Serving the High Plains
Serving the High Plains
Sorted by date Results 477 - 501 of 1682
Quay County Clerk Ellen White and her longtime voting machine technician took a few hours last week to certify Dominion vote tabulators for next month's general election. They put the machines through their paces with a small mock election to ensure they are working properly. It took about three hours for White and Danny Wallace, the county's voting-machine technician since 1981, to test and certify eight machines that New Mexico has used for almost a decade. A number of Republican Party...
LOGAN - Down by one touchdown early in the second half, the host Longhorns moved the ball past midfield and were poised to tie their game against No. 1-ranked Fort Sumner-House. Instead, Foxes defender Clay Norman read Brock Burns' pass, stepped in front of the intended receiver and dove to catch the low throw for an interception. Fort Sumner scored off that turnover and its next possession to seize control of the district game during a 40-20 victory in eight-man football action on Friday. Logan...
The Snake Pit arena at Tucumcari High School contains dozens of banners commemorating various titles its teams have won over the decades. On the south wall of the gym, one stands out. It is a blown-up team photo of the 2002 football team. Amid the identifying text is a line in yellow script: "New Mexico State Champions." Twenty years ago, the Rattlers were in the middle of an eventual run for a state title. The team suffered setbacks and didn't even win their district. But the Rattlers...
A Mesalands Community College saddle bronc rider won an individual title during the finals Saturday of the college's 14th annual Grand Canyon Region Intercollegiate Rodeo at the Quay County Fairgrounds arena. As importantly for Mesalands coach Matt Hughes, he fielded a full roster during the weekend, enabling his team to likely move up in the regional standings. Final points totals weren't available from the event. Bryan Tyler Huey of Mesalands rode his mount during the Saturday finals for a 71...
LOGAN - The Longhorns' high-octane offense continued to excel, but it was their defense that saved the day during their district opener against a strong Clayton team on Friday. With Logan clinging to a 36-30 lead at halftime, its defense stopped the Yellowjackets on five straight possessions in the second half while the Longhorns scored four touchdowns en route to a 66-36 victory. Logan quarterback Brock Burns completed 10 of 20 passes for 170 yards and three touchdowns, and he ran for another...
A Tucumcari police officer on Thursday received a Medal of Valor for his actions in preventing a death or serious injury during a house fire earlier this month. Acting Police Chief Pete Rivera gave Cpl. Justin Garcia the medal during a presentation at the Tucumcari City Commission's regular meeting. The morning of Sept. 17, a fire was reported in the 1500 block of South Fourth Street. Garcia was the first to arrive and was told someone still was in the home. Rivera said Garcia tried to enter...
It was almost like the Fired Up festival never left. Teeming crowds, long lines and general enthusiasm for Tucumcari MainStreet's annual event Saturday at the city's historic railroad plaza mostly belied the three-year hiatus Fired Up took because of restrictions and uncertainties over the COVID-19 pandemic. Connie Loveland, executive director of Tucumcari MainStreet that puts on the festival, noted it wasn't apparent the long layoff had much of an effect. "It's comparable to what we've had...
Call it a birthdate and a born-again date. The Tucumcari/Quay County Chamber of Commerce held a celebratory open house Thursday to commemorate a more than year-long renovation effort and mark the 56th anniversary of the building's groundbreaking. The chamber, which also houses the Tucumcari Visitors Center, displays a golden-colored shovel from Tucumcari Lumber Co. that was used during the groundbreaking ceremony of the facility a 404 W. Route 66 Blvd. on Sept. 22, 1966. More than a...
LOGAN - The Lady Longhorns secured bragging rights over the Lady Rattlers this season, but players from both teams likely will be talking to their children and grandchildren about that wild second set of Saturday's non-district clash. Logan (7-5) prevailed in the three-set match for its second victory over Tucumcari this season. But what had spectators buzzing was a topsy-turvy second set the Lady Longhorns ultimately won by a 34-32 score. Sets, which require a two-point margin of victory,...
A disastrous sequence of five touchdowns allowed in a seven-minute span Friday spoiled Tucumcari's annual Homecoming game during a 56-0 loss to Robertson at Rattler Stadium. The game ended midway through the fourth quarter due to the mercy rule, but the Cardinals (3-2) had all but won the game against the Rattlers (0-6) before the first period ended. Tucumcari was hampered by five turnovers and only 29 yards of offense. The Rattlers' coaches knew their young team faced a tough task before...
The Tucumcari Public Schools board last week approved a base quote of $3.31 million from a contractor to redevelop the high-school baseball and softball fields, though superintendent Aaron McKinney said he would continue to look for ways to reduce costs for the over-budget project. The winning bidder was Weil Construction of Albuquerque with its base quote of $3,316,382, which provided additional bids of $433,082 for new lighting, $23,142 for grass turf and $51,285 for demolition of the current lighting system. The other bidder was Jaynes...
In a basketball gymnasium of what was National Guard armory, Paulita's New Mexico began packaging green chile seasoning and other spices about six weeks ago, and it will began jarring its other food products later this month. Paulita's recently completed its move from Rio Rancho to Tucumcari, where it is manufacturing its New Mexico-based foods in a temporary facility in the armory, now owned by Mesalands Community College, before it builds or finds a permanent facility in the area. One of the...
Tucumcari's football faced a tall order Friday in slowing a Santa Rosa team that was beginning to click with its offense amid its flurry of fakes and misdirection plays. That tough task was made in impossible by penalties, bad snaps and other mistakes during a 54-0 non-district loss at Rattler Stadium. The game was halted early in the fourth quarter by the mercy rule. The Lions (3-2), who struggled early in the season, racked up almost 500 yards of offense against an often bewildered Rattler...
