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Morning Word
Gov plans assault ban proposal at next year’s session
Assault rifles. A high-capacity ammunition device. Handguns. Ballistic vests. These were some of the items law enforcement seized from just one repeat violent offender as a result of the state’s ongoing public health order regarding gun violence. Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham and members of her administration yesterday held a news conference to address public safety and the impacts of the governor’s standing public health orders declaring gun violence and substance abuse public health emergencies. The governor renewed both public health orders last month and yesterday touted a variety of data, such as 2,490 arrests made in Albuquerque and Bernalillo County since the orders were signed—40% of which were drug-related (a new dashboard rolled out with the health orders also displays such metrics). “Let me just state unequivocally the public health order has been in effect three months, and it’s working,” the governor said yesterday. Nonetheless, she acknowledged the state isn’t “out of the woods,” a fact made “painfully clear” by the fatal shooting of an Albuquerque student last Friday night. Lujan Grisham also said the upcoming legislative session—a 30-day session typically focused on finance and any topics the governor specifies—will be heavily focused on public safety. Part of that package, she said, will be an assault weapons ban modeled on federal legislation co-sponsored by US Sen. Martin Heinrich, D-NM, the Gas-Operated Semi-Automatic Firearms Exclusion (GOSAFE) Act, which would regulate firearms based on the lethality of their internal mechanisms. “Let’s try that vehicle in our own assault weapons ban in New Mexico,” the governor said. “Because one thing I have that the senator doesn’t have is I’ve got a set of lawmakers that are more likely than not to have a fair debate about guns, gun violence, weapons of war, and keeping New Mexicans safe.” The governor also said she would be reviewing suggestions from Attorney General Raúl Torrez, who yesterday released a letter to the governor and legislative leadership outlining eight policy proposals related to guns and public safety.
NM revenue forecasts: nearly $3.5 billion in new money
State lawmakers on the Legislative Finance Committee yesterday received good news regarding state revenues, with analysts presenting forecasts showing total general fund recurring revenues at a little over $12.7 billion for fiscal year 2024 and a little over $13 billion for fiscal year 2025—$3.48 billon of which represents “new money.” Those FY25 forecasts, Department of Finance Administration Secretary Wayne Propst told legislators, align with the projections from August. “The good news is that while the amount of new money projected for FY25 in December has not changed from the August estimate, $3.48 billion in new money is still a lot of new money,” Propst said. “We are very blessed, of course, to have these additional resources.” On the other hand, he noted, requests from lawmakers—between recurring funds and new projects—already have reached approximately $5 billion. “The decisions don’t get any easier from here,” he said, however “we have an opportunity to build a responsible budget, but also a budget responsive to the needs of our great state.” The state Taxation and Revenue Department notes that while revenues are expected to continue to grow in FY25, they won’t grow as fast, based the state’s Consensus Revenue Estimating Group forecast. Nonetheless, “the latest forecast indicates New Mexico’s finances remain in very good shape with strong reserves,” Taxation and Revenue Secretary Stephanie Schardin Clarke said in a statement. “We’ve been able to provide significant tax relief in the past several years while also investing in the state’s future and ensuring the state’s financial future is secure.”
Feds recapture Asha the wolf
The US Fish & Wildlife Service yesterday announced the recapture of the female Mexican wolf nicknamed Asha (known by federal officials as 2754) over the weekend north of Interstate 40 near Coyote. According to a news release, the state Department of Game and Fish used a helicopter to locate and recapture Asha, who was then transferred to the Sevilleta Wolf Management Facility, where she has been paired with a male “to increase her odds of successful pup production in the coming year.” The agency says it intends to relocate her to the wild in spring or summer next year, possibly with pups. “Our decision to capture F2754 was made out of concern for her safety and well-being,” Brady McGee, Mexican Wolf recovery coordinator, says in a statement. “Dispersal events like this are often in search of a mate. As there are no other known wolves in the area, she was unlikely to be successful, and risked being mistaken for a coyote and shot. By pairing her with a carefully selected mate in captivity, we are hoping she will breed and have pups this spring. The best outcome for her is to be released back into the wild, where she and her offspring can contribute to Mexican wolf recovery.” Environmentalists, who have argued Asha should be allowed to roam free as she sees fit, decried the agency’s decision to recapture and relocate her again. “It’s such an old school, ‘command and control’ approach to wildlife management,” Greta Anderson, deputy director of Western Watersheds Project, says in a statement. “Wolves roam, and roaming is an integral part of their individual and collective identities. Asha deserved to live her wild life and not be used as a pawn in the political battles over wolf recovery in the west.” Chris Smith, southwest wildlife advocate for WildEarth Guardians says: “Asha is repeatedly telling us what peer-reviewed, independent science also indicates: that lobos need access to this habitat in the southern Rocky Mountains. She doesn’t know it, but her journeys have a powerful message that resonates and should be taken seriously from a policy perspective.”
