had underlying conditions; one in her 80s who had been hospitalized and had underlying conditions; and one in her 90s who had been hospitalized. Santa Fe County has now had 230 deaths; there have been 6,454 statewide. As of yesterday, 590 people were hospitalized with COVID-19, a 12.3% decrease from the day prior.
Currently, 91.4% percent of adults 18 years and older have had at least one dose of a COVID-19 vaccine and 77.3% have completed their primary series. Among the same demographic, 41.8% have had a booster shot. In the 12-17-year-old age group, 70.2% of people have had at least one dose and 59.6% have completed their primary series. Among children ages 5-11, 35.7% have had at least one dose of the Pfizer vaccine and 24.5% have completed their primary series. In Santa Fe County, 99% of people 18 and older have had at least one dose and 86.6% have completed their primary series.
Yesterday, New Mexico State University Chancellor Dan Arvizu announced all food and beverage sales during indoor sporting events at NMSU would be discontinued until New Mexico’s mask mandate is lifted statewide. The decision came, he said, due to inconsistent fan compliance with the state’s indoor mask mandate,
New Mexicans can register for a COVID-19 vaccine here, schedule a COVID-19 vaccine booster here and view a public calendar for vaccine availability here. Parents can add dependents to their vaccine profiles here. You can read the updated guidelines for quarantine and isolation here.
You can order free at-home COVID-19 tests here and access the DOH testing directory here.
You can read all of SFR’s COVID-19 coverage here.
Where the wild things are
New Mexico Wild Northern Conservation Director Garrett VeneKlasen hit an elk last year while driving. “Had I been five inches over, the elk probably would have come over the hood and killed me,” VeneKlasen tells SFR. Human contact with wildlife is only increasing as climate change and development increasingly impacts wildlife’s natural habitat. At 6 pm tonight and on Feb. 3, the state Department of Transportation in partnership with the New Mexico Department of Game and Fish will take comments on its draft Wildlife Corridor Action Plan (you must register to attend and those links are here). The agencies also will take comments through March 12 via email, snail mail and phone (find those links here). New Mexico Wild also has a petition in conjunction with its campaign for the plan.
The state prepared the plan in accordance with the 2019 Wildlife Corridors Act, and it focuses mostly on the movements of six large mammals: elk, deer, pronghorn, bighorn sheep, black bear and mountain lion. VeneKlasen says it’s key the Legislature and Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham support robust funding for the transportation department to implement improvements (the federal Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act of 2021 includes $350 million in competitive grants for wildlife crossing safety projects). New Mexico’s plan identifies 10 high-priority wildlife corridors and 11 hot-spot projects, which were selected based on on the numbers of wildlife vehicle crashes per mile (deer are the top animal involved within the hot spots). “A single project can cost between $15 and $50 million,” VeneKlasen says. “But if [it] saves one life, it’s worth the expense.” New Mexico, he notes, trails behind in terms of infrastructure projects and “we really need to step up our game.” (Relatedly, this interactive New York Times story from last spring shows some of these types of projects elsewhere). In addition to expressing support for funding the projects, VeneKlasen tells SFR, the public can help by contributing knowledge about dangerous crossings; he cites NM-68 between Taos and Santa Fe, for instance, and recently shared a photograph of a elk near Eagle Nest he spotted last week on the side of the road. The state also needs to hear support for landscape restoration, he said, “so that wildlife have dependable places to feed and breed and get water and don’t have to cross long distances to do so.”
Correction: The original version of this brief mis-numbered the road VeneKlasen identified as a dangerous wildlife crossing and the animal he photographed on the side of the road in Eagle Nest. SFR regrets the errors.
Rust shooting prompts legislation
State Sen. Cliff Pirtle, R-Roswell, introduced a bill yesterday in the wake of the fatal October shooting on the Rust film set that would require film actors and others in the industry to receive state-sponsored gun training. A police investigation remain ongoing regarding the incident in which actor and producer Alec Baldwin fired a gun, killing cinematographer Halyna Hutchins and wounding director Joel Souza. In a statement on his bill, Pirtle said he was “heartbroken to learn of the tragic incident on the Rust film set. Having personally used a similar revolver on film sets, I know there is no space to be cavalier with these firearms. They are not props; they are deadly weapons regardless of the context of use.” Pirtle’s 10-year-old son, he said, “knows this. He has undergone standard training done by the New Mexico Game and Fish Department because I wanted him to know that though guns are a tool in my household, they are still deadly. I believe responsible gun ownership is essential to our freedom. Unfortunately to the Hollywood elite, the talk around guns is all too abstract. This is a simple bill to bring some gravity back to the use of firearms on film sets.” Senate Bill 188, the Albuquerque Journal notes, “faces long odds” as the session edges toward its mid-way point. Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham has not authorized the bill (as required in financial 30-day sessions), though her office said she would review it.
