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City Council approves plan for five affordable downtown units
The Santa Fe City Council this week approved the donation of a city-owned downtown lot that will be converted into five low-priced housing units. According to a news release, the donation is the first of what the city intends to be a series of donations of under-used properties for green infill-housing projects. Santa Fe Habitat for Humanity headed the development team that scored the highest on the city’s proposal request for this project, and will be partnering with B.PUBLIC Prefab (read SFR’s profile of the company from earlier this year), using sweat equity per Habitat for Humanity and contemporary modular components per B.Public. Santa Fe Habitat for Humanity Executive Director Kurt Krahn estimates the homes will cost approximately $225,000 to construct, and have monthly housing payments of $600 to $800 (a nearby home that sold earlier this month appears to have been listed for $700,000). “We’re thrilled to be supporting Habitat Santa Fe in this development,” B.PUBLIC CEO and co-founder Edie Dilman said in a statement. “For years, they have been building to high standards. By building with our pre-insulated structural walls, the community will see the shell of this project complete in a matter of days. Our craftsman-built prefab is designed for 100-plus years of comfort and 80-90% energy savings.” The city’s Historic Design Review Board will need to approve the final design and development plan for the project, which is in a historic district on Alto Street. Also on the green building tip, the city will hold a ribbon-cutting at 2:30 pm today for a new solar carport at the Southside Santa Fe Public Library, the latest in a series of city-wide solar projects.
Prosecutors seek adult penalties against Santa Fe teen
SFR has obtained a criminal complaint in the case of Santa Fe teenager Elijah Judah Trujillo, accused of fatally shooting 60-year-old Samuel Cordero last summer in Ragle Park. Prosecutors yesterday said they would seek a first-degree murder charge in the case and had filed a “notice to invoke adult sanctions” against Trujillo, who was 15 at the time of the alleged murder. Assistant District Attorney Jeanine Salustri told First Judicial District Judge T. Glenn Ellington “the state will proceed as a serious youthful offender,” as the office had previously said was likely, meaning, if convicted, Trujillo could face time in adult prison, but Ellington would not be bound by the mandatory sentence of 30 years to life in prison. In the criminal complaint, police contend both Cordero and Trujillo had accounts on the Grindr dating app, although the complaint doesn’t indicate or suggest the two communicated or even matched on the app. On the night of the murder, Cordero and Trujillo were near the same baseball field about five minutes apart, according to a timeline police laid out in the criminal complaint, which they pieced together from a “geofence search warrant.” Salustri also told Ellington yesterday the DA’s office has filed a request to keep Trujillo incarcerated at the San Juan County Juvenile Services Center until his trial, a preliminary hearing for which is scheduled next week.
SOS, AG warn against voter intimidation
With the first week of early voting underway, Secretary of State Maggie Toulouse Oliver and Attorney General Hector Balderas yesterday issued a joint advisory about the Nov. 8 general election and the illegality—under both state and federal law—of “voter intimidation and discriminatory conduct, as well as obstruction or interference at the polls.” The advisory comes amidst heightened national concerns about such intimidation, and follows ongoing reports of harassment aimed at Toulouse Oliver and other election officials. The US Department of Justice and other state attorneys general have issued comparable advisories in the last week. New Mexico’s guide includes information regarding permissible forms of election observation and monitoring, along with key election dates and details. “Clear information about how to vote and what to expect when voting is essential to increasing voter confidence in our elections,” Toulouse Oliver said in a statement. She and Balderas presented the advisory during an Albuquerque news conference yesterday. The Secretary of State’s Voter Hotline can be reached at 1-800-477-3632 and additional voter information can be found here; the AG’s office says reports of voter intimidation or interference can be reported to 1-844-255-9210 or by filing a complaint at nmag.gov.
COVID-19 by the numbers
Reported Oct. 13: New cases: 342; 621,824 total cases; Deaths: 0; Santa Fe County has had 353 total deaths; there have been 8,599 fatalities statewide. Statewide hospitalizations: 78. Patients on ventilators: one. According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s most recent Oct. 13 “community levels” map, which uses a combination of hospital and case rate metrics to calculate COVID-19 risk for the prior seven-day period, all of New Mexico is once again green, aka has low levels. Corresponding recommendations for each level can be found here.
Resources: CDC interactive booster eligibility tool; NM DOH vaccine & booster registration; CDC isolation and exposure interactive tool; Self-report a positive COVID-19 test result; Curative testing sites; 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.
You can read all of SFR’s COVID-19 coverage here.
Listen up
In the latest episode of the Las Cruces Sun News Reporter’s Notebook podcast, host Damien Willis switches gears from the podcast’s usual modus operandi of discussing its own reporting and instead talks poetry. Specifically, Willis talks with Lauren Camp, who the state appointed as its newest (and second) poet laureate back in September, and her predecessor, Albuquerque poet Levi Romero, about the important role poetry plays in everyday life and the valuable experience of promoting literacy as New Mexico’s poet laureate.
Anti-nuke groups take to the street
This weekend marks the 60th anniversary of the Cuban Missile Crisis, with anti-nuclear protests planned around the country, including at noon today at 120 S. Federal Place in Santa Fe, outside the offices of members of New Mexico’s congressional delegation and the post office. A news release from Concerned Citizens for Nuclear Safety, Nuclear Watch New Mexico, Santa Fe Veterans for Peace and Nonviolent Santa Fe says protesters will be calling upon the government for a series of actions, including halting expanded plutonium pit production at the Los Alamos National Laboratory. The protests come amidst heightened fears of a nuclear war following Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in February. “Few Americans realize we’re closer to nuclear war than ever,” Santa Fe Veterans for Peace President Greg Corning said in a statement. “This is tragically serious, even pathetic 60 years after the Cuban Missile Crisis. Yet here we go again. When will we learn to get rid of genocidal nuclear weapons?”
Giants in the desert
The New York Times T Magazine’s 2022 Greats issue, which publishes Oct. 16, includes sculptor and Santa Fe resident Lynda Benglis, with an online multi-media profile of the 80-year old artist, who, the magazine writes, is “a giant of postwar American sculpture.” Though her art is collected by major institutions and Benglis still exhibits new work, “she’s not accorded the same reverence as her male peers, and she’s far less renowned,” the story notes. Writer Sasha Weiss interviews Benglis in Santa Fe, at one of her two homes, which are approximately one mile apart. “She likes to move between the two, depending on her mood.” (She also has homes in Washington state, New York and Greece, but discusses her life in New Mexico in greater length in a 2019 Times profile). In addition to discussing her career and her art, Benglis also makes recommendations to Weiss for her time in Santa Fe, which included telling her to visit Ojo Caliente Santa Fe and the Girard collection at the Museum of International Folk Art. The two also drive to Benglis’ studio: “The day was cooling and there was a wildfire in the desert, the progress of which Benglis tracked with fascination as smoke hurled itself into the sky. She studied the clouds— a bulging one that resembled one of her sculptures caught her attention. ‘Looks like a brain,’ she said. ‘The cloud has a mind.’”
Rain or shine
TGIF, Santa Fe! The National Weather Service forecasts a sunny day with a high temperature near 70 degrees and northeast wind 5 to 10 mph becoming west in the afternoon. Tomorrow looks about the same, but Saturday night we may see some rain, with a 40% chance for storms after midnight and a 70% chance for showers on Sunday, with a temperature drop into the low 50s. Might be a good day to start experimenting with warm drinks.
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