In a crowded field, political candidates stand out on street corners — and practically in your yard — with catchy campaign signs.

And in a city where people get a little hot under the collar when someone steals a campaign sign from a given spot, it’s not always simply theft. Rather, it could be somebody playing silly mind games.

Candidates running for office put up signs all around town — some of the signs survive through the June 7 primary and up until election day in November; some get blown away by the elements; and some are likely knocked down by people with nothing better to do.

Strangely, most candidates running for office this time around chose not to put up signs...

After being exposed to months of campaigning, and in some cases mud-slinging at whatever cost, McKinley County voters will pick winners June 7 in a number of interesting primary races, from possible new persons in the District 3 McKinley County Board of Commissioners seat to perhaps somebody equally new in seats related to District 5 and District 4 of the New Mexico House of Representatives and Senate.

In McKinley County hundreds of poll workers are set to start working. Besides who will win each of the races, and there are quite a few that pertain to McKinley County, one question yet to be answered is how many registered votes will actually turn out to vote. Early voting numbers around...

A two-generation approach gives parents tools to better their situations

Back in 2013 when New Mexico fell to 50th in the nation for child well-being, advocates hoped that the state’s policy-makers and administrators would finally rally together and take up the cause of improving child well-being in a concerted manner. We hoped the state would launch a comprehensive plan to ensure that our impoverished children have all of the opportunities, supports, and protections that middle- and upper-income children have, which would also give them the best shot at becoming successful adults.

Nearly three years later the state has launched PullTogether—a campaign seeking to “make New...

Credit Lt. Pat Salazar of the McKinley County Sheriff’s Office for doing his part in keeping the heat on McKinley County’s drug dealers who operate under the radar of other drug-fighting agencies.

Street level drug activity isn’t done by the kingpins, but by the people who sell and use illegal narcotics. “Druggies” at whatever level are the scourge of every neighborhood. They attract crime and violence like a dead animal attracts vultures.

The people who do such illegal are fairly blatant in some areas of Gallup and McKinley County. This observation is maddening, but it is something that Salazar has grabbed by the horns and something that doesn’t appear that he’ll rest on...