LOGAN - The Logan volleyball team looked out of sorts, trailed 17-10 in the first set and seem destined to lose to Santa Rosa for a third time this season. Then the Lady Longhorns began making blocks. Logan blocked three shots in a row at one point, ultimately rallying the team to win the set and setting the tone in a 25-20, 25-22, 23-25, 25-15 non-district victory Thursday. The Lady Longhorns dominated the net, making 11 blocks to the Lady Lions' two. Logan also made 41 kills to Santa Rosa's...
The Quay County sheriff presented a Life Saving Award to his undersheriff whose quick actions last month likely prevented a woman's death from a heart attack she suffered in the county courthouse. Sheriff Russell Shafer presented the honor to Dennis Garcia during the county commission's regular meeting Monday. Shafer said during his presentation that on Aug. 12, when Garcia was about to head home after a long shift, he received a call for help from the district court's office about a woman who...
The City of Tucumcari is down to two operating ambulances after one was totaled last month in an accident, the city manager told commissioners during her regular report Thursday. City manager Paula Chacon said the city’s insurer recently declared the ambulance a total loss after the Aug. 11 accident on Interstate 40 near the Texas border. She said the insurer would give a settlement of $38,000, plus salvage costs, on the 2016 model. Mayor Pro Tem Ralph Moya, who presided over the meeting in place of absent mayor Ruth Ann Litchfield, said an e...
Quay County had the sixth-worst rate of alcohol-related deaths in New Mexico in 2016-2020, which was double the national average, Quay County Health Council members learned during their regular meeting Thursday. Council member Rachelle Moon, who presented the data, said alcohol-related deaths included liver and kidney diseases attributed to alcohol abuse, plus accidents. The three worst counties in New Mexico for alcohol-related deaths were in the northwest part of the state. She said one in five deaths by working-age adults in New Mexico was...
The Tucumcari City Commission on Thursday voted to authorize the use more than $6,700 in lodgers tax executive funds to buy a replacement air conditioner and heat pump for the Tucumcari / Quay County Chamber of Commerce building one day after the city’s lodgers tax board expressed reluctance to do so. Members of the Tucumcari Lodgers Tax Advisory Board were sympathetic to the chamber director’s request but refrained from recommending the purchase until the chamber’s contract with the city could be examined. Scott Crotzer, executive direc...
Paula Chacon said she loved her business specialist job at the 10th Judicial Circuit in Tucumcari, where she had been employed for more than 20 years. But when she learned earlier this summer about an opening for city manager at the City of Tucumcari, she applied for it, indicating she was motivated by what she described as a sense of duty. "I care about Tucumcari; I'm from Tucumcari," Chacon said during an interview in her office in City Hall last week. "I genuinely care about the future of...
Early in Thursday night's screening of "Hell or High Water," applause spontaneously erupted from many in the audience as they saw the film's bank robbers drive a getaway car on what they recognized as Second Street in downtown Tucumcari. Those moviegoers could very well have been also cheering the reopening of the historic Odeon Theatre, which showed a film for the first time in almost 2 1/2 years after COVID-19 shutdowns and needed repairs and renovations. Hundreds of people attended the free...
SAN JON - Officials with the Eastern New Mexico Water Utility Authority, the agency in charge of building a nearly 100-mile water pipeline from Ute Lake, conveyed a genial tone during a town hall-style meeting about the project Aug. 29. However, several Quay County landowners became testy with those officials, especially with the process of the authority gaining easements and how their land would be restored after the project is finished. The Clovis-based ENMWUA billed the meeting at the San...
Logan won the hard-fought battle against Tucumcari but lost the war Saturday night during the Tucumcari Invitational volleyball tournament. A few hours after a two-hour, five-set semifinal victory over the host team, an apparently less-sharp Lady Longhorns squad fell 18-25, 14-25, 16-25 to state-ranked Santa Rosa. The Lady Lions (6-0) captured their second straight title at the Tucumcari Invite and saw four players make the all-tourney team, including Most Valuable Player Daelyn Pacheco. Logan (...
LOGAN - You wouldn't know it from the final score, but Menaul trailed Logan by only two touchdowns during the second period of Friday's non-district game. The Longhorns responded to the challenge with four unanswered scores in the second half to secure a 54-14 victory in eight-man football action. Logan (3-0) largely dominated despite six turnovers against the Panthers (1-2). Logan quarterback Brock Burns passed for 130 yards and four touchdowns and ran for another 69 yards. Devin Kotara and...
Required financial audits of the City of Tucumcari and Mesalands Community College are more than eight months late, landing both on the state auditor’s at-risk list and the possibility of a loss of state funds. Stephanie Telles, director of the government accountability office for the New Mexico Office of the State Auditor, told the Quay County Sun in an email last week that Mesalands should have submitted an audit for fiscal year 2021 by Nov. 1. Telles also stated the City of Tucumcari should have submitted its FY2021 audit to the state by D...
The co-owners of the Odeon Theatre in downtown Tucumcari were determined to reopen by Sept. 1, hell or high water. So it seems appropriate it will screen a film of the same name. The Odeon will reopen as a movie venue Thursday for the first time in nearly 2 1/2 years with a 7 p.m. screening of the 2016 Oscar-nominated film, "Hell or High Water," that was shot in Tucumcari and other parts of eastern New Mexico. Half-priced popcorn and sodas will be offered as part of the celebration, and...