By JO LUTZ
Daily Press Correspondent
Ahead of approving a letter of recommendation to the U.S. Department of Transportation at Thursday’s meeting, the Grant County Commission heard a proposal for airline service from Boutique Air — which served the Grant County Airport prior to the selection of incumbent bidder Advanced Airlines, which presented last month.
Boutique’s Finance Director Eitan Spiegel touted a 99 percent reliability rate and a $50,000 marketing package, proposing 18 weekly round trips to Albuquerque and six to Phoenix.
Commission Chair Chris Ponce asked about their customer service promises, which included 24-hour email and chat access and a toll-free phone number.
“Flights can be canceled because of mechanical, weather — I understand those things,” Ponce said. “But … I would expect that somebody there at the front counter, not through email, [would] sit there and help them figure out what their next thing is.”
Spiegel assured the commission that during working hours, there would always be someone at the Grant County Airport’s front counter, and that staff is not sent home when flights are canceled.
Advanced Air Vice President of Business Operations Barbara Hunt was on hand Tuesday with some quick follow-ups to the airline’s earlier presentation, reminding the commissioners of her airline’s 99 percent reliability rate and saying that Advanced had surveyed more than 1,400 customers, who gave the company a 4.8-star rating with only 30 people having something “unhappy” to say.
“I also wanted to let you know how we got here, just as a funny note,” Hunt said. “Our flights were full coming out of Albuquerque and Phoenix, so we, as employees … had to fly commercially and drive from El Paso. So that’s also a good sign of how our performance has been in this community.”
The county’s letter to the Department of Transportation, drafted by Airport Manager Rebekah Wenger, recommends renewing the contract with Advanced Air for four more years. The U.S. Department of Transportation subsidizes the Grant County Airport through an Essential Air Service, or EAS, grant, which guarantees minimum air service to small communities which had scheduled air service prior to federal airline deregulation nearly 50 years ago. Commissioners will consider the language and recommendations of Wenger’s draft letter at Thursday’s regular meeting.
Commissioners did not suggest going back to Boutique, but Ponce said he would prefer a two-year contract with Advanced Air.
Emergency Manager Scot Fuller reported on-time progress on his larger projects, such as the hazard mitigation plan revision and the funding of generators at the Grant County Veterans Memorial Business and Conference Center — which also serves as the county’s designated emergency evacuation center. He also mentioned some public outreach improvements, including tying his department into the county website and social media accounts and launching a wildfire education program early next year in time for the 2025 fire season.
Previewing Thursday’s regular meeting agenda, County Manager Charlene Webb addressed a conversation from previous meetings about updating the county’s drug and alcohol policy, which was written prior to cannabis legalization.
“At this time, we will just continue with post-accident testing with volunteer [firefighters],” Webb said. “We’ll have a workplace drug policy, hopefully, next month.”
The alcohol and drug policy to be considered Thursday will apply to safety-sensitive positions such as CDL drivers, and aligns the policy with federal and state statutes.
Jo Lutz may be reached at jo@scdailypress.com.

