Santa Fe Reporter, March 15, 2023

FOOD FOTO Contest Contest

SFR’s Food Foto Contest is back!

Whether your favorite images are of finely plated restaurant dishes; homecooked successes; gorgeous ingredients from the garden; or other artful interpretations, we hope you’ll share them with the class.

Two grand prize winners earn $100 cash prizes from our advertising partners, and will be featured in our upcoming Restaurant Issue. No limit on entries per photographer.

$5 entry fee per photo supports journalism at SFR.

ENTRIES ACCEPTED THROUGH MARCH

SFREPORTER.COM/CONTESTS

OPINION 5

7 DAYS, CLAYTOONZ AND THIS MODERN WORLD 6

HEALTHY BUSINESS 8

Patrick Allen becomes the newest DOH secretary as the agency begins to look past the COVID-19 pandemic

MONEY TRAIL 10

City eyes campaign finance law rewrite ahead of election

COVER STORY 12

THE FOILIES

Presenting the nationwide look at the last year’s most terrible transparency

CULTURE

SFR PICKS 17

Instagram: @sfreporter

Communicating through pottery, landscapery, Picasso and zines on zines on zines

THE CALENDAR 18

3 QUESTIONS 2O

WITH GEORGIA O’KEEFFE MUSEUM FELLOW KIMBERLY BECENTI

FOOD 25

A RICH TABLEAU

The Kitchen Table is poised to become Santa Fe’s one-stop commercial kitchen mecca—meet the women behind it

A&C 27

TO SLEEP PERCHANCE TO DREAM

Is iwatchyousleep single-handedly reviving postpunk and screamo in Santa Fe?

MOVIES 28

SCREAM VI REVIEW

Plus Vegas madness in Storming Ceasers Palace

WE’RE HERE FOR YOU

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EDITIONS ARE FREE AT SFREPORTER.COM. CONTENTS © 2023 SANTA FE REPORTER ALL RIGHTS RESERVED. MATERIAL MAY NOT BE REPRODUCED WITHOUT WRITTEN PERMISSION.

We’re Lucky to have you

Jesse Allen

Stephen Apodaca

Gini Barrett

Gayla Bechtol

Jonathan Blakey & Nanci Cartwright

The Blogs

The Bobs

Curtis Borg

M Yvonne Brown

BSPOKE Brand Consultancy

Kent Buckingham

Anne Coller

Barbara Conroy

John & Bekki Cook

Davis-Gibbon Family

M DeAnda Hay

Mark Davies

The Deej

Adrienne DeGuere

Rothstein Donatelli, LLP

Deborah Dorff

Nate Downey

DeeDee Downs

Frances Adams & David Patterson

Bill Adrian

Elizabeth Alexander & Larry Metzger

Jan & Jim Allen

Helga Ancona

Keith Anderson & Barbara Lenssen

Lars Anderson

Jarratt Applewhite

Atlas Fitness Center

Karen Aubrey

Irene P. Ayala

Joseph & Tamara

Banar

Cris & Marilyn Barnes

Ben Baur

Betty Baxter

Joanie Puma Bennet

Bill Bergner

Neil H. & Kelley O.

Berman

Jason Berry

Ruth Blaser

George Ducker

Dona Durham

Lauren Eaton Prescott

Sara, Michael & Nordic Eckhardt

Areena Estul & Shell Goldman

Ever Joyful Yoga

Jill & Terry Fernandez

Gail B Flanagan

Cheryl Fossum

Graham Q Gallaher

Dr. Jan Gaynor

Mark Glaser

Helen Goldberg

Goodwest Productions

Katy Gross

David Gunter

Mary Hall

The Harwood Family

M DeAnda Hay

HaydenFold

Tom & Rose Himrod

Samuel Hokin

Nelson Hower

Gay Block & Billie Parker

Gino Brazil

David Breecker

Markeeta Brown

Alexis Bove

Georgellen Burnett

Anne & Jack Burton

(IMO - Richard McCord)

Lee Caldwell & Marcus Randolph

Mary Ellen Capek & Sue Hallgarth

Susan & Appy Chandler

Jill Christian & Kiera Ortiz

Cisneros Design

Tom Claffey

Mary Costello

Gene Covington & Patrick Murphy

CC Culver

Tess DeGange

Merrilee De Vore

Elizabeth Dunham

Joanna Hurley

Sheila Hyde

RECURRING GIFTS

James Lutz

Scotty & Sue

Grace Perez & John Benfatto

Melinda Silver & Melvin Buchwald

Megan Kamerick

Heather Karlson & Bill Leeson

Diane Karp

The Reverend

Canon Ted Karpf

Katie & Andrew

Nicholas King

Photography

Laurie Knight

Karen Ann Koestner

Ruth & Paul Kovnat

Joseph Lacayo

Laurel Ladwig & Trina Altman

Melanie Lamb Faithful

Guido Lambelet

David LaPlantz

Catherine Leach

Long View Asset Mgmt

Douglas Lonngren

Peter Lundberg & James Mowdy

Meredith Dunning

Peace Exists

Joanne Feinberg

Dede Feldman

Joshua Finnell

Barbara Fix

Denise Fort

Ella Frank

Michael Friestad

Thomas G. Gallegos

Paul R. GanzenMuller & Mary Anne Crowe

Roman Garcia

Russ Garland

Lynn Gary

Tim & Lina Germann

Birgitte Ginge

Marvin Godner

Susan Gordon

Lisa Gray Fisher

Teri Hackler

Eleanor Hartgerink & Michael J Huvane

Cynthia Hartling

Annette & Ben Hayden

MacGregor

Jane & Paul Mandel

Virginia Mattingly

Kate McCahill

Jean McCray

James McGrath Morris

Mike & Mary McGuire

Jean McIntosh

Sara McKenzie

Jean McRay

Lanette & Jeff Meister

Bram Meehan

Richard Meeker

Michael A. Messner

Katherine Mille Wimmer

Karla Milosevich

Laurie Mitchell Dunn

Marylin Morgan

Kristen S. Moy

Heidi Munziner

Juliet Myers

Lauren Paige

Kristen Pelz

SUPPORTERS

Pat Hodapp

Vicki Holmsten & Don Allen

Bernhard Holzapfel

Michel & Lynn Hopkins

Jane & Lee Hruska

Ken Hughes

Carol Ingells

Craig D. Jolly

Hal Kahn

Jeff & Sue

Kemner-Richardson

Thomas J Kenny

Michael Kentor & Mandy Dealey

KevinBox Studio

Corinne Kratz

Nicole Kuckly

Malissa Kullberg & Joshua Maes

Kelly & Robinson Kurth

Cathy LaForte

Bushrod Lake

Leslie Lakind

Justin Peters

Janey Phillips

Johnnie Prather

Proctor Family Rainbird

Susan Ray

Leslie Reambeault & Carol Nolden

Greg Reiche

Shelley Robinson

John R Roby

B. Rose

Pat & Richard Rosenthal

Barbara Russell

Pamela Ryan

Gary A. Sanchez

Dante Schackel Bordegaray

Don Schreiber

Vickie Sewing

Mary Ann Shaening

Martin Shannon

Joan Sickler & Mike Roscow

Danette Sills

Mary Laraia & Andrew Mooney

KZ Langan & LH Cline

Signe Lindell

Ramona Lopez Marcus

Randi Lowenthal

Dave Maass

Brandt Magic & Mary Kinney

Dorothy Marchand

Gloria Martinez

Friestad

Virginia Mattingly

Alice McAlpine

Pam McFarland

Sasha McGhee

Dee Ann McIntyre

Milagro Dental

Rohit Millstein

Native Bloom

Bob & Karan Novak

Craig O’Hare

Dylan O’Reilly & Sara Montgomery

OrigamiInTheGarden

Caitlin Smith

Leslye Sneider

Joan Snider

Lauren Snyder

Meredith Speers

Dr. Eric Springstead

Howard & Dorothy Stein

Laura Stupin

Robert D Taylor

Caitlin Thomas

Pamela Villars

Adair Waldenberg

Jasmine Walker

Jeff Waters

Dr. David Wood & Brad Barrios

Mary Beth Yates

Kimberly Zeilik

Ellen Zieselman

Linda Osborne

Nancy Paap Wright

Janet Patrick

Susan Allen Priest

William & Susan Primm

Linda Prince

Daniel Quat

Photography

Dori & Tom Ramsey

James & Barbara Redd

Judith Redstone

Linda Reid

Coletta Reid & Pat Hastings

Ana Reinhardt

John Robertson

Sally Rodgers

Patsie E. Ross

Karen Rowell

Sonya & Myron

Salamon

Gail P Samota

Patrice Schooley

Roberta Shaw

Linda Siegle

Martha & Ken Simonsen

Andrea Szekeres

Morgan Smith

Anne Souders

Carolyn Spolidoro

Monica Steidele

Dennis Storz

Melody & Michael Sumner

Jim Terr

Rachel Thompson

Suzanne Timble

Two Star Trading

Rob Turner

Christine & Paul Vogel

Kaela Waldstein

Brian Watkins

Adam Wasserman

Elizabeth West

Brian & Joan Weiss

Janislee Wiese

Leah Yngve

Faith Yoman

Mail letters to PO Box 4910, Santa Fe, NM 87502; or email them to editor@sfreporter.com. Letters (no more than 200 words) should refer to specific articles in the Reporter. Letters will be edited for space and clarity.

MORNING WORD, MARCH 8:

“COUNCIL TO WEIGH NEXT STEPS FOR PLAZA OBELISK TONIGHT”

GOOFY SIDE

[Mayor Alan] Webber’s proposal for a water feature in the Plaza of a water-starved city is obviously wasteful. It would give Santa Fe an image of the City Stoopid. My calm way of putting it is, Mayor Webber needs to have a colonoscopy to grab a good selfie.

ALBO FASSO

SANTA FE

ONLINE, MARCH 9: “MONUMENT

DECISION DELAYED”

THE OLD MAN

If you insist on having a damn statue in the center, can we put a Zozobra?! I mean....it’s not offensive to anyone, I don’t think and our annual Zozobra celebration brings in tourists from all over the world.

JEANETTE DANIELLA RODRIGUEZ

VIA FACEBOOK

TEAR IT DOWN AGAIN

It’s amazing to me how so much of the population here can voice their anger over something that offends them, to the point of destroying it, and everyone else is just like, “We don’t care, we love our racist historical shit!” Rebuild the damn thing, so it can be torn down again.

JUSTIN RAEL

VIA FACEBOOK

POOR CHOICE

Last night was a clear display of how much this Mayor has divided this City with all of his actions and deliberate non-actions. Now, he wants to

place a “water feature” as his centerpiece to this debacle. Santa Fe needs better leadership! To place any water feature in the center of a city in the drought-ridden Southwest is a poor choice. This would not show well for the city of Santa Fe. Our “emperor” still has no clothes!

DANIEL STREET

VIA FACEBOOK

LEVEL IT

Level it. We don’t need a monument to colonialism.

PABLO LAPAHIE-PAZ

VIA FACEBOOK

LET’S DANCE

Santa Fe Bandstand in the middle of the Plaza is my vote! It’s a done deal. It has been taken down. Let’s move on and dance!

MARISSA ROYBAL

VIA FACEBOOK

HOW ABOUT NOTHING?

Who’s up for creating an independent citizens council for all cultures and a completely open space plaza with zero monuments?

RIC LUM

VIA FACEBOOK

OPEN WAR

Remove the obscene monument that honors genocide and the invading US Army who were the savages. Sure the Union fought against the slave-owning Confederates, however, at the same time the union invaded and openly declared war and genocide on New Mexicans and Native Americans.

And they have the nerve to call us the savages? Raze it down and bring back the original gazebo for bandstand and whatnot. Actually make it a all inclusive community thing.

KEITH KING

VIA FACEBOOOK

Editor’s note: Read at sfreporter.com about how councilors announced Tuesday that they now plan to withdraw this proposal

CONTINUED ON PAGE 7

MAYOR BENCHES PROPOSAL FOR ARENA SOCCER AT GCCC

At least city City Hall only spent five months working on this half-baked idea.

COUNCILORS WITHDRAW PLANS TO REBUILD PLAZA OBELISK

“The City Different” seems like a cooler motto than “The City That Rebuilt the Racist Monument” anyway.

BRING IT IN FOLKS

CITY LABOR SHORTAGE REPORTEDLY TO AFFECT PARK UPKEEP THIS SUMMER

Here’s a thought—don’t throw your trash on the ground, citizens.

AFTER OSCARS WINS, EVERYTHING EVERYWHERE ALL AT ONCE IS NOW THE MOST-AWARDED MOVIE OF ALL TIME Which is weird, because we could swear Hollywood has been saying nobody would like movies with Asian leads forever.