Feds allocate $43.7 million to NM to clean up wells
New Mexico is eligible to receive $43.7 million for orphan well clean-up under a new federal program aimed at addressing such legacy pollution. The Department of the Interior yesterday announced the amount of funding for which states are eligible to apply. According to a news release from Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham’s office, the state has approximately 1,700 orphaned and abandoned wells on both state and private land. At current funding levels, the Energy, Minerals and Natural Resources Department can plug about 50 wells a year, but the number will increase significantly with the new funding. “Orphaned wells release toxic emissions into the air and contaminants into the water—often near Native American, rural and Latino communities,” US Rep. Teresa Leger Fernández said in a statement. “Last year, I visited an orphaned well next to a school in my district—you could taste the metal in the air.” Each state’s grant allocation was determined using data provided by the states regarding the number of orphaned wells, the cost of cleaning them up, as well as the number of job losses in each state between March 2020 and November 2021, as required under the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act that provides the funding. “The investments in this program are a win-win,” Lujan Grisham said in a statement, “protecting the environment and public health while also providing good-paying jobs in our rural areas.”
Listen up
Poet Miriam Sagan, author of more than 30 books of poetry, fiction and memoir, says she wrote the poems in her new collection Start Again during the COVID pandemic and they “speak of solitude and isolation. The ‘Monastery’ poems are about inward containment and self-reflection…And they extend even further, into the wider socio-political realms, crossing borders, entering social unrest.” Sagan will read from the book at 6 pm tonight via Zoom. Register here to receive the link.
#PhotowalksTV visits NM
Jefferson Graham, host of the travel photography series “Photowalks with Jefferson Graham” has been spending some time in New Mexico. A former USA TODAY tech columnist, Graham joins local experts in various locales searching for the best hidden spots for photographs. His series streams on YouTube and Tubi. The most recent installation features Taos, Graham’s “favorite part of the state for photography,” he writes, “where I’ve consistently found those huge expansive skies that I love, a historic 1,000 year-old plus Pueblo, great art, more amazing food (”red or green chili?”) incredible old adobe buildings and just the best light.” Prior installations from the last week or so include trips to Bosque Del Apache and a discussion of how to photograph birds with an iPhone; and a sojourn to Pie Town where Graham visited with Pie-O-Neer restaurant owner Sarah Chavez.
Yelpers show love to Las Cruces restaurant
Only one New Mexico restaurant made Yelp’s annual top 100 restaurant list and, as the Las Cruces Sun-News points out, it wasn’t in Santa Fe, “a city known to pride itself on its cuisine and eateries.” DH Lescombes Winery & Bistro in Las Cruces ranked #47 on the list, where “diners love the baked brie drizzled with local lavender honey, which is served with the winery’s Heritage Bellissimo sparkling wine, as well as the Pasta New Mexico with sautéd chicken breast and Hatch green chiles, which pairs nicely with their heritage pinot gris.” Owned and operated by sixth-generation French winemakers, the restaurant, according to its write-up by Yelp, sports a “true partnership between the vintners and a chef,” with each entree suggesting a specific wine pairing. According to one happy yelper named Alex: “I can’t express how good this place is. Come on a date or a double date with close friends. Bring the people who you love the most, as they will love you even more after showing them this restaurant.”
A storm is brewing
Today should be mostly cloudy with a high near 46 degrees and north wind 10 to 15 mph becoming south in the afternoon. The National Weather Service has issued a winter storm warning starting at about 5 pm tonight straight through Wednesday night, with the chances for snow this evening at about 70%, rising to 90% tomorrow morning with plummeting temperatures and difficult driving conditions expected. The New Mexico Gas Company yesterday issued a news release encouraging customers to lower their natural gas consumption during the storm. “We are closely monitoring weather conditions and natural gas supply chains around the clock to make sure our customers will stay warm,” NMGC President Ryan Shell said in a statement. “Be assured that our employees will be on 24/7 standby and ready to respond to any issues that may come up.”
Thanks for reading! Happy Lunar New Year! The Word learned a lot about the Year of the Tiger from this Los Angeles Times story, but then lost track of time watching all of these TikToks dance videos from Alex Wong (born in the Year of the Tiger).
