Morning Word Header
COVID-19 by the numbers
New Mexico health officials yesterday reported 248 new COVID-19 cases, bringing the statewide total so far to 197,218. The health department has designated 178,003 of those cases as recovered.
Bernalillo County had 93 cases, followed by Doña Ana County with 34 and San Juan County with 24. Santa Fe County had 15 new cases.
The state also announced 12 additional deaths for the second day in a row; there have now been 4,051 fatalities. As of yesterday, 136 people were hospitalized with COVID-19.
You can read all of SFR’s COVID-19 coverage here. If you’ve had experiences with COVID-19, we would like to hear from you.
Gov sets June 30 target for 60% vaccination, reopening
New Mexico will be set to fully reopen on June 30, provided 60% of eligible residents 16 years and older have been fully vaccinated by then. Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham announced the target during an afternoon news conference yesterday with Health Secretary Dr. Tracie Collins and Human Services Secretary Dr. David Scrase. The governor said, based on projections, the state is on track to meet that target. Currently, 41.6% of eligible residents are fully vaccinated. “We are weeks away,” Lujan Grisham said. “In nine weeks, New Mexico: We. Are. Open. I want us to fully embrace that New Mexico, today, is the first state, I believe, in the nation that can reach a percentage of population fully vaccinated that allows us to be fully open in the safest possible way, and this is amazing.”
Scrase also announced pending revisions to the statewide COVID-19 gating criteria, upping both the daily case number over a seven-day average from 168 to 210 and the test positivity rate from 5% to 7.5%. Those new metrics will also be used for a new red-to-green county framework going into effect on Friday, in which counties’ vaccination rates will now figure into their color status. The relaxed metrics are expected to greatly increase the number of counties operating in the less restrictive green and turquoise color categories. The new health order also allows those counties already in the turquoise category—such as Santa Fe County—to forego biweekly assessment and only be reviewed monthly. Lastly, the state officials announced that New Mexico has, indeed, adopted new Centers for Disease Control and Prevention updated guidance for fully vaccinated people that allow for mask-less outdoor exercise alone or with household members.
Pending policies may spur jobless back to work
During a virtual Economic Forum of Albuquerque event yesterday, Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham told business leaders that the state will soon unroll new policies geared at incentivizing New Mexicans to return to work. “We need to both incentivize employees to go back to work and we’re going to need some accountability aspects,” Lujan Grisham said. New Mexico has had one of the highest unemployment rates in the US—8.3% as of March—and hasn’t required job seekers receiving benefits to actively search for work. Local employers have said they are having trouble competing with expanded benefits and finding candidates for open positions. New Mexico Chamber of Commerce CEO and President Rob Black said he thinks tomorrow’s change to the state’s public health order will help encourage people to return to work, as will employers ensuring they are taking safety measures.
LANL director hosts public form
Los Alamos National Laboratory Director Thom Mason will give an online update about the lab’s work, science research and economic impact at 5:30 pm today and take questions from attendees. The event is open to the public. Find the link, password and additional information here. Questions for Mason can be submitted live or in advance to AskLANL@lanl.gov. Not sure what to ask? LANL has been in the news lately on a variety of topics, including its lease of several properties in Santa Fe for employees; two safety breaches recently reported by the Defense Nuclear Facilities Safety Board; a new program for science-driven entrepreneurs; and its research on COVID-19 and conspiracies, to name a few.
Listen up
The state’s Economic Development Department recently announced a new position that focuses on connecting underserved communities and their business leaders to resources. KUNM reporter Taylor Velazquez speaks with Shani Harvie about her new role as the justice, equity, diversity and inclusion coordinator, and how she hopes to grow New Mexico’s local businesses. “I think that position is really important at this time,” Harvie says, “...in making sure that we have positions and people who are dedicated to making sure that everyone has access to these programs, regardless of the communities that they come from.”
Four sites of return
Artist Nikesha Breeze says all of her projects “start with deep scholarly research, and often draw on Black imagery and narratives from the past.” Four Sites of Return: Ritual | Remembrance | Reparation | Reclamation opens today at form & concept (435 S Guadalupe St.) with an open-house style reception from 5 to 7 pm, and a limited number of visitors flowing through the gallery at any given time. The multi-faceted exhibit is divided across four main tenets—ritual, remembrance, reparation and reclamation—and takes up the entire first floor of the gallery, as well as parts of its second-story catwalk. It includes 108 ceramic death masks sculpted by hand that flared into creation through what Breeze calls “ancestral memory,” as well as large-scale archival portrait paintings. She encountered the photos “while studying my own biological histories, when I came to a point where my family line ended with ’1857, plantation,’” she tells SFR Culture Editor Alex De Vore. “Before that, almost nothing; after that, nothing. As I started digging into archives for even a mention of a name from my family history, the one I found was Dinah, so I started looking for any mention of a Dinah in wills, in slave bequeathments, and in that process, what I found was that Dinah was a catch-all name given to Black-enslaved women—like Little Black Sambo. There was Sambo. There was Dinah.”
Meow Wolf Denver sneak peak
Denver weekly Westword delves into what’s known about Meow Wolf’s forthcoming Denver location. Known: It will have a live performance arena that can hold more than 450 people for concerts and other events in the evenings. By day, “the arena will turn into another immersive experience as guests interact with projections that change in real time based on their movements.” Meow Wolf teamed up with Montreal-based Moment Factory for the project, the story says, “to create an interactive experience that transforms the venue into an immersive space of discovery where guests can explore and influence the art around them,” according to a statement from Moment Factory Creative Director Alexandre Lupien. Unknown: The name of the permanent exhibition and its specific opening date, although it’s expected some time this fall. “Our most ambitious project to date, the Denver exhibition is bound to bend minds, inspire creativity and touch hearts when we open our doors this fall,” Todd Richins, executive creative producer at Meow Wolf, says in an update. Catch a sneak preview video here.
Here comes the sun
We’re back to our regularly scheduled program today, aka, a sunny day with a high near 65 degrees and northeast wind 10 to 20 mph.
Thanks for reading! The Word is finding these rescued sheep living at the Farm Sanctuary in Watkins Glen, NY very soothing.
