Motels feel pinch

Tucumcari's motels, long a vital part of the city's sector with Route 66 with its famous "Tucumcari Tonite" motto, are feeling the pinch of the governor's 25% occupancy limits to curb the spread of the coronavirus pandemic.

The situation has become grim enough that city commissioner Todd Duplantis directed acting city manager Mark Martinez to see whether he can come up with an aid package for the city's motels. The Tucumcari City Commission is scheduled to meet Thursday evening. An email to Martinez last week requesting comment was not answered.

On April 7, Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham ordered a reduction of the hotel and motel occupancy limit to 25%, down from 50% initially ordered in mid-March. She extended all public health orders to April 30.

At least one motel owner asked for an easing of the limit. Nancy Mueller, co-owner of the Blue Swallow Motel, commented on social media her 12-room complex would be limited to just three overnight rooms under the current rules.

"We cannot even pay our bills with that kind of reduced revenue!" Mueller wrote.

Mueller said motels should be categorized differently because their rooms don't share interior hallways, common rooms, elevators or stairways compared to hotels.

An email Friday to the governor's spokesman that asked about the hotel and motel differences was not immediately returned.

The Blue Swallow has been closed since late March, citing the pandemic's threat to the health of guests and employees and it hurting the customer experience there. The Route 66 motel announced last week it would reopen April 30.

Lila Doughty, manager of the Palomino Motel and a member of the city's Lodgers Tax Advisory Board, said most motels in the city are "hanging on" during a time when tourism season should be ramping upward.

"Most of these places have mortgages they've got to pay," she said. "With this going on, they're not going to make their mortgages. This is killing us for our tourism season. Right now, I'm lucky if I'm renting one room a night."

Even if Lujan Grisham eases motel and hotel restrictions by the end of April, Doughty thinks the pandemic will create ripple effects the rest of the summer.

"I think it's going to go beyond May, June, July," she said. "Even when they get everything up and running, how many people are still going to be too scared to go traveling?"

Al Patel, owner of the Desert Inn Hotel and a lodgers tax board member, said business has been "really slow."

"We're not really getting any travelers," he said. "It's definitely going to affect the money the (lodgers tax) city will have for events."

Patel said he feels more fortunate than most because he enrolled in the Small Business Administration's Payroll Protection Program, which issues loans so a company's workers can keep working.

"It's the only reason we can keep our employees to stay on," he said.

Patel said the easing of restrictions would have to happen soon to "salvage our summer."

"If this goes into mid-May, it's going to be hard to see any summer business," he said. "But lifting (the restrictions) will have to be nationwide before we get any travelers. It doesn't mean much if one state will do it and another won't."

Lack of clarity about occupancy limits prompted Doughty to close her motel to travelers for a week because the Palomino also houses about eight long-term tenants. She called the state April 10 to get answers, but no one called back.

"I was shut down for a week because I can't afford to get a citation," she said. "I called state police and told them, 'Look, you want to come down here and take me to jail or fine me? I'm not kicking out my long-term people. My long-term people I have here are between the ages of 60 and 80. I take care of them.'"

Finally, Duplantis and acting city manager Mark Martinez found a New Mexico Department of Health document for Doughty that states "extended stays, such as temporary housing" wouldn't be counted as part of the occupancy limit.

John Castelli, co-owner of the Blaze-N-Saddle RV Park, also said the occupancy limit seemed unclear regarding long-term RV rentals. He said his phone call to a state agency didn't offer much clarity, either.

"The lady I called said, 'It doesn't seem to be very clear to me. It seems like a gray area,'" he recalled.

"We're slow anyway, so we're not even getting that (25%)," Castelli added. "We'll probably pick up again in June, July, but I won't know with this thing."

Castelli said the state's occupancy limit "seems too be baloney."

"The motels, they're hurting," he said. "I'm not too fond of this government right now, anyway, but I'll do what they want us to do."