By TRISH KIRCHHOFF
Daily Press Correspondent
The Youth Mural Project and the Bear Mountain Center for Sustainability, together one of the recipients of this year’s awards from the Grant County philanthropy group known as the30something, have been fast-tracking their project to take advantage of youths’ energy and availability during summer break.
Under the direction of Diana Ingalls Leyba and Linda Brewer respectively, these organizations’ winning proposal was to create a bird and wildlife sanctuary open to the public at Bear Mountain Lodge north of Silver City. Youth have excitedly been constructing benches from recycled plastic, wire mesh and cement mâché, molding the whimsical shapes of a roadrunner and an owl.
A well has also been drilled to create a pond, which will have viewing stations and a windmill. However, it won’t be an ordinary windmill with these creative minds at work, but one adorned with painted blades and ceramic birds. When in motion, the windmill will be reminiscent of the artist Eadweard Muybridge’s stop-motion photographs of the movements of animals.
The annual $30,000 award was the brainchild of Janey Katz, who decided to establish the30something in 2019. Katz thought that by combining individual donations of $1,000 from each member, money could be pooled to create a larger award and make a greater impact.
This year, the30something was pleased to be able to award three 501(c)(3) nonprofits, with applications for the awards voted on by the organization’s membership.
“This is a wonderful incentive for members, as it fosters community involvement and awareness, but one that often requires difficult decision-making due to the many outstanding nonprofits in Silver City and Grant County that participate,” member Suzi Calhoun said.
The two other recipient organizations for the30something awards in 2024 are the New Earth Project of the Upper Gila Watershed Alliance and the Virus Theater.
The New Earth Project will be using their funds to help complete a pole barn to house their youth-centered composting programs. By using food left over from elementary school cafeterias and woody biomass, children are taught about composting, zero waste, companion planting, carbon in the atmosphere and soil health. The proposal was submitted by Carol Ann Fugagli, with Nan Franzblau.
Based in the historic El Sol Theatre building, the Virus Theater group plans on using their award funds to purchase new plush seating, to repair the ceiling of the theater and to replace their back door. That application was submitted by Teresa Dahl-Bredine, with Jessa Tumposky and Kristen Warnack.
This year’s sixth annual awards celebration was held at The Commons, where members socialized in the abundant gardens and were able to tour the recently completed freestanding serve-yourself pantry built in part with funds from a the30something award in 2023.
For more information on the30something history, award application requirements, past recipients of awards and on how to join the community-minded dynamic organization, check out the30something website at the30something.org.

Trish Kirchhoff is a member of the30something.

By PATRICK LOHMANN
Source New Mexico
The number of people living on the streets of New Mexico increased to the highest level since at least 2009, according to a new “point-in-time” survey released July 30 by the New Mexico Coalition to End Homelessness.
The survey sends volunteers out on a single night in January once a year to speak to people on the streets and collects data about people living in shelters across the state. The survey has many limitations but still likely represents a significant undercount of the total number of homeless people in the state, according to the report’s authors.
In Albuquerque on Jan. 29 of this year, 1,231 people were counted experiencing unsheltered homelessness. That’s a 14.5 percent increase over last year, when 977 people were counted.
In the rest of the state, 1,011 people were estimated to be living on the streets that same night. That’s a 62 percent increase from the 623 people counted during last year’s survey, according to the report.
There are a lot of moving parts to the “point-in-time” count, according to the authors, and the survey results vary based on how many people are willing to sit for a survey, how many volunteers the coalition could recruit and how responsive shelters are to survey requests. This year, for example, nearly half of 2,079 people contacted by the coalition refused surveys.
One factor that affected the Albuquerque count, according to the report, was the increasingly common sweeps of established homeless encampments.
“The city’s aggressive decommissioning policy leading up into the night of the count still caused surveyors to arrive in surveying zones, previously identified as having been heavily populated with unsheltered individuals, with no one to survey,” the authors wrote.
They noted, however, that surveyors reported that the number of police-led clearings of encampments did appear to be an improvement over last year, when more camps were cleared around the time of the count.
The surveyors asked respondents what types of property they lost after sweeps by police, and how often they occurred. Of 786 respondents, 497 said their encampment had been swept five or more times. A significant number responded “every day” or something similar to that, according to the survey.
Nearly 90 percent of respondents said they’d lost identification or a driver’s license in the sweeps. More than three-quarters lost a phone or tablet. More than 70 percent said they lost a personal or sentimental item. More than half said they lost prescription medications, according to the report.
Other methods for counting the number of homeless estimate that as many as 20,000 people are unhoused in New Mexico over the course of the year, a figure that appears to be increasing.
The survey cited a recent ProPublica article interviewing people about what they lost in sweeps. They said the ongoing clearings just make it harder for those experiencing homelessness to improve their situations.
“No one’s ability to exit homelessness is improved by repeatedly having their belongings stolen or thrown away,” the authors write. “The only lasting impact of such initiatives is to prolong episodes of homelessness and inflict additional suffering on an already extremely vulnerable population.”