MLG EXPECTED TO SIGN FREE LUNCH BILL FOR SCHOOL KIDS

Pizza rectangles for all!

FORMERLY INCARCERATED PEOPLE TO HAVE VOTING RIGHTS UNDER BILL HEADING TO GOVERNOR

Nothing but applause from us on this one. LEGISLATORS WORK LATE AS END OF THE SESSION NEARS

The return of Daylight Saving means no one really knows what time it is anyway.

READ IT ON SFREPORTER.COM

SO LONG, OBELISK PLANS

We know we just made that joke, but learn why, following public outcry, councilors dropped a proposed plan to rebuild the Soldier’s Monument.

WE ARE WAY MORE THAN WEDNESDAY HERE ARE A COUPLE OF ONLINE EXCLUSIVES:

LISTEN

Find another episode of our ongoing Leaf Brief podcast wherein SFR’s Andy Lyman digs into talking to your kids about cannabis.

NEWS, MARCH 1: “READY, SET, SOLAR”

THE OTHER HALF

Environmental protections would ideally take precedence over views, yet it seems the county is somewhat arbitrary in its actions. The article states that the county took into account the residents complaints and tried to ameliorate the effects. Yet, the county did approve a 16-feet high, 60-feet long industrial garage with a water line and electricity on a residential property line, thereby completely blocking the view of the Sangre de Cristo range that existed and contributing to the overuse of water and electricity, with no attempt to ameliorate the effects of its actions. What is, therefore, the rule?

Given that half the population of Santa Fe County lives in Santa Fe and the other half in the county, one would think that there’s plenty of room to store one’s things and also to protect one’s view, while protecting the environment. We all live in one of the most beautiful places on the planet and yet…“Don’t it always seem that you don’t know what you’ve got till it’s gone, (destroy) paradise and put up a parking lot.” (Thank you, Joni Mitchell—and that song was written over 50 years ago.)

PAMELA SHER SANTA FE COUNTY

ONLINE, MARCH 8: “SHIRTS VS. SKATES”

GREATNESS BEGINS HERE

I would guess that many hockey players and figure skaters began as recreational skaters. I am a life-long recreational skater, enjoying the push and glide as I sail around the ice. As are skiing and bicycling, skating can be a multi-generational activity. Recently, I took my 5-year-old grandchild to skate at the Chavez Center and was reminded of the ease with which young people learn new skills. Thanks to SFR for quoting hockey and figure skating representatives. Mine is

the voice of a recreational skater. Our ice rink is a Santa Fe treasure, best discovered by families and school groups that want to introduce their children to a fun healthy pastime.

BETSY LOMBARDI

SANTA FE

RINK USERS MAKE SENSE

The article states that the issue is pitting “fans” of one sport against fans of another. The users of the rink are not fans, but rather athletes and users of the facility. Here is a good analogy…. suppose Santa Fe had ONE baseball field available in town for all kids, high school and adult leagues, plus people that just wanted to practice. Then, the Fuego were introduced as a pro team to take up residence on that field, as well.

Now, we know this is not the case, but if people think of it in those terms, hopefully the position of the rink users begins to make more sense. We have one facility for all age groups in the entire city and most days, it is booked from 6:30 am until late at night, with the winter being the busiest season.

LARRY

MIRABAL

SANTA FE

CORRECTION

Last week’s cover story “Shirts vs. Skates” misstated the frequency of conversations City Manager John Blair claims to have had with the mayor and David Fresquez since last summer. Though meetings with key staff went on “intermittently” for months, Blair says and Mayor Alan Webber talked with Fresquez weekly for about three weeks before the story ran.

CHRISTUS St. Vincent is hosting a

CAREER FAIR

Thursday, March 30 10:00 am – 2:00 pm

Vernick Conference Center

455 St. Michaels Drive, Santa Fe, NM 87505

Looking to take your career to the next level? Don’t miss the opportunity to connect face-to-face with managers and explore clinical and non-clinical positions available at CHRISTUS St. Vincent!

CHRISTUS St. Vincent Hospital is a diversified workplace offering a wide variety of opportunities. We are the key to growing your future!

Employment Benefits include:

• Competitive Pay

• Tuition Reimbursement

• Paid Time Off

• Retirement Plan

• Paid Personal Holidays

SFR will correct factual errors online and in print. Please let us know if we make a mistake: editor@sfreporter.com or 988-7530.

• Employer Assisted Housing Program

• Paid National Holidays

• Shift Differentials

*Benefits become effective immediately upon hire. Initial on-site interviews will take place so remember to bring a resumé and dress to impress!

“My friend Susan is different from me. She’s very feminine. I’m rustic.”

—Overheard in the St. John’s arroyo

“If you’re buying power tools in the same store you can buy bologna, maybe you should think about it.”

—Overheard at Lowe’s

SANTA FE EAVESDROPPER

Healthy Business

your interest lie in public health?

tem of care better for all kids in the state, whether they’re on Medicaid or not.

In addition to that Medicaid figure, are you seeing other key differences between Oregon and New Mexico?

Oregon is not a wealthy state, particularly in comparison to Washington and California, but it has significantly higher incomes than New Mexico.

BY JULIA GOLDBERG @votergirl

Patrick Allen takes over the New Mexico Department of Health as its latest cabinet secretary at a turning point for the agency. He previously served for five years as director of the Oregon Health Authority—experience that should come in handy if a bill creating a New Mexico health authority makes it to Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham’s desk before the legislative session ends. He also comes to DOH as the state winds down its COVID-19 public health emergency order, which expires at the end of the month. Allen began running DOH at the start of January and was confirmed in February, succeeding Dr. David Scrase, who had run both the health department and the Human Services Department since the summer of 2021, and retired from the latter last month. The following interview has been edited for concision and clarity.

SFR: Is it true you’d only been to New Mexico once before accepting this job?

Patrick Allen: Yeah, that’s correct. Our daughter [Allen and his wife Joan have three adult children] was in school in Midland [Texas]. And she needed us to bring a car down to her, so we drove a car down through Utah and New Mexico and that was the first time we’ve ever been here.

Are you getting the lay of the land?

Yeah, a little bit. My wife is still back in Oregon cleaning 20 years of crap out of our house. I’m still doing a little bit of a two-household kind of thing going back and forth. But, yeah, right now I’m learning the politics and the players and how government works and those kinds of things and getting a little bit of chance to get out and about.

Our last two health secretaries have been medical doctors. Where does

My academic background is in economics [Allen has a bachelor’s degree of science in economics from Oregon State University]. If you think about health care in the United States for very long, if you’re not going to be in medicine, economics is probably the next best thing. More relevantly, health agencies tend to be big, complex organizations with lots of things going on…and the most important skill set is: Do you know how to run a big organization successfully? I think any number of backgrounds can be really helpful for that—a health background for sure—but lots of other backgrounds can be really relevant.

The governor is backing legislation that would make the Human Services Department the Health Care Authority Department and take some portions of the health department and roll it into that new agency. Did you suggest this idea?

No, it was more like this was something she was interested in and it was a prominent part of her discussions with me about my coming to New Mexico, in terms of my experience running an agency like that and being familiar with the policy tools and advantages you get with the creation of a health authority.

Is the best way to understand the benefit is it will provide the state with more purchasing power?

It’s not just purchasing power. It can be regulatory power and policymaking power and using leverage to get better outcomes. An example I’ve used a lot in Oregon is around screening kids by age 2 for developmental delay. Ten years ago in Oregon, we were doing a terrible job—maybe 17% of kids on Medicaid were getting successfully screened. By using purchasing power…Oregon got that number up to about 85% of kids who were successfully screened, but the best part is the practitioner doesn’t know who’s paying for the kid they’re treating. And so they changed the practice for all kids to get screened. Now in Oregon, only about half of kids are on Medicaid, unlike 85% here in New Mexico, so the analogy breaks down a little bit. But that use of purchasing power and incentives made the sys-

Oh, sure. Oregon is, I think 73% or 72% non-Hispanic white. And so, when you think about health equity work in Oregon, you’re really talking about a non-Hispanic white-dominated culture and the systems that have been developed that really center whiteness in the delivery of everything. There are equally challenging health disparities and inequities in New Mexico, but their shape is completely different. I’m just beginning to understand what those are, and I’ve got a long way to go to figure out what that looks like in terms of how to inform health equity policy. Related to the percentage of people on Medicaid is the overall impact of poverty in New Mexico.

Some other key areas are really quite similar. The rural/urban issues in New Mexico look very much like rural/urban issues in Oregon. Tribal relations—although they’re much more significant here— Oregon is still one of the top 10 states in the country for...Native American population. It’s really a big part of the attraction of coming here was the opportunity to do some things I think I’ve been successful at in one setting and see how I need to change and grow to be successful in a new setting. Our sister paper in Portland, Oregon, Willamette Week, interviewed all of Oregon’s gubernatorial candidates last year, who agreed the Oregon Health Authority was a big problem and you

Patrick Allen becomes the newest DOH secretary as the agency begins to look past the COVID-19 pandemic

Patrick Allen began work as health secretary at the start of January and was confirmed in February.

COURTESY NMDOH

needed to go. They were particularly critical about behavioral health, which also is an issue here. Would you respond to those criticisms?

The criticisms were maybe, in a couple of instances, a little more personal than I would have expected, but not surprising.

I was one of the main faces of the pandemic response in the state and, while I’m really proud of the work that we did… as time went on in the pandemic, that got more and more controversial. I think any new governor, given where we were in the pandemic, wants to make a clean start and have COVID be less a part of their administration. I think we kind of bore a little bit of the brunt of that.

And, in the five years I was at the agency, I did not fix the state’s behavioral health problems. I think reasonable people might agree there were reasons for that and the pandemic was probably one of the big ones. But it’s a pretty straightforward thing for me: You want politicians to be responsive to the problems people [raise], like open drug use in Portland and people living on the streets and family members that couldn’t get services. So saying you’re going to clean house at OHA and make a change in leadership is straightforward. And the person they replaced me with is gone already. I take that as a little bit of validation that it’s a hard job with some really tough problems.

In terms of New Mexico…we’ve got some huge advantages in trying to tackle some of these problems. The constellation of facilities the state operates in areas like

alcohol and drug and mental health facilities…really helps fill niches that were often left unfilled in Oregon. I think the Behavioral Health Collaborative is an incredibly strong way of taking…a scattered system of care and trying to bring some cohesion to it. What I’m able to bring, if nothing else, is an acute awareness of: If you don’t preserve those building blocks in the system, they’re real hard to get back.

Do you support New Mexico’s Public Health Emergency Order ending this month?

I recommended it, actually.

What do you say to people who remain anxious about ongoing cases, hospitalizations and long COVID?

I absolutely empathize with that. Is COVID a serious disease that we need to maintain a public health response to?

Absolutely yes. Does it continue to be an emergency, and will it be an emergency forever? If you think about individual humans in a fight-or-flight mode and the corrosive impact of that constant stress…I think the same thing applies to societies and organizations. What we need to do now with COVID is figure out how we’re going to continue to take it seriously…but in a more integrated way that looks more like the rest of health.

What initiatives do you want the health department to tackle?

There are probably three at the top of my list. Like health departments all across the country, the agency really is kind of traumatized by the pandemic. So: helping the agency repair and heal a little bit, and get back…to a non-emergency way of doing business. Number two, and this is a huge priority of the governor, is really expanding access to health. And I say health rather than health care because it’s not just health care…it’s access to clean water and nutritious food and all the things that make up the...overall public health fabric. And that really ties in to the third, which is health equity.

A year from now, what do you hope the public will think about when it comes to the health department?

Perversely, I kind of hope the public thinks a little bit less about the Department of Health as an agency and more about the outcomes that they see as a result of our work. I hope they’re able to see an expanded set of access points… and receive the support they need to be healthy without having to think about a state agency as a piece of that.

W hat we need to do now with COVID is figure out how we’re going to continue to take it seriously...but in a more integrated way that looks more like the rest of health.

-Patrick Allen

Money Trail

BY ANDREW OXFORD oxford@sfreporter.com

One election year may have just ended, but another is only getting started.

Voters will choose four city councilors in November, potentially reshaping Santa Fe’s governing body, and may also decide on changes to the city’s charter. Before campaigns and advocacy groups begin spending to sway voters, however, the city’s campaign finance laws could be in for a major rewrite.

City councilors are considering a 49-page bill that would change Santa Fe’s campaign finance laws in what backers say is a bid to make the dense code easier to understand. But the city’s ethics board has raised concerns that the changes could lead to less transparency heading into election season.

