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Property information
The Taos News was honored today as the best large weekly newspaper in the country by judges with the National Newspaper Association (NNA).
The award was presented during a gala celebration at NNA’s annual convention in Virginia.
Judges had high praise for the paper.
“Wow! This paper is chock full of good news and content! There is a lot here to keep readers engaged.
“Writing was consistent and solid, with some good editorials and columnists…
“The variety of glossy supplements was a real strength here, especially for a paper of this size (10,500)… This paper is working at a high level. It would compare well to most medium-sized dailies…
“I got a very strong sense of place reading this paper… Layout throughout was clean and never got in the way…”
Chris Baker, publisher of The Taos News, said the accolade speaks volumes about the staff’s commitment to excellence.
“This award is testament to all the employees of The Taos News,” he said. “We want to thank the community for its support, as well as our readers, our advertisers and the newsmakers for making this award possible.”
This is the paper’s third NNA General Excellence award since 2000.
September 28th, 2007 - Posted by thetaosnews | Gerald Garner Jr. |
A small crowd of county officials and supporters broke into cheers Tuesday (Sept. 25) night as the voters opted overwhelmingly to raise taxes and pay for a new county judicial complex.
Both questions on the ballot were passed by 2-1 margins, meaning the county can now borrow more than $30 million to build a courthouse, jail and administrative offices adjacent to the existing facility on Albright Street.
Voters approved a 1/8th-cent increase in the county’s gross receipts tax — a form of sales tax on all transaction except for food or prescription drugs — 1,301-606. They also approved a 1/4th-cent hike in the tax, 1,794-915.
“This means we have a new complex,” shouted County Commissioner Gabriel Romero as the tally was announced.
September 25th, 2007 - Posted by thetaosnews | By Andy Dennison | | No Comments
Magistrate Court Judge Ernest Ortega was on hand at Wednesday (Sept. 12) night’s Taos Municipal Board of Education meeting as the board ushered in a new member and said good-bye to another.
“I am pleased to have the distinct pleasure of swearing in my old friend Roy Martínez. He is a man of great integrity,” Ortega said.
“I’d like to say thank you to the board and the community and I’m glad to be back,” Martínez said.
Interim Superintendent Rose Martínez recognized former board member and Roy Martínez’s predecessor, Gary Embler at the meeting, presenting him with a plaque of appreciation.
“Your presence has enriched the lives of students,” Martínez said.
“I won’t say anything more than thank you and I enjoyed my time on the board,” Embler said. Embler was forced to give up his seat on the board in mid-August when he was diagnosed with cancer.
In other business, the board also set a tentative date to choose a model to either join or keep Enos Garcia and Taos Middle School separated in the future.
Board Facilities Committee members Steve Ward and Bob Blair urged the board to come to a decision about the bond election and a professional building consultation as soon as possible.
“We need to know very soon if the board wants to go forward with that and how much money we want,” Ward said. “We need to develop these plans between now and January so we can show the public.”
“We may be coming back to you and saying we need a consultant,” Blair said. “Pretty soon it’s going to be beyond our expertise to put that together.”
Interim superintendent Rose Martínez said she was hoping the board would have a model chosen and a decision on a possible bond election for funding by Nov. 1.
By Chandra Johnson, Taos News, September 13, 2007
Wednesday, February 28, 2007
State: Relief route is dead
By Andy Dennison, The Taos News
Feb. 28 - 11:04 a.m.
The relief route around Taos was officially pronounced dead Tuesday (Feb. 27).
After decades of surveys, plans, hearings and discussion, state highway officials told the county commissioners that the project would be “put on hold” indefinitely.
“It was clear that there aren’t enough through trips along (US) 64 and the local support wasn’t there,” said Joe García, manager of regional design for the New Mexico Department of Transportation (NMDOT)
Plus, García and Phil Gallegos, NMDOT District 5 manager, said money for major new road construction in the state and the federal coffers is drying up. Even if any relief route was approved, it would take 20-30 years to gather the funds.