By LISA JIMENEZ
Daily Press Correspondent
Where some see waste, others see opportunity. Jamie Thomson and Chris Lemme of the nonprofit Silver City Recycles have partnered with the town of Silver City in a fairly simple yet profoundly promising demonstration project to transform solids from the wastewater treatment plant — a hazardous waste — into compost.
On behalf of Silver City Recycles, Lemme and Thomson presented a detailed proposal to Town Manager Alex Brown, who agreed to give the nonprofit $15,000 to fund the demonstration project. Human waste, even after processing, is classified by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency as a biohazard and is currently disposed of in the landfill — a difficult and potentially dangerous process for landfill workers, and a costly one for the town. Disposal of this waste costs the town nearly $57,000 annually, and volatile airborne compounds are a potential health hazard to landfill workers, who “absolutely hate dealing with this stuff,” Lemme said.
“We’re really grateful to town management for partnering with us on this project,” he added. “In just one week, we’ve already succeeded in establishing that this is a viable project that can be scaled to provide compost for agricultural use, town parks and many other uses.”
Currently, this hazardous sludge is transported by truck to the landfill — a potentially risky process for the town, which would be liable for cleanup if an accident ever occurred and waste was spilled. Once processed through the wastewater treatment plant, the remaining sludge is dumped into large cement drying beds at the plant where, after drying, it is loaded into dump trucks for transport to the landfill. Some 125 tons, or 18 dump truck loads, of this hazardous waste are taken to the landfill each month.
In their pilot project, Lemme and Thomson mixed the waste with biochar, a charcoal which Thomson creates from tree trimmings, slash and other biomass. The process sequesters carbon when added to soil, keeping it from being released back into the atmosphere. They also added pecan shells, which they were able to obtain for free from orchards in Las Cruces, placed the mix on top of a large waterproof tarp to ensure that nothing could leach into the ground, and tested the temperature daily. The compost pile must reach and maintain an internal temperature of at least 130 degrees Fahrenheit to ensure that harmful bacteria, especially E. coli, are destroyed.
According to their readings, for more than a week, temperatures in the pile reached the mid-140s and stayed there consistently. The next step is to send a sample to a state-certified lab for testing to ensure that all bacteria have been destroyed, and the material can be safely used as compost.
“We’ve successfully demonstrated that this is a viable project, and a win-win for the town,” Thomson said, adding that the next steps will be to scale the project to divert all of the waste from the landfill and create massive compost piles — preferably at the wastewater treatment plant itself to minimize transportation and other logistical and capital costs.
“I’m confident that working with town staff, we can find a way to do the composting right here at the treatment plant, which is the easiest and least costly solution.”
In the meantime, both Lemme and Thomson continue to monitor the demonstration project compost and work with town management and wastewater treatment staff to determine next steps.
“This is a terrific, environmentally sound project,” said District 3 Town Councilor Stan Snider, a project champion and a former supervisor at the wastewater treatment plant. “I would really like to see Silver City start composting all its sludge. I’m really grateful to Chris and Jamie for demonstrating that we can make this work, and to Utilities Director Robert Esqueda and Manny Orosco, treatment plant supervisor, and his staff for their support and cooperation.”
For more information about the demonstration project, contact Chris Lemme at d.chris.lemme@gmail.com.
For more information about the town of Silver City, visit townofsilver city.org.

Lisa Jimenez is contracted by the town of Silver City as a freelance writer. She may be reached at lmjimenez13@gmail.com.

This story was originally published by New Mexico Political Report at nmpoliticalreport.com.

By PATRICK LOHMANN
Source New Mexico
New Mexico’s respite from wildfires will likely continue through August, according to a new forecast, but experts warn the already long fire season here could stretch into September and October. 
The National Interagency Fire Center publishes monthly fire risk outlooks across the country. Early monsoon rains in early July blunted what forecasters had predicted would be elevated wildfire risk across the state, particularly in the central mountain chain and in southern New Mexico. 
But the new forecast released Aug. 1 shows that average temperatures and substantial precipitation mean New Mexico won’t have high fire risk for August, either. But that doesn’t mean New Mexico is out of the woods. 
“An uptick in large fire activity very well could re-emerge by late August or early September, then linger much longer than usual,” forecasters wrote in their predictions for the Southwest.
Fire season in the Southwest typically lasts until monsoon season. The forecasts this year have said hot, dry conditions might persist well into October, bucking that typical trend. 
At the moment in New Mexico, there are two active fires, according to the Southwest Coordination Center, including the Tanques Fire, which has burned about 6,500 acres. In the Gila National Forest, the Ridge Fire has burned about 4,200 acres. 
The forecast is released as major wildfires burn elsewhere in the West. There are 94 large, uncontained wildfires across the country, according to the NIFC.
Four fires that began last month in Oregon and California each have burned more than 100,000 acres, including the Park Fire in Northern California that has reached nearly 400,000 acres. That’s already bigger than New Mexico’s biggest-ever wildfire, which burned about 340,000 acres, and it’s just 24 percent contained, according to the NIFC. 