The changes backed by the city clerk would slash the section of the municipal code regulating what are known as “independent expenditures,” for example—that is, advertising and other campaigning by advocacy groups that are not formally connected to a candidate’s campaign.

The city’s current law requires groups that spend more than $500 on any form of “public communication” supporting or opposing a candidate to report the spending and identify anyone who donated over $25 to the efforts.

Yet, advisory board members worry the proposed changes would narrow the existing law to only require the disclosure of spending on advertising, not other campaign activities. That could allow groups to spend thousands of dollars campaigning for or against a can-

City eyes campaign finance law rewrite ahead of election

didate without having to say where they got their money.

Moreover, the proposed changes would only regulate ads that are “an appeal to vote for or against a clearly identified candidate or ballot question.” Some board members worry that definition of advertising could create legal wiggle room for groups to create ads that fall outside the city code by not directly mentioning voting.

“On the one hand, it’s certainly a positive thing to make the rules easier,” Paul Biderman, a member of the Ethics and

Campaign Review Board, tells SFR. “If you make them really arcane and complex and lengthy, some people might be discouraged from running or might run but accidentally violate the rules.”

But he added: “We don’t want to let some important principles fall by the wayside.”

City Clerk Kristine Bustos-Mihelcic told the board March 9 that the proposed changes are meant to streamline the sprawling code and align the wording with state laws.

“The state definitions are much shorter, are much more concise and they’re a bit more user-friendly, I’ll say, for individuals,” she told the board.

Bill sponsor District 2 Councilor Carol Romero-Wirth, who is working with the city clerk on the proposed revisions, said she welcomes the Ethics and Campaign Review Board’s input.

“This is a first step to align our definitions more clearly with the state definitions,” she tells SFR.

Spending this year is unlikely to top that of a mayoral race or hot-button special election, such as the soda tax vote in 2017 that included a flurry of spending from third parties and featured sparring between city regulators and a dark money group opposed to the tax that refused to play by Santa Fe’s campaign finance laws.

But the election could still be contentious.

The proposed changes would slash other provisions of Santa Fe’s campaign finance code, too.

Campaigns would no longer need to include the phone number of a campaign representative on yard signs, for example—a proposal that concerned District 1 Councilor Sig Lindell.

“I don’t think that’s the greatest idea,” she told the Finance Committee during a hearing Monday night.

The proposed changes would also eliminate the requirement that campaigns file a finance report the day before an election, reducing from five to four the number of such reports candidates must file during an election. But candidates would have to begin filing reports earlier—60 days before Election Day instead of 40, for example.

Some provisions of the election code may not be missed under the proposed changes. Campaigns would no longer have deputy treasurers, for example. And the city might scrap an effectively toothless requirement that each candidate sign a form saying they’re familiar with the city’s campaign code. A candidate can still get on the ballot if they don’t sign, making it more or less pointless.

The proposal passed the city’s Finance Committee on Monday night and heads to a vote of the Quality of Life Committee next week. It is scheduled to get a vote of the full council on March 29.

A flurry of campaign mailers are likely to hit voters’ mailboxes later this year as voters select four councilors. But whether third-party spending must be reported would change under a new proposal.

ANSON STEVENS-BOLLEN

The Foilies

Recognizing the worst in government transparency

BY THE ELECTRONIC FRONTIER FOUNDATION AND MUCKROCK ILLUSTRATIONS BY EFF/CAITLYN CRITES

It seems like these days, everyone is finding classified documents in places they shouldn’t be: their homes, their offices, their storage lockers, their garages, their guitar cases, between the cracks of their couches, under some withered celery in the vegetable drawer…OK, we’re exaggerating—but it is getting ridiculous.

While the pundits continue to speculate whether President Donald Trump, Vice President Mike Pence and President Joe Biden put national security at risk by hoarding these secrets, their actions ultimately might not be the biggest problem.

What we know for sure is these episodes illustrate overlapping problems for government transparency. It reveals an epidemic of over-aggressive classification of documents that could easily be made public. It means an untold number of documents that belong to the public

went missing—even though we may not get to see them for at least 25 years, when the law requires a mandatory declassification review. And then there’s the big, troubling transparency question: If these officials pocketed national secrets, what other troves of non-secret but nonetheless important documents did they hold on to, potentially frustrating the public’s ability to ever see them?

It doesn’t do much good to file a Freedom of Information Act request for records that have mysteriously disappeared.

Misbehavior like this is why we created our annual tongue-incheek “awards” for agencies and officials that thwart the public’s right to government information or otherwise respond outrageously to requests for documents and records. Each year, the Electronic Frontier Foundation and MuckRock News, in partnership with the Association of Alternative Newsmedia, pub-

lish this list of ne’er-do-wells to celebrate Sunshine Week (March 12-18)—an annual event to raise the profile of the democratic concept of government transparency.

It may be many years before the public learns what secret and not-so-secret documents weren’t turned over by past administrations to the National Archives. But when we do, we’ll be sure to nominate them for the top prizes. In the meantime, we have no shortage of redaction rascals and right-to-know knaves, from agencies assessing astronomical fees to obtain documents to officials who overtly obstruct openness to protect corporate interests. Read on and get to know the 2023 who’swho of government opacity.

THE BURN AFTER READING AWARD

Immigration and Customs Enforcement

Though it might be surprising, sometimes an agency will fulfill your request—and realize afterward they’d like to hit the undo button. Generally, however, the First Amendment protects your right to keep the records and publish them, even when the government could have originally withheld them.

That’s what happened to the wellknown, oft-feared FOIA warrior and journalist Jason Leopold after Immigration and Customs Enforcement used the wrong highlighter when they responded to his request for information on Department of Homeland Security activity in Portland, Oregon, in the wake of George Floyd’s murder during summer of 2020.

Leopold asked ICE for communication and documents from the DHS about the training and placement of DHS personnel in Portland that summer and received a “DHS Component Actions Report” in response. Among the information on the report that ICE later claimed was sensitive enough to warrant a gimme-back: the exact numbers of helmets, crowd-control shields, and pepper-spray projectiles that the DHS loaned to the United States Park Police, the police force of the National Park Service.

THE LEAVE NO COFFEE MUG UNTURNED AWARD General Escobedo, Mexico

When an agency receives a records request, an official is supposed to conduct

Officials in General Escobedo, Mexico looked for records on predictive policing in a coffee cabinet.

SOURCE: GENERAL ESCOBEDO

The Foilies 2023

a thorough search, not poke around half-heartedly before generating a boilerplate rejection letter. What’s rare is for an agency to send a photo essay documenting their fruitless hunt for records.

That’s exactly how the city of General Escobedo in Nuevo León, Mexico, responded to a public records request that the EFF filed for documents related to a predictive policing law under Mexico’s national transparency law. The “Inexistencia de Información” letter they sent included a moment-by-moment photo series of their journey, proving they looked really hard, but couldn’t find any records.

First, the photos showed they were outside the city’s security secretariat building. Then they were standing at the door to the police investigative analysis unit. Then they were sitting at a computer, looking at files, with a few screengrabs. Then they were looking in a filing cabinet.

The next photo almost caused us to do a spit take: They were looking in the drawer where they keep their coffee mugs–just in case there was a print-out jammed between the tea bags and the stevia. See, they looked everywhere.

Except…those screengrabs on the computer they breezed past were exactly the kind of documents we wanted. EFF appealed the case before the state’s transparency board, which eventually forced Escobedo to release a slideshow and re ceipts showing the city had wasted more than 4 million pesos on the Sistema de Predicción de Delitos (SPRED) project.

WE CAN NEITHER CONFIRM NOR DENY THE EXISTENCE OF THIS AWARD

National Security Agency

Sometimes agencies will respond to your FOIA request with a stack of documents. Other times, they will reject the request out of hand. But some agencies choose a third route: They tell you they can neither confirm nor deny whether the information exists, because the subject matter is classified, or be cause a positive or negative response would expose the agency’s hand in what ever intelligence or investigation game they’re playing.

This so-called “Glomar response” is derived from a Cold War-era case, when the CIA refused to confirm or deny to the

Los Angeles Times whether it had information about the USNS Hughes Glomar Explorer, a CIA ship that was used to try to salvage a sunken Soviet spy sub.

“The Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press is studying the prevalence of so-called ‘Glomar’ responses to FOIA requests across the federal government,” RCFP Senior Staff Attorney Adam Marshall told us. “As part of that project, it has submitted FOIA requests (what else) to every federal agency regarding their Glomar volume over a five-year period.”

So far, RCFP has learned that the US Commodity Futures Trading Commission sent four Glomars; the US Department of Energy Office of the Inspector General sent 14; and the US Department of

Health and Human Services Office of the Inspector General sent 102.

The NSA came back with an astounding 2,721 Glomar responses over the five-year period. As Marshall noted on Twitter, in fiscal year 2021 alone, Glomars accounted for at least 41% of all the FOIA requests the NSA processed. And so we honor the NSA for being so transparent about its lack of transparency.

THE DIGITAL DIVIDE AWARD

US Office of Personnel Management

Strolling through the independent records clearinghouse Government Attic offers a wide range of interesting, useful and refreshingly creative ideas for records to request, such as government agency intranet homepages.

Producing a copy of an intranet homepage should be a pretty easy task for an agency: Open up your browser in the morning; click “Save As”; and, boom—kick back after a job well done. You don’t even need to talk to your colleagues! But after five years of inexplicable transparency purgatory, a lead government information specialist at the U.S. Office of Personnel Management responded curtly to one such request with the following:

“The FOIA does not require agencies to create a record. The records you seek would require the creation of records. Therefore, OPM is unable to provide you any records.”

Even odder, the agency’s FOIA log for last year notes the request, but writes that it was closed with “no records,” rather than being rejected. Keep that in mind when calibrating the reliability of FOIA annual reports and other official transparency statistics.

Happily, we can report that other agencies are more digitally adept when responding to these types of requests, even if they do have a maddening tendency to print out the pages and mail them rather than just sending the actual digital files. We can only hope the Office of Personnel Management manages to get some better-equipped personnel when it comes to understanding that simply copying bits is one of the least-creative acts a computer—or FOIA officer — can do, and they should take these requests as a gift rather than a challenge.

THE BULK DATA FOR ME BUT NOT FOR THEE AWARD

Los Angeles Police Department

Police departments have an uncanny knack for being able to fund cutting-edge (if horribly broken) technology to watch the public while only mustering ‘90s-era (also horribly broken) technology to help the public watch them back. This appears to be the case in Los Angeles, where the forthrightly named Stop LAPD Spying Coalition found that it was being monitored by the LAPD.

Like any good public watchdog, it filed a records request, in this case for emails that mentioned “Stop LAPD Spying” or “stoplapdspying.” We will make a concession that this is a potentially broad search. It’s not always easy for agencies to search across all departmental emails; sometimes emails are stored in different systems, and so on.

LAPD didn’t seem to have an issue with conducting the search, but, rather, they just had found too much material when they did: “The query resulted in a file(s) that exceeds the maximum gigabyte that our system would allow to export; therefore, we are unable to search for and identify emails responsive to your request.”

LAPD then asked the requester to narrow their request. For better or worse, the reality of public records is that it’s often a negotiation, but if an agency is going to compile more than a gigabyte of emails on an organization dedicated to curbing surveillance, the least the agency can do is have the capability to sift through and export that material. The agency’s response—put bluntly, we talk about you too much to tell you how much we’ve talked about you—would be flattering if it wasn’t both creepy and aggravating.

THE WISHY-WASHY ACCESS AWARD

Alphabet and The Dalles, Oregon

The Western United States has been caught in a 20-year megadrought, but when The Oregonian/OregonLive sought records on water usage from the city of The Dalles, the news organization found itself on the wrong side of a lawsuit. The city claimed the data was a trade secret, and filed suit on behalf of Google parent company Alphabet to block the release of records.

Alphabet, like other major tech companies, has increasingly invested in massive data centers that slurp up vast quantities of water to cool off their hardware. How

The “Glomar response” takes its name from the USNS Hughes Glomar Explorer, a spy vessel, the existence of which the CIA would neither “confirm nor deny.”

We honor the NSA for being so transparent about its lack of transparency.

much water, however, was a mystery, and one of pressing concern for locals. One resident told The Associated Press she had seen her well water continue to drop year after year. “At the end of the day, if there’s not enough water, who’s going to win?” she asked. After a 13-month fight, there was something to sa vor: The city dropped its fight. Alphabet even tried to spin it as a PR win and declared itself a champion of transparency.

“It is one example of the importance of transparency, which we are aiming to increase... which includes site-lev el water usage numbers for all our US data center sites, including The Dalles,” a spokesperson said at the time.