“These conditions mean we will take a ‘no build’ option for the relief route,” García said. “It means we will take a different look at this area.”
A shift in perspective may mean proposed solutions to congested traffic in the downtown Taos area, or what Gallegos called “micro-traffic.” Several proposals have come up for rerouting traffic off of Paseo del Pueblo as traffic gets clogged up around the plaza area.
The decision pleased Taoseños for Real Traffic Relief, an activist group that has opposed any bypass road around the town, and prompted a plea for other forms of congestion relief.
“We need to get creative,” Barbara Sheppard, president of the group, told the commissioners. “We’ve got to coordinate with any master plans.”
Other road projects
Gallegos confirmed that a major $4.3 million reconstruction of NM 68 north and south of the entrance to Taos Pueblo on Elk Creek Road was still on the books. He said design for adding a turn lane from Placitos to Guadulajara Grill and adding sidewalks should begin in October, once fiscal year 2008 funding is available.
“The El Prado project is lucky to still be on the books,” he said.
Several commissioners asked about possible improvements on NM 240 through Ranchos de Taos, but the highway official said little money will be available in the coming years.
“We’re working on STIP (Statewide Transportation Improvement Project) four years out,” Gallegos said. “And there isn’t much money there.”
Commissioner Charlie Gonzales asked if the state could help with “lateral roads” that feed into state routes, but he was told that the state couldn’t be involved in those types of projects.
By Patricia Chambers, The Taos News
Nov. 15 - 3:48 p.m.
The public meeting Nov. 14 to take public comments on the proposed expansion of the Taos Regional Airport seems to face the same obstacles that delayed the expansion 20 years ago.
About 60 residents attended the meeting which is part of the public comment period on the Draft Environmental Impact Statement (DEIS) that extends until Nov. 27.
The most significant objection came from Taos Pueblo.
Gil Suazo, a representative of the Taos Pueblo government and a member of the study group on the airport, read an opening statement that listed the reasons for the pueblo’s opposition to the project.
“The FAA (Federal Aviation Administration) refused to complete certain studies,” Suazo said — studies that the pueblo government believes were vital to assuring protection of the “living culture” of the pueblo.
Although the FAA had paid for some studies since expansion of the airport adjacent to Taos Pueblo was first proposed, the agency would not finance studies to verify noise levels of overflights by planes landing or taking off from the airport located near the Río Grande Gorge Bridge, Suazo said.
Taos Pueblo was named one of 830 United Nations World Heritage Sites and only one of 20 in the United States. It is also the only World Heritage site with a population living at the site, according to Dr. Sid Martin, director of Indian Affairs for the Inter-Mountain Region of the National Park Service (NPS).
NPS, along with Taos Pueblo, is a cooperating agency on the Taos Regional Airport expansion proposal. Cooperating agencies have until Dec. 12 to add their comment to the FAA record.
The FAA apparently anticipated an emotional meeting. It hired a “professional facilitator” from Santa Fé to act as moderator of the meeting.
The response from an FAA staff member to a resident’s question about public hearings on the DEIS might explain the tension that resulted in brief applause or raised voices. The reply was, “We have held several meetings. The last one was held in 1999.”
About a half-dozen residents involved in the coalition that forced the FAA to complete a full Environmental Impact Statement in a 1991 lawsuit spoke at the meeting.
Jean Luis Bourgeois, a vocal opponent of the project from its inception, strongly objected to the format that allowed three minutes of oral comment. Although any resident could add written comment of any length to the record, Bourgeois refused to keep to the three-minute time limit and said he wanted to the opportunity to make his opposition known to the public.
Bourgeois said the DEIS did not reflect objections made during the public hearings in the 1990s.
Cliff Bain, who also was a member of the coalition, objected to the brief comment period and stressed that the public had very little time to review the three volume DEIS.
Simeon Herskovits, director of the Southwest Office of the Western Environmental Law Center in Taos, asked the FAA to extend the comment period. Federal regulations allow up to a 90-day comment period, he said.