State Supreme Court upholds conviction in “JB” White murder
The state Supreme Court yesterday upheld Estevan Montoya’s first-degree murder conviction last spring for the killing of local basketball standout Fedonta “JB” White at a high school party in August of 2020. A jury last May spent approximately four hours deliberating before convicting Montoya of first-degree murder, for which he received a life sentence. During the trial, the defense theorized Montoya was being attacked and shot in self defense, but First Judicial District Judge Glenn Ellington, declined to instruct the jury to consider the self-defense argument. In their order yesterday, justices affirmed Ellington’s decision. “The state presented evidence sufficient for a reasonable juror to find that Defendant deliberately intended to kill the victim,” the order reads in part. “Evidence submitted to the jury included a cell phone video showing defendant playing with the laser sight attached to the murder weapon immediately before the party; the defendant’s fixation on the gun before, during and after his stay at the party; and defendant lifting up his shirt and ‘flashing’ or displaying the murder weapon to a fellow gang member prior to any hostilities with the victim. Evidence was also presented that defendant escalated the hostilities and instigated a physical altercation with the victim through fighting words ‘Let’s get it!’ and ‘You don’t want this smoke’ as well as inviting the victim to come closer.”
Listen up
Two of Santa Fe’s favorite creative gurus team up at 6 pm tonight at Collected Works for an event designed to “ignite your imagination and elevate your spirit.” Author Natalie Goldberg of Writing Down the Bones fame—now in card-deck form (60 cards to “free the writer within”)—and Roshi Joan Halifax, founder and head teacher of Santa Fe’s Upaya Zen Center and creator of In a Moment, in a Breath— 55 Meditations to Cultivate a Courageous Heart box-set, lead this event featuring writing and conversation, both in-person (202 Galisteo St.) and on Zoom; register here.
A bloke in New Mexico
Australian travel writer Rob McFarland, who last September espoused the charms of Truth or Consequences for the Sydney Morning Herald, now turns his sights on Santa Fe, where he visited courtesy of Brand USA, New Mexico Tourism and Tourism Santa Fe for a new story appearing in Escape magazine. McFarland’s guide to the United States’ “most surprising little city” begins at Meow Wolf, where he searches in vain for the allegedly 25 hidden hamsters (we have either never heard of hidden hamsters at The House of Eternal Return or have blocked out the memory of this facet of the exhibition). McFarland eventually abandons the search, “choosing instead to just enjoy the trippy labyrinth of fairytale treehouses, giant musical skeletons and eerie, neon-lit forests.” The escapade, he continues, serves as “an appropriately arty introduction to America’s oldest state capital, a city that has embraced its Native American, Hispanic, Mexican and Anglo heritage to become a world-renowned arts and culture hub.” McFarland name-checks the usual suspects for art, history and the like, with a stop at the Railyard for good measure. There, he notes, a " 93-year-old local” with whom he chats at Sky Coffee describes the Railyard as having once been “nothing but rubble and glass” before becoming the “vibrant community hub” we know today, thanks to the galleries, cafes, restaurants, Farmers Market and “swish new outpost of the New Mexico Museum of Art” (aka the Vladem Contemporary). McFarland ends his trip at the Gruet tasting room, “toasting the ingenuity of a group of monks who smuggled some vines out of Spain to plant the region’s first grapes in 1629. That makes New Mexico the US’s oldest wine region—yet another notable accolade for this perennially underrated state.”
The calm before the foyer
“Amid such a chaotic world and hectic day-to-day lives, it can be hard to find a peaceful place to retreat to even in your own space. Which is why, sometimes, you need to carve out a quiet niche—whether for reading, studying or simply sitting in stillness.” So says Mansion Global, in a weekly feature that “tackles a topic with an elite group of designers from around the world who work on luxury properties.” For its recent installment, “Designing the Calmest Room in the House,” the elite designers consider how to create a library “that’s meant for unplugging,” with Paul Rochford and Michael Violante of Violante & Rochford Interiors in Santa Fe weighing in on the topic. Ideally, the designers say, the room “should feel cozy, with a neutral or subdued color palette. There should be comfortable seating, either a supportive club chair or sofa as well as having a work surface large enough to spread things out on. Lighting should be soft yet adequate enough for surfaces so that reading is easy. A variety of soft textures makes the room more inviting.” Case in point, they say, they are currently designing a room “with a seating grouping composed of a comfortable sofa that isn’t too deep with a writing table serving as a corner table with a comfortable desk chair behind it.” A “generous coffee table flanked by a comfortable upholstered club chair facilitating conversation” completes the grouping.
What old December’s bareness everywhere!
The National Weather Service forecasts a cloudy day turning gradually mostly sunny, with a high temperature near 48 degrees and southeast wind 10 to 15 mph. Looks like wetter weather makes its way here tomorrow.
Thanks for reading! The Word is perusing with delight LitHub’s best book covers of the year.