The data was worth fighting for: The data centers’ water usage had tripled in the past five years, to where it consumes more than a quarter of all water used in the city, according to analysis from Mike Rogoway at The Oregonian/OregonLive.

I WANTED TO CLARIFY THAT MY A** IS COVERED AWARD White House

Backroom dealers sometimes struggle to keep their deals in the backroom, especially when they inadvertently reveal them in emails that are presumptively public records. That’s when they follow up by saying, “I wanted to clarify that the email I sent was pre-decisional and privileged information,” hoping these magic

words will exempt the email from disclosure should anyone file a records request.

On June 23, 2022, a White House staffer revealed to the Kentucky governor’s office that President Biden planned to nominate Chad Meredith as a federal judge the next day. Days later, the White House official then tried to use the follow-up “clarification” email as cover. But the Louisville Courier-Journal got the story, and the Kentucky governor’s office released the emails confirming the nomination plans, despite the weak follow-up email trying to claw them back into secrecy.

The president ultimately scrapped

Meredith’s nomination entirely after pro-choice advocates criticized Biden’s apparent backroom trading on judicial nominations with Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell. Meredith had defended Kentucky’s anti-abortion laws under the previous Republican governor.

The whole ordeal, which was overshadowed by the Supreme Court overruling Roe v. Wade on the very day Meredith would have been nominated, shows the ridiculous ways officials will try to keep public records secret.

THE TRANSPARENTLY PROUD OF DESTROYING PUBLIC RECORDS AWARDS

Michael

Gableman

The effort to investigate unsubstantiated 2020 election fraud claims in Wisconsin sped past comedy, plowed through farce, and fell into ludicrous land. The driver of this ridiculous journey: Michael Gableman, a former Wisconsin Supreme Court justice who was hired by Wisconsin State Assembly Speaker Robin Vos to investigate alleged election fraud.

Gableman’s inquiry has cost taxpayers nearly $2 million, with no evidence of any election wrongdoing disclosed when Vos shut it down and fired Gableman last August.

The probe itself, however, has generated plenty of violations of state public records laws. Gableman’s inquiry is the subject of at least four public records lawsuits. And in the process of responding to public records requests about his election inquiry, Gableman has admitted to routinely deleting records and deactivating an email account he used while working

on the probe.

After receiving a records request from American Oversight, someone deleted Gableman’s personal email account, the former justice testified during a hearing in one of the suits. And when questioned about whether he knew who deleted records responsive to a public records request, Gableman was refreshingly honest.

“Did I delete documents? Yes, I did,” he said.

In Gableman’s defense, he believed deleting the records was proper, because in his view, the destroyed records were not part of his election investigation. The problem is that no one can trust Gableman’s judgment, because there is no paper trail to confirm that the records were, in fact, irrelevant to his work. Gableman’s lack of an auditable paper trail to check his work stands in stark contrast to the auditable results of the 2020 Wisconsin election.

For his records destruction and general frustration of the public’s right of access, courts have awarded plaintiffs $163,000 in attorney’s fees and costs in one case, and $98,000 in another.

THE ANCIENT ART OF DODGING ACCOUNTABILITY AWARD Cyber Ninjas

Wisconsin isn’t the only state where we’re recognizing an election “audit” contractor’s misbehavior.

After the audit of the 2020 presidential election in Maricopa County, Arizona— which ultimately reaffirmed Biden’s victory—state Senate President Karen Fann tried to save face by claiming that the reason the project spiraled out of control was because the election system was hard to audit, and not because auditing firm Cyber

CONTINUED ON NEXT PAGE

The Dalles, Oregon initially put Google’s interest over the public’s in a records battle.

The Foilies 2023

Ninjas might have been inexperienced and tilting at windmills. That’s kind of like saying it’s the homework’s fault that the dog ate it.

“As our efforts have clearly shown, elections processes here in Arizona are not designed to be easily audited, unlike every other government process accountable to citizens,” Fann wrote in a statement. “... (W)e look forward to implementing improvements to add ease, authentication, transparency, and accountability to our elections processes in the coming legislative session.”

The Cyber Ninjas’ own work, however, was anything but authenticatable, transparent and accountable, as the group tried to evade legitimate public records requests at nearly every turn.

The nonprofit American Oversight and The Arizona Republic newspaper had to take Cyber Ninjas to court in mid2021 to demand access to audit records. The firm routinely refused to hand over documents, including communications, despite a court order, leading a judge in 2022 to sanction Cyber Ninjas’ founders $50,000 per day.

“I think the variety of creative positions Cyber Ninjas has taken to avoid compliance with this order speaks for itself,” Superior Court Judge John Hannah said. Cyber Ninjas began handing over records last year, revealing connections between the firm and various election conspira cy theorists and lawyers tied to Trump’s campaign and his efforts to overturn the election.

According to The Arizona Republic, Cyber Ninjas’ fines surpassed $10 million, and the firm closed up shop— and yet they still haven’t learned their lesson.

The firm continues to withhold and im properly redact text messages and other correspondence. For example, Cyber Ninjas has withheld communications between CEO Doug Logan and promi nent election denier

Phil Waldron, claiming the messages are covered by legal privilege. This is clearly the FOIA equivalent of a torinoko, the legendary nin ja smoke grenade, since Waldron is not a lawyer at all, and definitely not Logan’s lawyer.

(I’M NOT YOUR) STEPPIN’ STONE TO TRANSPARENCY AWARD Federal Bureau

of Investigation

We are all lucky the FBI is always on the lookout for “left wing innovations of a political nature,” especially those nasty “subliminal messages.” That’s why, in 1967, it sent an informant to a Monkees concert, who reported on the band’s anti-war sentiment to add to the FBI’s growing file on the band.

Micky Dolenz, the band’s sole surviving member, is suing for that file under FOIA. As his complaint points out, the FBI spied on many musicians of that era, including Jimi Hendrix and John Lennon.

Dolenz sued after the FBI failed to produce the file beyond the heavily redacted The FBI has since provided five more redacted pages, Dolenz’s attorney tells us. Hopefully, this will shed more light on the FBI’s heroic war against Beatles, Monkees and other subversive members of the animal kingdom.

THE TRANSPARENCY TAX AWARD Mendocino County

The Foilies regularly recounts outrageous public records fees that seem clearly aimed at discouraging specific records requests. But those are usually one-off efforts aimed

at specific requests. This award to officials in Mendocino County, California, is based on their creation of a fee system that appears designed to discourage everyone from requesting public records.

The ordinance lets officials charge you $20 per hour to look for records if you fail to “describe a specifically identifiable record.” So, if you asked for the sheriff’s “Policy 410.30,” you wouldn’t get charged, but if you asked for “all directives, policies, and orders related to body-worn cameras,” you might have to pony up hard cash. Even worse, the ordinance says if you ask for emails or other types of records that “may” include information that needs to be redacted or withheld, the county would charge you $50 or $150 per hour, depending on whether an attorney needs to be involved.

In other words, the ordinance punishes the public for not knowing exactly how the county organizes and stores its records, or what records might contain sensitive information. If you have an encyclopedic knowledge of the county’s systems and how to request records, you may not be charged any search fees. But if you are a normal person who just wants to find out what’s happening in the county, you are probably going to be charged a huge search fee.

Mendocino County’s ordinance is on shaky legal ground. The California Public Records Act does not give state and local government agencies the authority to assess their own search fees, review fees, or even fees to redact records. The law only allows agencies to charge the public what it costs to make copies of the records they seek.

But aside from being potentially unlawful, Mendocino County’s fee ordinance is an affront to its residents. It treats all records requests as hostile, resource-wasting inquiries rather than a central mission of any public agency committed to transparency.

THE MISFIRE IN ALL DIRECTIONS AWARD

Irvington Township

Sometimes you just have to marvel at the hubris of an agency that would prefer to pick unwinnable fights rather than just open up its books.

Irvington Township, New Jersey, started one such berserk rampage in 2021 when it filed a lawsuit against a retired teacher who had gotten in the habit of regularly asking for information about local government operations. The suit claimed her requests were “unduly burdensome, time consuming and expensive” and that the octogenarian had “bullied and

annoyed” township administrators. Then, in a misguided attempt to avoid negative attention, the town sent cease-and-desist letters to NBC reporters who were covering the lawsuit, also accusing them of harassment. Less than a week after the reporters published their story, Irvington Township withdrew the suit.

But it didn’t end there. Curious about how much the lawsuit had cost and who had authorized it, Adam Steinbaugh, an attorney for the Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression, filed his own records requests. Irvington Township failed to respond to the request, and Steinbaugh filed a complaint with the New Jersey Government Records Council.

At that point, Irvington Township claimed that Steinbaugh, being from out of state, had no right to the records (false!) and deserved to be referred to law enforcement and criminally prosecuted (no!). Not only were Irvington Township’s arguments frivolous; they backfired: Saber-rattling about vexatious lawsuits against a free speech lawyer is like threatening them with a good time.

THE REDACTIONS DON’T GITMO SURREAL AWARD

The US Southern Command

The US facility at Guantanamo Bay regularly serves up both insults and injuries. A number of people still held there have been subjected to torture and other inhumane treatment at US “black sites”; many are imprisoned indefinitely; and the Pentagon considers detainees’ artwork to be property of the U.S. government. The whole thing is a bit surreal, but US Southern Command (SOUTHCOM) has more techniques for turning up the dial.

Bloomberg reporter Jason Leopold submitted a FOIA request in 2017 for artwork created by those detained at Guantanamo Bay. SOUTHCOM finally fulfilled the request last spring, and it took its own creative liberties with the release.

To the hundreds of pages of colorful paintings and drawings created by Gitmo prisoners, the military added hundreds of little white redactions. FOIA requires redactions to be very particular and to specifically cite applicable exemptions. It seems there were plenty of very particular elements with which the agency took issue, claiming that amidst trees of leaves and other scenes were materials that were ineligible for release due to personal privacy concerns and the risk that they would betray law enforcement techniques. When prisoners’ art could potentially disclose military secrets, we’re well

The Monkees’ Micky Dolenz filed a lawsuit to force the FBI to turn over spying records.

through the looking glass.

“Gitmo, after 20-plus years, is not only a black box of secrecy,” Leopold said, “but it has its own Orwellian rules when it comes to transparency.”

The Foilies (CC BY) were compiled by the Electronic Frontier Foundation (Director of Investigations Dave Maass, Senior Staff Attorney Aaron Mackey, Frank Stanton Fellow Mukund Rathi, Investigative Researcher Beryl Lipton) and MuckRock (Co-Founder Michael Morisy, Data Reporter Dillon Bergin, and Investigations Editor Derek Kravitz), with further review and editing by Shawn Musgrave. Illustrations are by EFF Designer Caitlyn Crites. The Foilies are published in partnership with the Association of Alternative Newsmedia.

If you’ve read this far, SFR thanks you for it. So does the Electronic Frontier Foundation, and so does EFF’s director of investigations, Dave Maass, himself an SFR alum. Now, we’re gonna ask you to read just a little further. Given some of the challenges our newspaper has faced on the government transparency front in the last year, we felt we’d be remiss without including a local Foilie:

THE HUNDRED DAYS POLICE REPORT AWARD

The Santa Fe Police Department

Police reports are among the most basic public records known to humankind. There’s not a state anywhere in the purple mountains or along the fruited plain that doesn’t require cops to cough ‘em up on request. In New Mexico they’re known as “original records of entry” under the Inspection of Public Records Act, our state’s sunshine law. And original records of entry are always public under IPRA. SFR’s grizzled news team has nearly a

century in journalism under its collective belt, and none of us can recall a time when snagging a police report presented much of a hassle. Hell, back in the olden days of, like, a few years ago, a reporter (or anyone else) could just roll up to police HQ anywhere in New Mexico, ask for a report and walk away with some light, poorly written reading.

That is no longer the case anymore with the Santa Fe Police Department.

Like the rest of the City of Santa Fe, the cops here are now using an online portal—a nightmarish abyss called “NextRequest”— to deal with all public records requests, even for garden variety police reports. (We think the portal is a rolling violation of IPRA in and of itself, but that is a gripe for another time.) The upshot: SFPD

pushes out a news release saying someone got shot in a park, our journalist asks for it.

“You’ll need to use NextRequest,” comes the cold reply. A high-profile so-and-so gets arrested on suspicion of DWI. Report, please? “You’ll need to use NextRequest.” Officer rescues adorable kitten from tree.

“You’ll need to use NextRequest” if you wanna write some copaganda about it. And here’s the thing about SFPD and NextRequest: It takes a veeerrrryyyy long time to get the report, if you get it at all. Consider:

A man was shot to death in August at Ragle Park, as announced in a SFPD news release. SFR asked for the police report on the 11th of that month. We got it on Sept. 15. That’s 35 days.

