World Cup: Portugal stuns U.S. with stoppage-time goal Sports, B-1
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Monday, June 23, 2014
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Politics, business will force Redskins change
W
hat easy marks team owner Daniel Snyder and his Washington Redskins are for all those somber politicians. Like hounds to the chase, senators, congressmen and council members were all over Snyder again last week after a government agency canceled the Redskins’ Milan trademark on Simonich grounds that it is Ringside Seat derogatory. Snyder will appeal, and the team’s name will live on a while longer, until his own business interests force him to change it. Pressuring Snyder to junk the name provides the perfect soundbite for officeholders from New Mexico to New York. It is simple and politically expedient for them to climb aboard the crowded bandwagon to denounce Snyder for maintaining a team name that is objectionable to many, particularly in the Southwest. But where were all these elected officials during the past 30 years, when owners of professional sports teams were regularly fleecing taxpayers for new stadiums? Most ranged from silent to enthusiastic about ordinary people subsidizing the playpens of millionaire team owners. Even a politician who appealed to the tea party when he ran for president fought hard for a tax increase so new stadiums could be built for teams in the National Football League and Major League Baseball. That politician is former U.S. Sen. Rick Santorum of Pennsylvania, a man who spent years portraying himself as adverse to tax increases. Then Santorum reversed course in a flash, becoming a leading advocate for a sales-tax increase to build new stadiums for the Pittsburgh Steelers and the Pittsburgh Pirates. The wealthy men who owned the teams sat back and watched in delight as Santorum argued their case. Santorum even wrote a newspaper column about the wisdom of
Please see RINgSIDe, Page A-4
Today Partly sunny. High 87, low 57. PAge A-12
Obituaries Madeline Marie Tapia, 80, Rio Rancho, June 18 PAge A-10
Pasapick www.pasatiempomagazine.com
12th annual Santa Fe Bandstand opening night The Mil-Tones, New Orleansstyle second-line brass band, 6-7 p.m.; Terrance Simien & The Zydeco Experience, 7:158:45 p.m., the Plaza, no charge, visit santafebandstand.org for the summer series schedule.
Index
Calendar A-2
Classifieds B-5
Tablets take on restaurants
Help prevent wildfires
Using rhythm to rescue
Eateries are turning to technology to help with food preparation and improve customers’ experiences. TeCH, A-8
Fire danger in Northern New Mexico remains high, and it’s up to all of us to take precautions. OPINIONS, A-11
In response to Uganda’s kidnappings and ritual killings, citizens drum alarms to find abducted children. NATION & WORLD, A-2
Drilling industry, watchdogs agree: Checking for contaminants is good
Go ahead, test the waters Water acquisition
Chemical mixing
Well fracking injection
Flowback and produced water (wastewater)
Injection well
Waste disposal
Domestic well
Vertical oil and gas well
H-board to mull cell tower proposal Community divided over project; decision likely will be appealed by losing side By Daniel J. Chacón
The New Mexican
oil and gas,” he said. Contamination in the past has been linked to unlined waste pits or leaks at pump sites. There isn’t proof yet that newer hydrau-
Santa Fe residents are once again rallying against a proposal to install a 64-foot telecommunications tower close to a school and next to a gas station and fastfood restaurant on the corner of St. Francis Drive and Alameda Street. The proposal, which has been in the works for at least two years, will go before the Historic Districts Review Board at 5:30 p.m. Tuesday at City Hall, 200 Lincoln Ave. The tower, which AT&T seeks to install next to a Burger King and an adjacent gas station, has been met with stiff opposition before from various sectors, including Santa Fe Public Schools. Last year, the Board of Education approved a resolution opposing the project. “The reason that we passed the resolution was not solely based upon that it was a cellphone tower,” school board member Linda Trujillo said Friday. “When it came down to it, what made us concerned about having it near Gonzales [Community School] and in the gas station area was the fact that there’s a possibility of sparking. It just didn’t seem like it was the right place to be.” City Councilor Signe Lindell, whose district includes the proposed site, questioned whether the proposed tower could be installed elsewhere. “Does it have to be next to a school?” she asked. “It just seems like there’s someplace else that would be more acceptable to the community than that location.” The telecommunications giant previously considered two other sites for the proposed tower: the Solana Center and Alto Park. The city rejected the Alto Park proposal, and the neighborhood opposed the Solana Center proposal, said Peter Dwyer, a former city attorney who is now representing AT&T in the case. “I’m not going to say that the opponents are universally against any site because they seem to be willing to entertain alternatives,” he said. “But they didn’t like the Solana Center alternative, and it’s clear that a number of people don’t like the current alternative.”