Andrés Vargas, newly elected Taos County probate judge, was the town attorney when the expansion was initially proposed. The town council at that time did not want to hear comments from the public, Vargas said.
He agreed there are safety issues for the pilots using Taos Regional Airport, but suggested it might be better to move the airport to another location.
The proposed expansion, first proposed in 1986, calls for construction of a “crosswinds runway” that would allow pilots to take off or land in the east-west direction when strong winds affect the main north-south runway.
The injunction against the expansion issued by the U.S. District Court of New Mexico in 1991 also prohibited the airport from building new hangars, and many pilots must strap their planes down when they sit in the open.
The current runway is 5,800 feet by 75 feet. Planes, such as the Lear Jet and Cessna Citation, that currently use the airport, need at least 5,000 feet of runway to take off or land, said Airport Manager Mark Fratrick.
The airport also sits at an altitude of 7,091 feet, which makes elevation density a serious factor for planes taking off from the airport, he said. For those reasons, planes often do not take on a full load of fuel and that limits revenue at the airport.
The proposed expansion also includes construction of a new terminal and a new access road about a half-mile west of the current access road, Fratrick said.
Several local pilots pointed to the need for an extended runway and construction of a crosswinds runway for the safety of pilots currently using the airport.
Mark Cohen, a local pilot, listed figures about the current use of the airport. Taos Regional Airport has about 19 landings and 19 takeoffs each day, he said. The high altitude in Taos also requires a runway 25 percent longer than runways at a lower altitude, Cohen said.
“One of these days, there is going to be an accident that could have been prevented with a longer runway,” Cohen warned.
Eric Montoya, administrative fire chief for the town of Taos, said the airport is also important to public safety. He said high crosswinds grounded a fire-fighting plane during a fire near the Río Grande Gorge several years ago. “The fire chased us to our first and then second safety ground because we couldn’t get air support.”
Others referred to the safety of air ambulances and rescue mission flights, as well as overnight freight delivery that are jeopardized by high winds.
If the FAA is listening, however, the issue may come back to the objections of Taos Pueblo, which could be resolved with technical data drawn from noise ratings of planes that fly over the runway path.
Village of Taos Ski Valley Administrator Rob Straebel and Village Mayor Neil King expressed their support of the expansion, but said they want the pueblo’s issues addressed by the FAA.
To send comments to the FAA on the proposed expansion, contact:
Joyce M. Porter
FAA — Southwest Regional Office
2601 Meacham Blvd.
Fort Worth, Texas 76137-4298
Include “Taos Regional Airport EIS” in subject line
By Patricia Chambers, The Taos News
Nov. 14 - 9:38 a.m.
The Taos County area code will change within about two years.
The county drew the short straw with the decision made Nov. 9 by the New Mexico Public Regulation Commission (NMPRC) to geographically split the state into Area A and Area B.
Area B will keep the 505 area code and the rest of the state will switch to the 575 area code. Taos County is in Area A.
Area B is an odd swatch of land from Shiprock to Aztec, south to Farmington then to Bernalillo with some towns to the east.
Ojo Caliente, Abiquiú, Española, Santa Fé, Chimayó, Dixon, Velarde, Truchas and Las Vegas are included in Area B.
The line crosses half the state from the west at Fence Lake to Belen and Mountainair.
Dulce, Chama and towns south to San Ysidro will fall into the new area code.
The PRC commissioners decided in early November to designate the areas by geographic split. The decision about which area keeps the 505 area code was made at the recent PRC meeting.
Chairman Ben Lujan said the decision was “extremely difficult because Commission District 3 is split the most. I have had to weight the impact of each alternative.”
Lujan, who is the son of state Rep. Ben Lujan, has been commission chairman since 2005.
Vice Chairman Jason Marks said his decision was focused upon creating the least impact on the largest number of people.
The PRC held 16 public hearings throughout the state on the new area code and received more than 1,300 comments through the Web site called nm575 (www.nm575.info) and by telephone. An overwhelming majority of comments supported the geographic split.
The commission estimates telephone service providers will require 27 months to implement the change.