Later in August, a man was killed on Cerrillos Road. Again, the cop shop let the public know via news release. We slithered into the NextRequest swamp on Aug. 30 and shook our metal cup for the police report. After granting itself a few extensions on the 15 days IPRA requires to comply with a request before the requester can start collecting money damages, SFPD claimed our entreaty was a “duplicate”— it wasn’t—and closed the matter. SFR has tried to rectify this affront, to no avail. As of this writing, 198 days have passed, and we still don’t have the damn report.

This one’s personal: On Sept. 30, somebody did some creepin’ and crawlin’ around SFR Editor and Publisher Julie Ann Grimm’s place. She NextRequested the report a few days later, on Oct. 4. The mystic NextRequest responded some time later with a befuddling communique: No records existed. Hmmm. So, Grimm emailed Deputy Police Chief Ben Valdez in search of satisfaction—not something the average Santa Fe resident would be able to do, but that, too, is a gripe for another time. She finally got the report on Jan. 6. SFR will do the math for you: It took 98 days to get that report. For an attempted residential trespassing.

As all this nonsense was playing out, Grimm emailed Santa Fe City Manager John Blair in September to make him aware of the outrageous delays we’d been seeing with police reports. He never responded.

If you’ve read this far, SFR thanks you for it. So does the Electronic Frontier Foundation, and so does EFF’s director of investigations, Dave Maass, himself a SFR alum. Now, we’re gonna ask you to read just a little further. That’s because, this past year, given some of the challenges our newspaper has faced on the government transparency front, we felt we’d be remiss without including a local Foilie:

The Bloomberg reporter Jason Leopold submitted a FOIA request in 2017 for artwork created by those detained at Guantanamo Bay.

LAND, HO!

We’ve said it before and we’ll say it again—there’s certainly no shortage of landscapes hanging in Santa Fe galleries. The real question is how an artist might stand out from the pack? In this case, Russian-born Pecos resident Felix Voltsinger does just that by bringing a sort of expressionistic edge to impressionistic works. OK, we get that that’s a lot of “istics.” Consider: Voltsinger reportedly never works from photographs, but instead uses his own dang memory to create paintings that are recognizable but dreamlike. Soft at the edges and magically comforting, Voltinsger’s works elicit outdoor memories and inspire future sojourns. You know these places, right? Maybe you don’t. Maybe you will. Maybe this is the reason you start finding out. (ADV)

Felix Voltsinger: Land, Space and Color Opening:

4-6 pm Thursday, March 16. Free Santa Fe Community College, 6401 Richards Ave. (505) 428-1000

ART OPENING FRI/17

IT’S KIND OF A BIG DEAL

Santa Fe is no stranger to the legendary artist game. Hell, quite a few of ‘em came out of our fair hamlet. Still, when a space like LewAllen Galleries—which is easily one of the more steadfast galleries when it comes to hosting excellent shows—announces it’s going to exhibit some lesser-seen figurative works by Pablo Picasso, it’s hard not to think about how that’s kind of amazing. Starting this week, you, too, can swing by the Railyard-based gallery to catch works on paper. Some of them are exactly what you think they are, some of them are surprising, intriguing and, perhaps, new to most but the more seasoned visual arts fans. Brass tacks? Where else are you going to see this stuff outside of a museum around here? (ADV)

Celebrating Picasso’s Legacy: Important Works on Paper Opening: 5 pm Friday, March 17. Free LewAllen Galleries, 1613 Paseo de Peralta (505) 988-3250

WORKSHOP SAT/18

ALL ABOUT THE PAPER

Even for those of us who missed the heyday of zines, the process of creating them touches on something powerfully nostalgic. Maybe it’s because so many people spent some portion of childhood cutting photos from old magazines; maybe it’s just that very specific non-toxic glue stick smell. Regardless, zine making just plain feels good in that it lets you build little paper altars to the weird things you love— whether those be old short form sci-fi stories or B horror movies so disgusting they make your loved ones’ eyes pop out. And with the library providing all the materials, this workshop is a great place to start. Maybe save any gore for home, though—all ages are welcome. (Siena Sofia Bergt)

Zine Workshop: 3-5 pm Saturday, March 18

Free. Santa Fe Public Library Main Branch

145 Washington Ave., (505) 955-6780

TALK FRI/17

Now and Then

Journalist and storyteller Tara Gatewood discusses the communicative nature of Indigenous pottery

“I think we’re often severed from the outside world, what’s written about us, reported about us,” says journalist and storyteller Tara Gatewood (Isleta Pueblo and Diné). “For us Indigenous people, and especially from my pueblo perspective, though, there was never any fragmentation—we have a continuous connection to the people before us, the people who thrived and survived so we could be here.”

Gatewood is one of a coterie of members from the Pueblo Pottery Collective which, along with the Museum of Indian Arts & Culture and the School for Advanced Research, co-curated the ongoing Grounded in Clay exhibit at MIAC that opened last summer. After its stint in Santa Fe, the show will travel far and wide, illuminating the practicality and histories of pottery, clay vessels, Indigenous artistry, et al. At an upcoming talk from Gatewood through the School for Advanced Research, she will discuss how certain pieces—specifically a Mogollon jar and an Isleta vessel—informed her as a storyteller, a writer, a journalist and, now, a curator.

“We were asked to come in see the collection and to find something that connected to us, or that we felt connected to,” Gatewood tells SFR. “That in itself is just amazing, the ability to walk into this room of many different vessels and say, ‘OK, which

of these am I going on a journey with?’ And it has created so much introspection, fathered so much curiosity.”

In brief, Gatewood says, modern clay and ceramic methodologies are still intertwined with elements of the practice dating back hundreds of years, which aids in understanding how communication between present day creators and their ancestors has such a vital place in contemporary artistry and academia.

“We are not necessarily time-machining, more like we’re picking up a line that has always been there, a live wire that connects many generations to now,” Gatewood says. “This live wire has been there this whole time, and the group of people who make up the Pottery Collective are putting their hands on it to think about how these periods connect. You can run your hands on these vessels and hear the sound, you can think of your ancestors running their hands over it and being able to make the exact same sound. That’s as important and fresh as the moment it was made hundreds of years ago.” (Alex

De Vore)

COURTESY SANTA FE COMMUNITY COLLEGE VISUAL ARTS GALLERY COURTESY LEWALLEN GALLERIES COURTESY SANTA FE PUBLIC LIBRARY

TARA GATEWOOD

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ONGOING

ART

ANNUAL MEMBERS’ SHOW

Foto Forum Santa Fe 1714 Paseo de Peralta (505) 470-2582

Showcasing the recent work of more than 50 local photographers.

Noon-5 pm, Thurs-Fri; 12:30-5 pm, Tues, free

AMALGAMATION: BEHIND

THE STUDIO DOOR

Vital Spaces Midtown Annex 1600 St. Michael’s Drive vitalspaces.org

Printmakers, painters and much more.

1-5 pm, Tues-Sun, free

ARRIVALS 2023

form & concept

435 S Guadalupe St. (505) 216-1256

A sneak peek at the gallery’s upcoming exhibitions.

10 am-5 pm, Tues-Sat, free

THE ART OF WALKING BACKWARDS: RODNEY

HATFIELD

Susan Eddings Pérez Galley

717 Canyon Road (505) 477-4ART

Geometric oil paintings nodding towards Primitivism.

10 am-5 pm, Mon-Sat; Noon-5 pm, Sun, free

ATI MAIER: THE WORLD IS MY

OYSTER

Peyton Wright Gallery

237 E Palace Ave., (505) 989-9888

Psychedelic twists on universal landscapes.

9 am-5 pm, Mon-Fri; Noon-5 pm, Sat, free

ATTASALINA: FREED FROM RAGE AND SORROW

Aurelia Gallery 414 Canyon Road (505) 501-2915

Twenty years of black-and-white autobiographical photography printed using a range of techniques.

11 am-5 pm, Mon-Fri; Noon-5 pm, Sat-Sun, free

BLAIR: TECHNICOLOR GLASSES

Iconik Coffee Roasters

1600 Lena St. (505) 428-0996

Vibrant acrylic portraits of women.

7:30 am-5 pm, free

CARLOS CANUL: BETWEEN WORLDS

Strata Gallery 418 Cerrillos Road (505) 780-5403

Darkly surreal landscapes playing with Meso-American mythology.

10 am-5 pm, Tues-Sat, free

CARRIED IMPRESSIONS: LITHOGRAPHS AND MONOPRINTS

Gerald Peters Contemporary

1011 Paseo de Peralta (505) 954-5700

Archiving Phyllis Sloane and Garo Antreasian’s 1960s print works.

10 am-5 pm, Tues-Sat, free DANA HART-STONE AND DANA NEWMANN: A STATE OF NEWNESS

Pie Projects

924B Shoofly St. (505) 372-7681

Mixed-media pieces formed from antique ephemera.

11 am-5 pm, Tues-Sat, free EBENDORF AND THE USUAL SUSPECTS

form & concept

435 S Guadalupe St. (505) 216-1256

Selections from the career of famed jeweler Robert Ebendorf.

10 am-5 pm, Tues-Sat, free

FOOD FOTO

FEAR OF FLYING TITLE Gallery

423 W San Francisco St. titlegallery.org

Humans and birds on canvas. Noon-4 pm, Sat or by appt., free FOTO CUBA

Artes de Cuba

1700 A Lena St., (505) 303-3138

Documenting life on the island.

10 am-4 pm, Tues-Sat, free FRANCIS DIFRONZO

Evoke Contemporary

550 S. Guadalupe St. (505) 995-9902

Uneasy local landscapes.

10 am-5 pm, Mon-Sat, free HERMAN MARIL: SCENES FROM MID-CENTURY AMERICA

LewAllen Galleries

1613 Paseo de Peralta (505) 988-3250

Sparse modernist paintings.

10 am-6 pm, Mon-Fri;

10 am-5 pm, Sat, free

IMMORTAL

Santa Fe Community College 6401 Richards Ave. (505) 428-1000

Honoring seven late ceramicists.

8 am-5 pm, Mon-Fri, free

INSIDE OUT

Axle Contemporary Visit axleart.com for daily location (505) 670-5854

Chromatic, symbolic abstracts.

10 am-4 pm, Tues-Thurs, Sat-Sun;

10 am-7 pm, Fri, free

INVENTORY OF REFLECTION: C ALEX CLARK form & concept

435 S Guadalupe St. (505) 216-1256

Holograms embedded in glass.

10 am-5 pm, Tues-Sat, free

JESSICA LAUREL REESE

Prism Arts & Other Fine Things

1300 Luisa St., Ste. 3A (248) 763-9642

Steel rod figurative sculptures.

11 am-5 pm, Weds-Sat, free

KAREN HAMPTON

Kouri + Corrao Gallery

3213 Calle Marie (505) 820-1888

Textiles blending historical commentary with folk imagery. Noon-5 pm, Tues-Sat, free

LISA GORDON: WILD THINGS

Sorrel Sky Gallery 125 W Palace Ave. (505) 501-6555

Cast sculptures of local animals.

9:30 am-5:30 pm, Mon-Sat; 10 am-5 pm, Sun, free

LISBETH CORT

El Zaguán 545 Canyon Road, (505) 982-0016

Chromatic collages.

9 am-5 pm, Mon-Fri, free

MERIDEL RUBENSTEIN CONTAINER

1226 Flagman Way (505) 995-0012

Haunting photography addressing Iraqi water reclamation.

11 am-5 pm, Tues-Sun, free

The Naghash Ensemble brings traditional Armenian folk music to the San Miguel Mission on Saturday evening.

DAVID GALSTYAN / COURTESY OF AMP CONCERTS

ENTER EVENTS AT SFREPORTER.COM/ CAL

MOVING IMAGE FILM CO-OP

No Name Cinema

2013 Piñon st., nonamecinema.org

Ephemera from Santa Fe’s 1971-72 DIY film scene. During events or by appt., free

PEDRO REYES

SITE Santa Fe

1606 Paseo de Peralta (505) 989-1199

Multimedia political sculptures.

10 am-5 pm, Sat-Mon, Thurs; 10 am-7 pm, Fri, free

RESONANCES

Currents 826

826 Canyon Road (505) 772-0953

Southwestern artists experiment with futuristic techniques.

11 am-4 pm, Fri-Sun, free

SEVEN CONTEMPLATIONS

CONTAINER

1226 Flagman Way (505) 995-0012

Artist Swoon’s huge installations, on view until March 15.

11 am-5 pm, Tues-Sun, free

SF PHOTOGRAPHY AWARD

Online fotoforumsantafe.com/award

Submit snaps by the end of the day on March 15 to win a show at Foto Forum.

