Opinion

Fire and Water: The Las Conchas Fire

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Column by State Representative Jim Hall

On June 4 and 5, I attended a conference “Impacts and Lessons Learned from the Las Conchas Fire,” sponsored by New Mexico’s Experimental Program to Stimulate Competitive Research (NM EPSCoR–https:////nmepscor.org/). 

NM EPSCoR is funded by the National Science Foundation, and this year their focus was to research the impacts of climate change on Northern New Mexico water resources.

The Las Conchas Fire broadened their focus to the environmental impacts of wildfire–with water and water quality as an important subtext.  Read More

I = IR + SE Innovation Results from Intelligent Risk Taking and a Supportive Environment

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Column by Dr. Harry Hertz 

Like many people in many companies and organizations, I have been thinking a lot about innovation lately.

In my case, the effort has been a prelude to thinking about upcoming revisions to the Baldrige Program’s 2013–2014 Criteria for Performance Excellence.

I consulted works by Rosabeth Moss Kanter, Clayton Christensen, Jeff Dyer, and Hal Gergersen, as well as numerous articles and blogs.

And my conclusion was that innovation (I) is the result of intelligent risk taking (IR) and a supportive environment (SE): I =IR + SE.

In this column, I will explore each of Read More

Letter to the Editor: What Happens When Mike Grabs George by the Ego?

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My friend Mike grabbed me by the ego, put me hard up against reality, and forced me to face my shortcomings.

Conceptually, the dialogue went something like this: “George,” he said, “you guys look like you’re hiding something. You can’t just say that signing those petitions will cost people their right to vote on the Charter Amendments. You have to explain it.” 

“But Mike,” I wailed, “this is a complicated issue. I can’t put all that information in a $68 dollar ad or a leditter. People have to do some of their own research.” 

“George,” he replied, twisting my rationality, “don’t tell me Read More

Letter to the Editor: Why doesn’t LANL patch its potholes?

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Dear Editor,

I’m wondering why Los Alamos National Laboratory lets West Road, near the Ice Rink, get so full of potholes?

There are now several in the eastbound lane that I go into the other lane to avoid.

In the past when I’ve called Los Alamos County to report the potholes, I discovered that this is a section of West Road that is the responsibility of the Lab to maintain.

Locating the responsible person at the Lab is always an “interesting” (time-consuming) process.

I can’t understand why the Lab doesn’t do routine checks of West Road to assess the potholes Read More

Letter to the Editor: Why do a few individuals so distrust the citizens of Los Alamos?

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Why is a small special interest group afraid of the voters?

The Charter Review Committee in good faith made its best recommendations to the Los Alamos County Council for improvements to the Charter. 

These were intended to clarify, remove ambiguities and to rationalize the processes that had slowly become obsolete over the years. 

Council agreed that the separate recommendations had sufficient merit to warrant sending to the voters for their approval or disapproval.

A small group of people in an organization called LAGRI does not want to let the citizens vote on the CRC recommendations.  Read More

The Red Elvises are Coming!

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LETTER TO THE EDITOR by Russ Gordon
 
Dear friends of the Los Alamos County Summer Concert Series,
 
The Red Elvises are coming! The Red Elvises are coming! This is going to be one of the absolute best concerts we’ve ever had in Los Alamos and it’s free.
 
How do you say in English, “These cats are a gas!?” 
 
C’mon out Friday, May 25 to Ashley Pond. The show starts at 7 p.m. and goes till 10 p.m.
 
The original members of the Band came out of Moscow, Russia as a folk and folk-rock band.
 
The band moved to Santa Monica,Calif. They were personally welcomed by President
Read More

OBITUARY: James “Danny” Doss

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JAMES “DANNY” DOSS 1939–May 17, 2012

James “Danny” Doss, 73, of Los Alamos passed away peacefully on Thursday, May 17, 2012 with his family at his side, and is now in Paradise in the presence of his Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ.

Danny Doss was a long time resident of Los Alamos, retiring in 1999 from a career as an electrical engineer with the Los Alamos National Laboratory where he worked on a variety of projects, including particle accelerators and biomedical technology used in cancer therapy.

Many others knew Danny Doss as the author of 17 “Charlie Moon Mysteries,” the first of which Read More

How the Affordable Care Act is Working for New Mexico

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By Sen. Jeff Bingaman

In the two years since Congress passed the health insurance reform law, called the Affordable Care Act (ACA), there has been a lot of debate about its merits. As we move closer to implementing some of the most significant pieces of that law, I’d like to highlight reasons why New Mexico will be one of the nation’s biggest winners from the improvements in the ACA.

Nearly one in five New Mexicans lacks health insurance, making New Mexico the state with the second-highest rate of uninsured in the country. The cost of treating the uninsured is being passed along to those who have insurance, Read More

Mother’s Day – Sentiment Not Profit

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Column by Kay Kerbyson

How did Mother’s Day begin? Well you would be forgiven for thinking it was a business ploy to sell off all the cute fluffy toys that didn’t get sold on Valentines and Easter.

But in essence, Mother’s Day goes back as far as ancient Greece and Roman times, as a day of appreciation.

The most modern version of the day started in England as Mothering Sunday, a day when workers were allowed time to visit their mothers, as well as attending church.

In America, the early English settlers often disapproved of secular holidays and the idea never really took off, until Anna Jarvis lobbied Read More

Our Threatened Jemez Forests

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Rep. Jim Hall of White Rock, center, during a workshop in the Jemez last week focused on changing forest management policies based on current forestry science. Courtesy photo

Column by Rep. Jim Hall

I attended a Desired Condition Workshop May 9 and May 10. The workshop was a joint effort of the Ecological Restoration Institute at Northern Arizona University, the Forest and Watershed Institute at New Mexico Highlands University and the Colorado Forest Restoration Institute at Colorado State University.  

The focus was on the changing forest management policies based on current Read More