So far in New Mexico this year, 580 wildfires have been detected that burned more than 84,000 acres.

By HALLIE HARRIS
Daily Press Correspondent
Artistic practice can build community, and the human form is beautiful.
That’s the message that Joel Armstrong hopes to spread the word to the community at large through his life drawing sessions at Light Art Space in Silver City. The weekly studio session is approaching its third consistent year, and Armstrong is looking for more models and artists for the classes.
Armstrong moved to Silver City in 2019, after retiring from teaching drawing and illustration at John Brown University in Arkansas. He taught a figure drawing class at Light Art Space, where he also shows his artwork, in 2020, before COVID restrictions shut down in-person gatherings.
“At Light Art Space, I had a show that opened the day that everything closed for COVID,” he said. “I finally got a show! Please come see it — oh, never mind.”
The classes had to go on hiatus as well.
In August 2021, Armstrong started drop-in life drawing sessions — not as a formal class, but as a drop-in studio space where artists could continually develop their craft.
Armstrong has a background as a professional illustrator and art director, as well as a fine artist, having exhibited his work since 1977. In addition to his tenure as an associate professor at John Brown University, he has taught at Colorado State University, the University of Arkansas and the Dallas Art Institute. His work ranges from photo-realistic colored pencil drawings and portraiture to wire art and immersive installations.
He began drawing seriously in junior high, but has spent much of his artistic career fascinated by the human form.
“By the time I got to college, it seemed like figures were a natural way to go,” Armstrong said. “I’ve just been doing the figure for such a long time.”
As an illustrator, he often used the figure to create a sense of human connection or tell stories.
“I was an architectural illustrator too, and they would say, ‘Here’s the blueprints. Make it look real,’” Armstrong said. “‘Here’s a condominium that’s being built, and we want it to look engaging.’ So I would put people fishing in the lake in front, swans, people playing on a jungle gym. … It’s all storytelling. You want people to relate.”
Later, when he pursued his graduate degree, a Master of Fine Arts at Colorado State University, his instructors encouraged him to branch out into working with wire, which he shapes into flattened figures and narratives.
“They looked at my illustrations and said, ‘These are nice, but you’re not going to do them here,’” Armstrong recalled, adding that working with wire challenged him to see differently.
His evolution as an artist continues today, even in the figure drawing classes he facilitates.
“I’m trying to learn to loosen up a lot,” Armstrong said. “I’m working diligently to loosen up every time.”
What would that look like?
“‘Free, uninhibited,’ as opposed to ‘tight and rigid,’” Armstrong said. “I’m also trying to get the feel of the model, the weight of the model, the shading. Put a scribble to define a head and a shadow behind it and I’ve defined a figure.”
He said that art requires practice, which people get at these life drawing sessions.
“This is like going to the gym. Art gym,” Armstrong said.
Participants bring their own materials to the Thursday evening sessions, spending two hours sketching nude figures from life as the models move through various poses. Artists use a variety of media — pencils, charcoal, conte crayons, watercolors, and oils — and take time at the end of the two-hour session.
Armstrong offers the classes to build community.
“It’s been a part of my life, and I thought it would be good to share with others to make that opportunity available. It’s a discipline,” he said. “We have such a great art community. The people that are drawing are from my age down to 20. There’s students from the college that come.”
The artists who attend Armstrong’s class speak highly of the experience. Many say that they appreciate the supportive community he has fostered.
One attends both a life drawing class at nearby Western New Mexico University and Armstrong’s sessions at Light Art Space. Sally Tilton, a retired nurse, also studied art at the University of Alaska and has used art to heal from personal tragedy — the recent losses of a son, sculptor Cyrus Tilton, a sister, and her husband — as well as to work on herself.
“I’m reinventing myself,” Tilton said. “I’ve always loved art, but then I was inspired to become a nurse. I continued to stay creative, but not so much with fine art.”
She opened her first solo show Friday night at the Grant County Art Guild Studio on Texas Street.
“Now I’m not just surviving,” Tilton said. “I’m thriving, and I connect with my deceased loved ones through my art.”
She said the life drawing practice in Armstrong’s class draws her in.
“For me [life drawing] is the most challenging,” Tilton said. “[Art] is everything to me. It’s my first love right now.
“I like the form. I like the figure. All shapes and sizes I love,” she continued. “I guess I just love the figure. When it comes to trying, I prefer figurative, and then I like to go way out there into the abstract of arts. I’m in the exploration stage of my art and will be there for the rest of my life.”