$35-45

SFR FOOD FOTO CONTEST

Online sfreporter.com/contests

Send mouth-watering photos by March 28 for a possible cash prize.

$5

SHADOWS AND LIGHT

ViVO Contemporary

725 Canyon Road (505) 982-1320

Exploring the concept of chiaroscuro across media.

10 am-5 pm, free

SITE SCHOLARS: TENTH

ANNIVERSARY SHOW

SITE Santa Fe 1606 Paseo de Peralta (505) 989-1199

The annual group exhibition of emerging New Mexican artists.

10 am-5 pm, Sat-Mon, Thurs;

10 am-7 pm, Fri, free

SOFT

Smoke the Moon 616 1/2 Canyon Road smokethemoon.com

Multidisciplinary takes on the word “soft.”

Noon-4 pm, Wed-Sun, free

SPONTANEOUS INSPIRATION

Aurelia Gallery

414 Canyon Road (505) 501-2915

Abstract paintings of decay.

11 am-5 pm, Mon-Fri; Noon-5 pm, Sat-Sun, free

STILL BEAUTY

Obscura Gallery

1405 Paseo de Peralta (505) 577-6708

Photographing winter.

11 am-5 pm, free

TERRAN LAST GUN

Hecho Gallery

129 W Palace Ave. (505) 455-6882

Piikani aesthetics meet pop art.

10 am-5 pm, Weds-Sun, free

THESE WINGS: MICHAEL

GODEY

Eye on the Mountain Art Gallery

222 Delgado St. (928) 308-0319

Mixed-media pieces probing the connections between humans and the natural world.

11 am-6 pm, Mon-Sat, free

LA VIE DES ARBRES: JEAN

MARC RICHEL

Santa Fe Public Library Southside

6599 Jaguar Drive (505) 955-2820

Paintings, collages and reverse prints inspired by trees.

10 am-8 pm, Tues-Thurs;

10 am-6 pm, Fri-Sat, free

WES MILLS: DRAWINGS

5. Gallery

2351 Fox Road, Ste. 700 (505) 257-8417

New works on paper.

Noon-5 pm, Thurs-Sat, free

WINTER ABSTRACTIONS:

GROUP SHOW

Gaia Contemporary 225 Canyon Road #6 (505) 501-0415

Mixed-media abstract offerings.

10 am-5 pm, free

WINTER FESTIVAL PART

TWO

LEWALLEN GALLERIES

1613 Paseo de Peralta (505) 988-3250

A group show highlighting representational artists.

10 am-6 pm, Mon-Fri;

10 am-5 pm, Sat, free

WINTER GROUP EXHIBITION

Charlotte Jackson Fine Art 554 S Guadalupe St. (505) 989-8688

Architectural pieces lit by pops of primary colors.

10 am-5:30 pm, Tues-Fri; 10 am-5 pm, Sat, free

WINTER GROUP SHOW

Chiaroscuro Contemporary Art

558 Canyon Road (505) 992-0711

Sculpture, photography and more.

10 am-5 pm, Tues-Sat, free

WED/15

EVENTS

FREE KIDS SING ALONG Railyard Park

740 Cerrillos Road

(505) 316-3596

Sarah-Jane from Queen Bee Music Association leads music games and sing-alongs for toddlers and babies.

10:30-11:15 am, free

GEEKS WHO DRINK

Second Street Brewery (Railyard)

1607 Paseo de Peralta

(505) 989-3278

Don't call it trivia.  8-10 pm, free

HISTORY CHAT

35 Degrees North

60 E San Francisco St. (505) 629-3538

Join walking tour guide

Christian Saiia to discuss geopolitics and colonization.  Noon-2 pm, free

OPEN MIC COMEDY

Chile Line Brewery

204 N Guadalupe St. (505) 982-8474

Wayward Comedy welcomes you to the stage weekly. Better make 'em laugh.

8-10 pm, free

WEE WEDNESDAYS

Santa Fe Children's Museum

1050 Old Pecos Trail (505) 989-8359

Today's theme is "people grow like flowers," and the wee folks of the title will be making flower hats.

10:30-11:30 am, free

MUSIC

AN EVENING WITH TANYA TUCKER

Lensic Performing Arts Center

211 W San Francisco St. (505) 988-1234

The country legend behind “Delta Dawn” and “What’s your Mama’s Name” pays Santa Fe a visit.

7:30 pm, $44-$79

DANA COOPER

Jean Cocteau Cinema

418 Montezuma Ave. (505) 466-5528

The man’s folk songs have been recorded by the likes of Trout Fishing in America, FWIW.

7 pm, $20-$50

DRUG CHURCH + PRINCE

DADDY & THE HYENA

Meow Wolf

1352 Rufina Circle (505) 395-6369

Albany post-hardcore and punk rock.

8 pm, $22

EARTHQUAKE: SOUL SHAKE

Altar Spirits

545 Camino de la Familia

(505) 577-3663

DJs Swilley and Prairiedog spin vinyl funk, soul and disco. We don't know about you, but we're praying for Sylvester to make us feel (mighty real).

8-11 pm, free

INSTRUMENTAL JAZZ JAM

Club Legato

125 E Palace Ave. (505) 988-9232

For all those jazz afficionados hankering for a chance to jam with the pros.

6 pm, free

JERRY FAIRES

Mine Shaft Tavern

2846 Hwy. 14, Madrid (505) 473-0743

Singer-songwriter tunes from a Madrid local.

7 pm, free

JOE WEST & LORI K. OTTINO

El Rey Court

1862 Cerrillos Road

(505) 982-1931

Classic country and Southwestern originals.

8-10 pm, free

LUCY BARNA

Cowgirl

319 S Guadalupe St. (505) 982-2565

Original Americana, folk and singer-songwriter melodies.

4-6 pm, free

CONTINUED ON PAGE 21

WINTER LECTURE SERIES

Alan Carr

Manhattan Project Spies at Los Alamos

March 28th, 6:00–7:00 pm

St. Francis Auditorium, New Mexico Museum of Art $10, free for Las Golondrinas and MNMF Members

2022 2022

During the Manhattan Project, four Los Alamos insiders stole secret information and provided it to the Soviet Union. This is the story of their treachery.

Alan B. Carr currently serves as a Program Manager and the Senior Historian for Los Alamos National Laboratory.

With a recent $25,000 Grants for Arts Project award from the National Endowment for the Arts, Santa Fe’s Institute of American Indian Arts and Georgia O’Keeffe Museum have jointly announced they will onboard IAIA student Kimberly Becenti (Tohono O’odham Nation) to a management fellowship at the latter’s downtown institution. Hailing from Arizona, Becenti will spend a year working with the museum across a variety of tasks and departments, including collections, registration, documentation and evaluation. In other words, while in pursuit of a bachelor’s degree in Museum Studies, Becenti will have the opportunity to engage with just about every step of the process, and in one of the most well-respected museums in the country. We caught up with her to see what’s what. This interview has been edited for space and clarity.

(Alex De Vore)

Are you an O’Keeffe fan? Is there any special meaning to working with this specific museum for you? It seems like you’ll have a lot of different focuses while you’re there.

I remember learning about O’Keeffe back when I was in high school during one of my art classes, and I’ve always found her an inspiration, being a woman artist. I tend to gravitate more toward female figures in all aspects of my life—music, art, books, anything—so as far as Georgia

O’Keeffe, her paintings, how established she is...she’s known worldwide, and I find that inspiring. It’s kind of like I came full circle; I remember being in high school, learning about her and never thinking this is where I’d end up.

How do you see your work with the O’Keeffe museum shaping up? Are you hopeful to contribute as much as you learn?

I’m hoping to have input. The O’Keeffe Museum is for everyone, and [I’m hoping] to learn from the individuals I’m working with now.

What’s your long game? You’re pursuing a Museum Studies degree, so how do you hope to use that down the line?

After I’m done here and I receive my degree at IAIA, I would love to be able to study abroad and hopefully form a career, get my foot in the door. I have my mind set right now on Italy, Florence, at schools I’ve been looking at there. I have an instructor I’m working with [at IAIA], and he’s very knowledgable [about Florence] as he worked there. That’s where I want to be in the long run—I’d like to go outside of the United States. I also have interest in South America. I would love to be able to work internationally, which makes it pretty cool because at the O’Keeffe, getting to network with different people and opportunities...will help with my travels.

Now that I’m actually doing the work to get there, I see it being a greater possibility for myself, but if you were to ask me five years ago, I probably would’ve said you’re crazy.

I do eventually want to go home with my expertise, but not any time soon or where I’m gonna be there permanently and settle there. I do travel back home a lot—it’s home, I miss it. I know there may be opportunities where I get to work with our tribal cultural center, and I would like to have my input there. I mean, I do want to go home eventually, that is ultimately what I’m going to school for. Even being able to travel and study abroad...I do hope to bring that back to my community.

with Georgia O’Keeffe Museum Fellow Kimberly Becenti JASON ORDAZ

WORKSHOP

AERIAL FABRIC WITH LISA

Wise Fool New Mexico

1131 Siler Road

(505) 992-2588

Learn how to foot lock, drop and pose with the best of 'em.

5:30-7 pm, $23-$28

POI WITH ELI

Wise Fool New Mexico

1131 Siler Road, (505) 992-2588

Get those fiery poles a-spinnin'.

7-8:30 pm, $20-$25

ROPES WITH CLARA

Wise Fool New Mexico

1131 Siler Road, (505) 992-2588

Practice wraps, drops and movement quality—or if you're new to corde lisse, learn what all those words mean.

5:30-7 pm, $23-$28

SOLDIER SONGS AND VOICES

The Candyman Strings & Things

851 St Michael's Drive (505) 983-5906

Vets gather every Wednesday to play and explore songwriting as post-conflict care.

5-7 pm, free

THU/16

ART OPENINGS

LAND, SPACE AND COLOR:

FELIX VOLTSINGER (OPENING)

Santa Fe Community College

6401 Richards Ave.

(505) 428-1000

Plein air western landscapes from a community college faculty member. (See SFR Picks, page 17)

4-6 pm, free

STUDENT ART EXHIBITION (OPENING)

Museum of International Folk Art

706 Camino Lejo

(505) 476-1200

Sharing papier-mache pieces by local sixth-grade students.

5:30-7 pm, free

DANCE

WORLD BALLET SERIES: CINDERELLA

Lensic Performing Arts Center

211 W San Francisco St. (505) 988-1234

It seems like being on pointe would really up the ante of losing that shoe...

7 pm, $41-$101

EVENTS

ALL FIERCE COMEDY SHOW

Jean Cocteau Cinema

418 Montezuma Ave.

(505) 466-5528

You either already love Graviel de la Plaga or you haven’t seen Carlos Medina’s comedy yet.

7 pm, $10-$30

ARTSPRING

James A Little Theatre

1060 Cerrillos Road

(505) 476-6429

New Mexico School for the Arts' performing arts students showcase their best work.

6:30 pm, $15

CHESS & JAZZ CLUB

No Name Cinema

2013 Pinon St. nonamecinema.org

Sip some herbal tea, play some chess, listen to some jazz. Soothing.

6-8 pm, free

DISTILLERY TOUR

Santa Fe Spirits Distillery

7505 Mallard Way, Ste. 1 (505) 467-8892

Check out the barrel aging room, then sample its various fruits.

5 pm, $20

GRATITUDE DOJO

Iconik Coffee Roasters, Red 1366 Cerillos Road (505) 428-0996

A two-hour group gratitude session featuring 12 "stations" to explore different methods of generating gratefulness.

6:30-8:30 pm, free

OPEN MIC POETRY AND MUSIC

Chile Line Brewery 204 N Guadalupe St. (505) 982-8474

Be a modern-day bard for your fellow Santa Feans.

8 pm, free

PAJAMA STORYTIME

Santa Fe Public Library Southside

6599 Jaguar Drive (505) 955-2820

Isn’t storytime always better with your favorite PJs? For families with children ages 5 and under.

6:30-7:30 pm, free

SEEDS & SPROUTS

Santa Fe Children's Museum

1050 Old Pecos Trail (505) 989-8359

Little ones explore pre-planting soil preparation and taste test the year's first harvest.

10:30-11:30 am, free

FOOD

SUSHI POP-UP

Tumbleroot Brewery and Distillery

2791 Agua Fria St. (505) 393-5135

It’s time to get over your Southwest seafood prejudices and try Brent Jung’s sashimi already. We promise you won’t regret it.

5-7:30 pm, free

MUSIC

AETHEREUS / MARROW

MONGER / DISTORTED

EVIL / FROZEN IN THE CATACOMBS

Tumbleroot Brewery & Distillery

2791 Agua Fría St. (505) 303-3808

Seattle-based tech/prog death metal with support from three local bands.

