Gallup City Council takes up masks; marijuana

 

The pandemic isn’t quite over, but the end is in sight.  On May 14, the New Mexico Department of Health announced that the state would be adhering to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s updated guidelines that say that individuals who are fully vaccinated no longer have to wear masks.

During the May 25 Gallup City Council meeting, Gallup’s City Attorney Curtis Hayes shared an ordinance that would allow vaccinated Gallup citizens to take off their masks starting July 1. Hayes explained that the city will drop its own ordinance and begin following the New Mexico Department of Health’s rules and regulations.

Hayes...

A new law which will take effect July 1 contains a number of reforms to the state’s liquor laws since 1981. Rep. Antonio “Moe” Maestas, D-Bernalillo, sponsor of HB 255, took questions about the new law from local liquor license holders at a special City Council meeting May 19.

HB 255 gives restaurants a new kind of license to sell spirits and one that is less expensive than in the past; the ability to deliver specific types of alcohol to homes; prohibition of small amounts of hard liquor away from licensed establishments; and assistance, like tax breaks and the waiver of license renewal fees, to liquor license holders due to the pandemic.

McKinley County is exempt from a number...

The Gallup McKinley County Schools District had something to celebrate at the school board meeting May 24 after the Lady Bengals won their state championship game three days before.

The board took the opportunity to congratulate the girls’ win with handshakes and plaques.

When it was his turn to congratulate them, Superintendent Mike Hyatt commented that Gallup had not seen a championship in a while, and that some people might not expect it from their school because they don’t have the tallest athletes.

“[The girls] really fought every single game,” Hyatt said. “I watched them play against some girls who were my height and they took care of them quite easily.”

Board...

PART FOUR: Water within sight, but out of reach

 

The Colorado, Little Colorado, and San Juan rivers wend through red mesas, creating ribbons of green river valleys that run up against the Navajo Nation’s boundaries and occasionally cut through pieces of tribal lands. Water is both right at hand, and unavailable to tribal members.

Navajo people, who call themselves Diné, which means “the people”, have made their homes for centuries in the high desert of what’s now the Navajo Nation by shaping their lives around when and where water became available in a homeland they call Dinétah. For more than a century, they’ve watched water run by, downstream to cities and other...