Please see WATeR, Page A-4
Please see TOWeR, Page A-10
Ground water
Depths of fracking wells, injection wells and vertical wells in the Permian and San Juan basins vary between 5,000 and 16,000 feet.
Depths of domestic water wells in the Permian and San Juan basins vary from 10 feet to 500 feet.
Rock layers vary in the Permian and San Juan basins
SOURCE: ENVIRONMENTAL PROTECTION AGENCY, KANSAS GEOLOGICAL SURVEY
By Staci Matlock
The New Mexican
T
he oil and gas industry is urging domestic well owners in New Mexico to test their water quality before and after drilling. Industry watchdog groups want the same thing, but for very different reasons. The industry trade organization is encouraging oil and gas well developers to get permission from water well owners to test as a way of proving that drilling and fracking are safe and won’t hurt water quality. The New Mexico Oil and Gas Association launched a campaign last week encouraging industry to voluntarily work with domestic well owners to have water tested. Watchdogs like Kathleen Dudley of Drilling Mora County said water quality tests before oil and gas drilling occurs is insurance for property owners, but they
ought to pay for their own tests. “If a homeowner does not know the quality of water before any industrial activity occurs, they have no baseline by which they can make industry accountable,” Dudley said. “Industry has been given a green light under the 2005 Energy Bill. And they aren’t accountable under the Clean Water Act or the Safe Drinking Water Standards Act.” Wally Drangmeister, spokesman for the New Mexico Oil and Gas Association, an industry trade group, said baseline tests will protect industry. “We have an excellent record of safety in the protection of water,” Drangmeister said. “Not withstanding that, there’s a lot of misinformation and innuendo out there that our processes aren’t safe.” “There are many water wells in New Mexico that have issues completely unrelated to oil and gas operations, but people have tried to blame well problems on
Fracking country
The three primary areas where oil and gas are developed in New Mexico San Juan Basin
Santa Fe
Raton Basin 25
Albuquerque
40
Permian Basin Las Cruces 10
VA falls short in addressing women’s care By Garance Burke
The Associated Press
SAN FRANCISCO — Already pilloried for long wait times for medical appointments, the beleaguered Department of Veterans Affairs has fallen short of another commitment: to attend to the needs of the rising ranks of female veterans returning from Iraq and Afghanistan, many of them of child-bearing age. Even the head of the VA’s office of women’s health acknowledges that persistent shortcomings remain in caring for the 390,000 female vets seen last year at its hospitals and clin-
Comics B-12
Main office: 983-3303 Late paper: 986-3010 News tips: 983-3035
Crosswords B-6, B-11
ics — despite an investment of more than $1.3 billion since 2008, including the training of hundreds of medical professionals in the fundamentals of treating the female body. According to an Associated Press review of VA internal documents, inspector general reports and interviews: u Nationwide, nearly 1 in 4 VA hospitals does not have a full-time gynecologist on staff. And about 140 of the 920 community-based clinics serving veterans in rural areas do not have a designated women’s health provider, despite the goal that every clinic would have one.
Life & Science A-9
El Nuevo A-7
Opinions A-11
u When community-based clinics refer veterans to a nearby university or other private medical facility to be screened for breast cancer, more than half the time their mammogram results are not provided to patients within two weeks, as required under VA policy. u Female veterans have been placed on the VA’s Electronic Wait List at a higher rate than male veterans. All new patients who cannot be schedule for an appointment in 90 days or less are placed on that wait list. u And according to a VA presentation last year, female veterans
Sports B-1
Tech A-8
Time Out B-11
BREAKING NEWS AT WWW.SANTAFENEWMEXICAN.COM
INSIDe u Officials in Southwest knew about VA’s wait-time problems. PAge A-10
of child-bearing age were far more likely to be given medications that can cause birth defects than were women being treated through a private HMO. “Are there problems? Yes,” said Dr. Patricia Hayes, the VA’s chief consultant for women’s health in an AP interview. “The good news for our health care system is that as the
Please see CARe, Page A-4
Two sections, 24 pages 165th year, No. 173 Publication No. 596-440