7:30-11 pm, $12-$15

ALEX MURZYN QUARTET

Club Legato

125 E Palace Ave. (505) 988-9232

Bay Area saxophonist Murzyn and his fellow jazz aficionados hold court.

6 pm, free

BILL HEARNE Cowgirl

319 S Guadalupe St. (505) 982-2565

The Kerrville Folk Festival Hall of Famer and former Willie Nelson collaborator holds down happy hour.

4-6 pm, free

BOB MAUS

Eldorado Hotel and Spa

309 W San Francisco St. (505) 988-4455

Piano and vocal takes on blues and soul classics.

6-9 pm, free

HALF BROKE HORSES

Tiny's Restaurant & Lounge

1005 S St. Francis Drive (505) 983-9817

Two-step your way to honky tonk heaven.

7-10 pm, free

QUEEN BEE

Mine Shaft Tavern

2846 Hwy. 14, Madrid (505) 473-0743

Bohemian pop.

7 pm, free

TIM O'BRIEN WITH JAN FABRICIUS AND MARY GAUTHIER WITH JAIMEE HARRIS

St. Francis Auditorium at the New Mexico Museum of Art

107 W Palace Ave. (505) 476-5072

Acoustic country focusing on stories of struggle and redemption.

7:30 pm, $27-$38

THEATER

SEVEN

Teatro Paraguas

3205 Calle Marie (505) 424-1601

A staged reading benefitting the Esperanza shelter, featuring stories of women activists. Basically, a great opportunity to do the Women’s History Month thing.

7:30 pm, $25

THE BABY MONITOR

Santa Fe Playhouse

142 E De Vargas St. (505) 988-4262

New parents are confronted with the intersection of race, class and queer parenting in America—what could possibly go wrong?

7:30 pm, $15-$75

WORKSHOP

BEGINNER FABRIC WITH KRISTEN

Wise Fool New Mexico

1131 Siler Road

(505) 992-2588

If you want to be up in the air but don't know how to get there, this is the class for you.

5:30-7 pm, $23-$28

CLARIFYING MEDITATIVE

WORK Online

bit.ly/3K8d586

(505) 281-0684

Forty minutes of quiet group meditation followed by gentle discussion.

7-8:30 pm, free

CONTINUED ON NEXT PAGE

A Rich Tableau

BY ALEX DE VORE @sfreporter.com

The idea started percolating roughly five years ago, when chef and one-time Charlie Trotter protégé Andrea Abedi took a look around Santa Fe’s culinary landscape and couldn’t find a meaningful or even particularly helpful commercial kitchen at the scale she wanted and needed.

Abedi’s business, The Temptress, was growing, but when you’re working as a private chef in Santa Fe, she says, you’re most often using kitchens inside people’s homes. When you’re working on building and scaling a business with no storefront or specific home base, however, good luck. While Albuquerque and Taos boasted commercial kitchens of one size or another, Santa Fe had no one-stop space.

That, she says, is technically when The Kitchen Table (313 Camino Alire, (505) 226-1984) was born, though the road to taking the concept from kernel of an idea to full-fledged and, frankly, impressive operation inside the old Desert Academy high school building on Camino Alire has been a long one. Now, though, a mere few weeks before The Kitchen Table’s grand opening, with final touches going in and a cadre of food purveyors ready to start working, Abedi and her business partner, Hilary Kilpatric, are anxious to pull the trigger. They’ve sunk their lives into the business, weathered a pandemic and land-use code changes, and have spent roughly $1 million garnered through a grant from the Regional Development Corporation and a private lender to transform a one-time school into a code-compliant and impossibly clean commercial kitchen business. This is the big one, folks, for chefs, caterers, food truck businesses and even farmers— and it looks so promising.

Much of The Kitchen Table’s potential comes from Abedi and Kilpatric’s part-

nership. Sure, it’s a great idea to have a space dedicated to just about every facet of commercial food products imaginable, but its ultimate success will hinge on Abedi and Kilpatric’s acumen. Their relationship dates back to high school, and they’ve got oodles of experience between them: Abedi in the kitchen and Kilpatric in business. The former attended the Culinary Institute of America in New York to learn to cook, then Johnson and Wales University in Rhode Island for a hospitality degree. The latter attended UC Santa Barbara, picked up a CPA license along the way and even spent time in Guatemala, with the Peace Corps, and in Laos. While living and working abroad, Kilpatric mainly helped artists start their own small businesses, which, in part, is how she wound up back in Santa Fe working with the International Folk Art Market and where, she learned, Abedi had been kicking around the idea of starting a commercial kitchen business.

“It started with me needing a kitchen that didn’t exist in Santa Fe,” Abedi says, “and then it turned out there’s a lot of people who need one.”

“I had been supporting artists and entrepreneurs,” Kilpatric adds, “now it’s food artists and entrepreneurs.”

At the start, Abedi says, she went through Santa Fe’s bizMIX accelerator program, which not only helped wouldbe business owners identify the language and skillsets needed to start their projects, but connected them to meaningful networking opportunities. Through that program, Abedi realized her idea was a solid one. Kilpatric was the magic ingredient that brought the idea into reality. So began the work: the land-use requirements and permitting; the construction and that God-awful pandemic, which, Kilpatric says, upped certain costs by 30% and stalled permits. Cut to today, and The Kitchen Table is nearly complete. A recent tour with Abedi and Kilpatric proves that they’ve thought out and nailed down just about any detail, too.

Right inside the door, for example, you’ll find a sort of vestibule/waiting area space, which sits adjacent to a room rife with possibilities for public-facing events, such as pop-ups and dinners, meetings, whatever. Deeper within, a kitchen with numerous workstations has nearly been

completed, and all down a long hallway are rooms for storage and refrigeration, including two massive and custom-built walk-in units. There’s a locker room/ lounge, too, plus a large back entry door into which clients may load and unload. And, at the far end of Abedi and Kilpatric’s usable space, The Kitchen Table’s first anchor tenant, Squash Blossom CSA and its founder, Nina Yozell-Epstein, have set up shop. Squash Blossom won’t be part of the kitchen spaces, but can you even imagine the implications of fresh veggies literally already in the building?

It’s just one of the ways The Kitchen Table will operate differently than similar businesses of its ilk. Take, for example, accessibility. Abedi says that even when she has worked in commercial kitchens in the area, booking time isn’t always convenient, nor is transporting all your equipment and food and such. The Kitchen Table provides 24-hour access with video monitored security and dedicated stations and spaces within, allowing would-be members (more on that in a sec) constant control of how and when they get to work. With other amenities such as onsite management, some of the nicest ovens and cooktops in the business and free wi-fi, memberships are already filling up fast. Chef Fernando Ruiz of the soon-to-open Escondido taco joint is a member, for example, as are chef Dakota Weiss of Catch Poke and pickle/hot sauce proprietor David Ahern-Seronde, whose Apicklelypse hot sauce/pickling brand

is easily one of the more exciting foodbased wholesale businesses to come out of Santa Fe in recent years.

Memberships cost a monthly fee based on the number of hours a user might need. The more hours per month one claims, the cheaper the fees on things like extra hours and a la carte services. Of course, potential clients will need to already have their food manager’s and handler’s certificates, as well as their business licenses and liability insurance.

And it all comes in a picture-perfect layout with consideration to everything from the height of prep tables and whether or not a sink will be used for meat, to the temperature of the freezer and how the natural light spilling in through the windows might affect food photography. The Kitchen Table is still accepting member applications ahead of its projected April 27 grand opening date.

“We both wanted to come back and do something for our town,” Kilpatric says, “and we have different motivations. Mine is to empower entrepreneurs, and Andrea’s is more based on building a community in the food business. Our interests meet perfectly at the intersection of commercial kitchen.”

“For so long it was just a concept,” Abedi adds. “It was, y’know, papers and diagrams drawn out, and moving around sticky notes. To see the back end and front end coming together into a place where people can actually use this space is so exciting.”

Hilary Kilpatric (left) and Andrea Abedi set out to open Santa Fe’s best if not first major commercial kitchen. The Kitchen Table is slated to open on April 27—visit thekitchentablesantafe.com for more.

The Kitchen Table is poised to become Santa Fe’s one-stop commercial kitchen mecca—meet the women behind it

To Sleep, Perchance to Dream

Is iwatchyousleep singlehandedly reviving post-punk and screamo in Santa Fe?

BY ALEX DE VORE alex@sfreporter.com

All the way back in 2019, then-SFR music writer Luke Henley wrote of local act The Blackout Pictures that, “while it seems like such a songwriting practice could be a nightmare if the chemistry were even slightly off, each member seems to have it dialed in.”

True enough, and in a relatively short time, the band put out three full-length records, became a mainstay on local stages and carved out a niche in Santa Fe’s post-hardcore scene, by which I mean they were just about the only people doing it. But this piece isn’t actually about The Blackout Pictures—they broke up last year. And, y’know, that might have been a tragedy if vocalist Lindsay Payton and drummer Jeff Jedlowski hadn’t picked up the pieces and formed iwatchyousleep, a complete banger of a band whose first release, a self-titled collection clocking in at seven songs, came out earlier this year.

Full disclosure? I’ve been putting off digging into iwatchyousleep despite the band reaching out around the time of release. My own middling band played with The Blackout Pictures a number of times and I’d formed emotional attachments to some of their songs. The fear, as it were, came from a feeling I couldn’t listen objectively enough, but this has proven to be a mistake. Don’t get me wrong, I’ll still bump Blackout Pictures jams in the car, but iwatchyousleep feels both like an evolutionary leap and a more varied take

After the Fire

on genres like emo, post-punk, metal, rock and more.

Intact is Payton’s ability to phase between clean vocals and brutal screams. In the best way I can say it, Payton’s imperfect delivery offers much of the charm on the album. Instead of over-production and/or auto-tune corner cutting, Payton’s sincerity just plain works on songs like “Real Quiet,” the sort of number that sounds like Rush turning evil. Payton follows those threads into the following track, “Hurt, Motherfucker,” wherein she describes herself as “mechanical as a windmill turning alone in a field.” Opener “Gone to the Storm” might be the most effective display of iwatchyousleep’s prowess, though, with its throwback Militia Group screamo vibe (anyone remember Blueprint Car Crash? No? Y’all should look ‘em up ASAP) and Iron Maiden-esque drum gallop courtesy of Jedlowski.

But what of the newcomers, bassist Jake Osborn and guitarist Auston Sceirine? Champions both. Osborn’s driving rhythm’s practically steer the ship, and he’s not afraid to drop out when necessary or to elicit Misfitsstyle punk rock flair—or to come out to the forefront with fuzzy excellence. Sceirine, meanwhile, phases between chords, riffs and chugs so seamlessly it’s almost hard to keep up on tracks like “Red At Dusk,” but the fun is in the attempt.

Once again, Decibel Foundry studio founder, producer and metal maniac Augustine Ortiz proves his knack for tunes that fall outside his usual metal purview. iwatchyousleep is, in fact, such a brilliant encapsulation of so many local music titans’ ability to mature that we can almost regard it like a time capsule. Try as you might, you won’t be able to assign it any single qualifier—the only thing to do is listen relentlessly and fall in love.

WILL 2023 BE THE YEAR YOU GO SOLAR & LOCK IN ENERGY SAVINGS?

Fire ravaged the interior of the Alas de Agua Art Collective’s Southside space last month, and the damage was...not small. Though no one was hurt, the disaster came in the leadup to a new group opening from the collective dubbed Tejiendo Art Show. That was obviously postponed, and the subsequent time has found members, friends and volunteers and trying to clean up and bring things back to normalcy, but even then, it’s only a start.

Alas de Agua officially kicked off in 2018 and has hosted everything from mural workshops, poetry readings and writing classes to solo and group art shows, plus more. It is, unequivocally, one of the more important groups of people working to better the lives of Southside residents and youth with a special emphasis on BIPOC and queer folks—though do note Alas is open to all, no matter from where they hail. Still, it needs support to keep going.

“We’re the only Brown-led organization in the arts on the Southside,” says-co founder Israel Francisco Haros Lopez. “[The fire] could have ended us, but it’s not— we still need help.” If you’re interested in donating to Alas de Agua, including building costs and future programming, visit gofundme.com/ alas-de-agua-southside-buildingand-programming. As of this writing, the effort had reached a little more than $7,000 of a $40,000 goal, which would, Haros Lopez says, help for an entire year.

Santa Fe’s iwatchyousleep is well worth your time. Visit iwatchyousleep.bancamp.com to hear why.

