City manager, city attorney to get raises

The 2021 legislative session led to some big changes for the New Mexico Liquor Control Act. One of those changes was a new type of restaurant license that would allow businesses to sell more than just beer and wine.

During the June 22 city council meeting, Gallup’s city attorney Curtis Hayes explained the different types of licenses available to restaurants.

A restaurant owner can opt to serve beer and wine only. Hayes called that option “Restaurant A.”  This type of license is already allowed in Gallup. “Restaurant B” will allow restaurants to sell spirits such as vodka and whiskey.

Hayes also mentioned a third option, which he...

When the pandemic hit, the Octavia Fellin Public Library was forced to close its doors to the public and was only able to provide curbside pickup and eventually virtual events. But now, as more and more people receive the vaccine, the library is putting a reopening plan in place.

During the June 17 Library Advisory Board meeting, Deputy Director Tammi Moe told the board what the library’s protocol will look like while things aren’t completely back to normal.

Anyone visiting the library will be required to wear a mask. Library staff has been checking temperatures, but in an interview with the Sun, Moe said that would be ending July 1.

The building’s capacity limit is currently...

Follow up to the story “A century of federal indifference left generations of Navajo homes without running water”

[Andrew] Robertson has focused his career on water access. He first worked along the U.S.-Mexico border in Texas, where he sometimes dug the trenches himself for a new pipeline. When he moved to New Mexico in 2000, he quickly saw Navajo communities facing the greatest need for that work. Working on construction projects has taken him all over the Navajo Nation.

After that meeting at [a chapterhouse in] Torreon, a local leader started rallying other chapters around the idea of a regional system, even before Congress approved the settlement for the Navajo Gallup Water...

Week ending Friday, June 18, 2021

On Thinning Ice

The sea ice surrounding the North Pole is probably thinning up to twice as fast as previously thought, according to research by University College London. Writing in the journal “The Cryosphere,” scientists say earlier estimates on the depth of the ice cap were based on data collected by the Soviets between 1954 and 1991, which are now outdated. They say their new modeling of temperature, snowfall and ice floe movements provides a better understanding of how fast the Arctic sea ice is actually disappearing. “Sea ice thickness is a sensitive indicator of the health of the Arctic. And when the Arctic warms, the world warms,” lead...