Another student is Erika Burleigh, a Silver City artist who distinguished herself at a young age with her mural work, which can be seen throughout the Southwest, including inside the Daily Press building and in some of the devotional murals in the Silver City Lotus Center.
“I started off modeling for the group, and then started drawing, and now I model and draw,” Burleigh said. “There’s a bunch of people in the class that model and draw. It has such a nice community vibe.
“Life drawing is kind of different from drawing off of a photo,” she continued. “Translating what you see in front of your eyes onto paper is different than what you see in a picture. … I oftentimes would use photo references for work, and so it’s really good for me to draw from life. It’s just a different practice and it feels good.”
Burleigh says she has enjoyed the consistency of the sessions.
“Some of it is just the practice,” she said. “Having two hours to practice every week is really good for me,”
Burleigh says she finds a challenge in each drawing session.
“I’m always trying to just fit it on the page,” she said. “It’s amazingly hard to scale it. The main thing I’m trying to do is get the proportions right. Make the pieces connect to each other in a way that is anatomically — maybe not accurate, but likely? Anatomically possible? So that’s one thing, and the other thing is trying to capture the moments of beauty, which is what I think is more important. Maybe just the hands or face and the rest of it doesn’t have to be filled out, so long as I can get something beautiful out of it.
“The human form is really beautiful,” Burleigh continued. “It’s such a good body-image experience. I model and draw, and it’s really fun to see the drawings people have made from my poses and my body. It kind of removes any judgment from what it should be, and makes it — this is a beautiful material. This is a beautiful thing sitting in front of me.”
Amy Maule is an environmental consultant who recently moved to Silver City from the Pacific Northwest, and plans to open a pottery studio. She is another artist who takes turns modeling when she’s not drawing.
“Three-quarters of the time I go to draw, and when he needs a model to fill in, I’ll model every couple of months or so,” she said. “I had taken some drawing classes, like community college-type classes, and they had a figure drawing element to them, but they were kind of all types of drawing. So I had done some figure drawing but not a specific group like this.”
Maule says that art has always been an important part of her life, although she’s never pursued it professionally. She said she didn’t feel objectified or criticized as a nude model — far from it.
“More of a tool,” she said of her role. “Ideally, an inspiration. It’s a learning process. So I would say as models we’re tools for people to hone their craft, develop ideas. No, I can’t say that I’ve felt scrutinized — which isn’t to say that people wouldn’t — but I don’t think that I have.
“I’m not a person who likes being in the spotlight, so it’s interesting that modeling for figure drawing is comfortable for me,” Maule continued. “I hear a lot of people talk about how it really leaves you feeling good about yourself, and good about your body, which I think is something we all need more of.”
Some models find the experience fun.
“It’s pretty invigorating,” Lucien Shephard said. “How can I put it? I guess it’s just kind of liberating just to stand there and have people draw you like that. I guess I just enjoy being the center of attention — plus it pays, too, and I enjoy the people I’m working with.”
Bland says it was her mother who inspired her to try nude modeling.
“My mom had done it when she was younger and had talked to me about how she really loved figure drawing,” she said. “Hearing her experiences always made me want to do it. And because of her, too, I think I’ve always been very OK with the naked form.”
Bland encouraged people to try modeling, regardless of their experience or body shape.
“I really enjoy it — I’ve done it dozens of times,” she said. “I think the biggest thing is just learning to be confident with your body and knowing that it’s for art — no one’s judging you.”
“I would love to see more variety of model types for the group,” Maule said. “I think it would be fantastic if we had older models. I think sometimes older bodies are sometimes much more interesting to draw. For me, people who are very fit and uninfluenced by gravity are sort of boring, because they don’t have the lines and the shadows. I think that people who are heavier and have more lines, maybe a little bit more weather-beaten, can be much more interesting to draw, because you get more contours, light and shadow and just more visual interest than you see on people that are more young and firm. I think when you’re looking at people from an artistic perspective, you appreciate their beauty in a really different way.”
Drop-in figure drawing classes are held most Thursdays at Light Art Space, 209 W. Broadway in Silver City, from 6-8 p.m. Cost is $20 per class. Contact facilitator Joel Armstrong for current offerings at jart56@gmail.com, or Light Art Space at 520-240-7075.
The gallery is open Thursday through Saturday from 11 a.m to 4 p.m. and Sunday from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m.

By GEOFFREY PLANT
The Taos News
TAOS — Congresswoman Teresa Leger Fernandez, who represents New Mexico’s 3rd Congressional District, announced the release of a comprehensive report July 8 by the U.S. Government Accountability Office following an investigation into the U.S. Forest Service’s prescribed burn protocols.
The results of the GAO investigation, which Leger Fernandez requested in June 2022, according to a press release, come two years after the devastating Hermit’s Peak/Calf Canyon Fire in northern New Mexico, the largest and most destructive wildfire in the state’s history.
Due to ongoing litigation, however, the GAO report does not include data related to the prescribed burn and pile burn that led to the Hermit’s Peak/Calf Canyon wildfire, which destroyed property, forest and watersheds across more than 341,000 acres in Mora, San Miguel, Colfax and Taos counties. The fires led to a nationwide 90-day pause on prescribed burns while the Forest Service conducted an internal review.
The separate Forest Service report, released in June 2022 (while the massive blaze was still burning), found the Santa Fe National Forest conducted a broadcast burn — which quickly grew out of control amid high winds and extreme drought, and merged with a pile burn the Santa Fe had believed extinguished — had been approved in 2019.
However, the report found plans for the burns were never updated to account for worsening drought conditions, for example. The report also found a lack of situational awareness among forest administrators and crews, a lack of communication among crews and leadership, and a lack of contingencies, like water, in case the prescribed burn grew out of control.
The GAO report draws some of the same conclusions, which the Forest Service has partly responded to already in the form of new protocols, such as increased and up-to-the-minute data from fuels experts and meteorologists, and increased communication regarding on-the-ground conditions ahead of ignitions.
In a statement, Leger Fernandez said the GAO report demonstrates the Forest Service still has work to do, calling some of its missteps “outrageous.”
“This GAO investigation makes clear that the Forest Service still has work to do so no community suffers like New Mexicans did after prescribed burns sparked the catastrophic Hermit’s Peak/Calf Canyon Fire,” she said. “Some of the errors the GAO uncovered — like including incorrect vegetation in a burn plan — are outrageous. The Forest Service must do better to prevent future tragedies.
“I secured a commitment from the Forest Service to use infrared technology to make sure burns are totally extinguished,” Leger Fernandez added, acknowledging that Congress still has not passed a bill that would permanently increase pay for wildland firefighters.
“I will keep working for increased funding for that technology as well as for higher pay for firefighters,” she said. “Finally, I will continue to hold the Forest Service accountable to prevent another escaped burn. When you play with fire, there’s no margin for error.”
The GAO report released on July 8 provides four key recommendations for improving the Forest Service’s prescribed fire efforts:
• Develop outcome- oriented goals and performance measures.
• Develop and implement a strategic workforce plan.
• Develop an implementation plan for its reform efforts.
• Assess the appropriate level of resources to maintain day-to-day management of reform efforts.
In response, the Forest Service said it “generally agreed” with the findings and committed to implementing a corrective action plan to address these recommendations.
The report also uncovered ways the Forest Service erred in past escaped prescribed burns, including:
• Using a prescribed burn plan with the wrong type of vegetation or that didn’t consider drought impacts.
• Using weather forecasts not specific to the site.
• Having insufficient trained staff and resources available.
According to the report, 43 prescribed burns escaped and caused wildfires in the 10 years prior to the Hermit’s Peak/Calf Canyon Fire. For example, a third prescribed burn was responsible for the Cerro Pelado Fire southwest of Los Alamos in the spring of 2022.

The full GAO report can be found online at gao.gov/products/gao-24-106239.