Scream VI Review

BY ALEX DE VORE alex@sfreporter.com

Oh, good—the original Kevin Williamson/Wes Craven Scream film is 27 years old. Great. Wonderful. That’s fun. But even as some of us struggle to contend with how we were pretty sure it just came out a minute ago, there’s no denying its indelible mark on horror cinema, its self-referential stab (#swish) at dissecting the genre’s tropes and repackaging them with sly nods and—spoiler alert for a nearly 30-yearold movie—more than one killer slashing their way through teens played by folks in their late-20s.

Jump to today, and the franchise now runs six deep while somehow staying fresh (or fresh adjacent). Scream VI is a hell of a good time.

In VI, we follow the so-called core four, survivors of 2022’s Scream (side note, why do we let filmmakers give later entries in a franchise the same title as earlier entries?) as they move from small town life in the fictional Woodsboro, California, to New York City for college. Their leader, so to speak, Samantha (Melissa Barrera), is still holding onto the things that happened to everybody last time (killings, et al), plus she struggles with the whole thing where she’s the daughter of the original film’s big bad, Billy Loomis (Skeet Ulrich), and this means therapy.

Her sister (the increasingly adored Jenna Ortega) attends college, her pals do, too, and everyone tries to put the events of their hometown slayings to bed.

STORMING CAESARS PALACE

In 1971, a group of mothers led a march down the Las Vegas Strip and into Caesars Palace, shutting down gambling in the famed casino and taking on the biggest industry in Nevada.

The women relied on public assistance to feed their children. But the state, known for its libertarian politics and reliant on the labor of hospitality workers, was stingy with benefits and illegally kicked some mothers off the rolls amid a wave of panic over so-called “welfare queens.” In organizing other mothers to shut down the icon of American excess that is the Vegas Strip, Ruby Duncan and her allies—most of them Black women—not only put a spotlight on poverty, they challenged how Americans view people experiencing poverty.

The women featured in the new documentary Storming Caesars Palace weren’t asking for handouts. They were demanding Americans recognize the work that mothers perform by raising children as work that deserves respect

Even Courteney Cox is there, reprising her role as unscrupulous newswoman Gale Weathers. Ruhroh, though, because copycat types are still obsessed with the ’97 murders and those who survived, so the principal cast starts getting creepy phone calls again. More murders follow.

Look, no one is saying the Scream franchise is fine art or high-minded cinema, but what it lacks in pretentiousness or even seriousness is secondary to how hard it leans into exactly what it is. There are no growing pains here or identity issues. In fact, Scream VI has some of the best cinematography in the genre, an arresting score and solid performances from pretty much everybody. Directors Matt Bettinelli-Olpin and Tyler Gillett know precisely what to do here, which is to get a bunch of young people running around terrified while a knife-wielding maniac takes them down one by one; all the while, the very movie itself winks knowingly at us, as if to

as well as pay. Director Hazel Gurland-Pooler and producer Nazenet Habtezghi use recent interviews and spectacular archival footage, letting audiences hear from Duncan in her own words and transporting viewers to the frontlines of a movement that took on racism, the mob and a rising tide of Reaganism.

In real life, politics—and the slow work of organizing in particular—doesn’t always make for exciting movies, but the documentary brings to life an underappreciated piece of American history. And the voices featured in it resonate as America still grapples with income inequality and amid renewed interest in a guaranteed income, an idea Duncan and her allies were fighting for 50 years ago. (Andrew Oxford) New Mexico PBS, March 20, 9 pm

I GOT A MONSTER 9

+ COMPELLING STORYTELLING OF UBIQUITOUS, GALLING POLICE BEHAVIOR

- VERY COMPLEX TALE FOR A SHORT DOC

“The criminal justice system is built to believe the words of officers, because if you don’t then that really erodes our belief in what’s right and

+ SUPER-DUMB AND KNOWS IT; FUN AND WEIRDLY FUNNY - EVEN FOR SATIRE, SOMETIMES GETS SILLY-SERIOUS

say, “These films are fun, stop being so up your own ass about so-called cinema!”

Instead, find some of the more grounded yet shocking death scenes in recent movie memory, a hysterical appearance from Dermot Mulroney as a cop and Hayden Panettiere at the height of her powers in a genre-busting turn (no spoilers). Oh, they won’t win Oscars and this certainly won’t be the last Scream, but it is among the most fun yet in the series, even if series mainstays Neve Campbell and David Arquette bowed out ages ago.

SCREAM VI

Directed by Bettinelli-Olpin and Gillett

With Barrera, Ortega, Cox, Panettiere and Mulroney Violet Crown, Regal, R, 122 min.

what’s wrong,” defense attorney Ivan Bates, now the City of Baltimore state’s attorney, says into the camera.

What happens, then, when police officers routinely plant evidence and commit robbery to line their own pockets? You may have seen a dramatized version of the Gun Trace Task Force scandal on HBO’s We Own This City last year, based on reporting by the Baltimore Sun and largely from the perspective of federal investigators. For more answers, stream the new doc I Got a Monster: The Rise and Fall of America’s Most Corrupt Police Squad, based on what journalists from an alt-weekly uncovered with victims at the center.

Long before Freddie Gray became a household name in 2015, journalists in Baltimore were working to uncover widespread corruption in the city police force. Stories about abuses by a unit of plainclothes officers were particularly galling. With a special police unit, notes one attorney in the film, came “especially bad policing.”

Baynard Woods and Brandon Soderberg published a book in 2020 based partially on their reporting for the Baltimore City Paper, and

although the documentary version rolls out nearly three years later, the reporting for both mediums occurred simultaneously. Woods serves as an energetic narrator, and director Kevian Casanova Abrams adds powerful storytelling.

An investigation by the US Attorney’s Office eventually resulted in federal prison sentences for police involved in the criminal activity. Yet, the people whose lives they affected with false reports aren’t neatly fixed with that outcome. Lasting, systemic change remains far from reach: DOJ is yet to wrap its investigation in Baltimore. Further, this story is playing out in other police agencies across the nation, with similar “special units” terrorizing people in other cities. Five officers in the Memphis Police Department’s SCORPION Unit, for example, are charged with murder after they beat Tyre Nichols to death during an arrest last month. Closer to home, the Justice Department forced the Albuquerque Police Department to dismantle its Repeat Offender Project team in 2015 after deep reporting on a legacy of violence by a local journalist. (Julie Ann Grimm) Amazon, Apple TV, NR, 91 min.

by Matt Jones

MIND BODY SPIRIT SFR

PSYCHICS

Rob Brezsny Week of March 15th

ARIES (March 21-April 19): I highly recommend the following experiences: 1. ruminating about what you learned in a relationship that ended—and how those lessons might be useful now. 2. ruminating about a beloved place you once regarded as home—and how the lessons you learned while there might be inspiring now. 3. ruminating about a riddle that has long mystified you— and how clarifying insights you receive in the coming weeks could help you finally understand it.

TAURUS (April 20-May 20): For “those who escape hell,” wrote Charles Bukowksi, “nothing much bothers them after that.” Believe it or not, Taurus, I think that in the coming weeks, you can permanently escape your own personal version of hell—and never, ever have to return. I offer you my congratulations in advance. One strategy that will be useful in your escape is this idea from Bukowski: “Stop insisting on clearing your head—clear your f*cking heart instead.”

GEMINI (May 21-June 20): Gemini paleontologist Louis Agassiz (1807–1883) was a foundational contributor to the scientific tradition. Among his specialties was his hands-on research into the mysteries of fossilized fish. Though he was meticulously logical, he once called on his nightly dreams to solve a problem he faced. Here’s the story: A potentially crucial specimen was largely concealed inside a stone. He wanted to chisel away the stone to get at the fossil, but was hesitant to proceed for fear of damaging the treasure inside. On three successive nights, his dreams revealed to him how he should approach the work. This information proved perfectly useful. Agassiz hammered away at the slab exactly as his dreams suggested and freed the fossilized fish. I bring this marvel to your attention, Gemini, because I suspect that you, too, need to carve or cut away an obstruction that is hiding something valuable. Can you get help from your dreams? Yes, or else in deep reverie or meditation.

CANCER (June 21-July 22): Will you flicker and sputter in the coming weeks, Cancerian? Or will you spout and surge? That is, will you be enfeebled by barren doubts, or will you embolden yourself with hearty oaths? Will you take nervous sips or audacious guzzles? Will you hide and equivocate, or else reveal and pounce? Dabble gingerly or pursue the joy of mastery? I’m here to tell you that which fork you take will depend on your intention and your willpower, not on the caprices of fate. So which will it be: Will you mope and fritter or untangle and illuminate?

LEO (July 23-Aug. 22): I applaud psychologists who tell us how important it is to feel safe. One of the most crucial human rights is the confidence that we won’t be physically or emotionally abused. But there’s another meaning of safety that applies to those of us who yearn to express ourselves creatively. Singer-songwriter David Bowie articulated the truth: “If you feel safe in the area you’re working in, you’re not working in the right area. Always go a little further into the water than you feel you’re capable of being in. Go a bit out of your depth, and when you don’t feel that your feet are quite touching the bottom, you’re in the right place to do something exciting.” I think this is a wise strategy for most of us, even those who don’t identify as artists. Almost everyone benefits from being imaginative and inventive and even a bit daring in their own particular sphere. And this will be especially applicable to you in the coming weeks, Leo.

VIRGO (Aug. 23-Sept. 22): You are in the sweet, deep phase of the Receiving Season. And so you have a right and a duty to show the world you are ready and available to be blessed with what you need and want. I urge you to do everything necessary to become a welcoming beacon that attracts a wealth of invigorating and healing influences. For inspiration, read this quote by author John Steinbeck: “It is so easy to give, so exquisitely rewarding. Receiving, on the other hand, if it be well done, requires a

fine balance of self-knowledge and kindness. It requires humility and tact and great understanding of relationships . . . It requires a self-esteem to receive—a pleasant acquaintance and liking for oneself.”

LIBRA (Sept. 23-Oct. 22): Libran poet E. E. Cummings wrote that daffodils “know the goal of living is to grow.” Is his sweet sentiment true? I would argue it’s only partially accurate. I believe that if we want to shape our destinies with courage and creativity, we need to periodically go through phases of decay and decline. They make periods of growth possible. So I would say, “The goal of life is to grow and wither and grow and wither and grow.” Is it more fun to grow than to wither? Maybe. But sometimes, withering is educational and necessary. Anyway, Libra, I suspect you are finishing a time of withering and will soon embark on a series of germinations and blossoms.

SCORPIO (Oct. 23-Nov. 21): All of us have elements of genius. Every person on the planet possesses at least one special talent or knack that is a gift to others. It could be subtle or unostentatious, like a skill for communicating with animals or for seeing what’s best in people. Or maybe it’s more spectacular, like composing beautiful music or raising children to be strong and compassionate. I mention this, Scorpio, because the coming weeks will be an excellent time to identify your unique genius in great detail—and then nurture it and celebrate it in every way you can imagine.

SAGITTARIUS (Nov. 22-Dec. 21): The emblem associated with Sagittarius is an archer holding a bow with the arrow pointed upwards. This figure represents your tribe’s natural ambition to always aim higher. I bring this to your attention because your symbolic quiver is now full of arrows. But what about your bow? Is it in tiptop condition? I suggest you do some maintenance. Is the bow string in perfect shape? Are there any tiny frays? Has it been waxed recently? And what about the grip? Are there any small cracks or wobbles? Is it as steady and stable as it needs to be? I have one further suggestion as you prepare for the target-shooting season. Choose one or at most two targets to aim at rather than four or five.

CAPRICORN (Dec. 22-Jan. 19): It’s prime time to feel liberated from the urge to prove yourself to anyone. It’s a phase when your self-approval should be the only kind of approval you need, a period when you have the right to remove yourself from any situation that is weighed down with gloomy confusion or apathetic passivity. This is exciting news! You have an unprecedented opportunity to recharge your psychic batteries and replenish your physical vitality.

AQUARIUS (Jan. 20-Feb. 18): I suspect you can now accomplish healthy corrections without getting tangled up in messy karma. Here are my recommendations: 1. As you strive to improve situations that are awry or askew, act primarily out of love rather than guilt or pity. 2. Fight tenderly in behalf of beautiful justice, but don’t fight harshly for ugly justice. 3. Ask yourself how you might serve as a kind of divine intervention in the lives of those you care about—and then carry out those divine interventions.

PISCES (Feb. 19-March 20): In describing her process, Piscean sculptor Anne Truitt wrote, “The most demanding part of living a lifetime as an artist is the strict discipline of forcing oneself to work steadfastly along the nerve of one’s own most intimate sensitivity.” I propose that many Pisceans, both artists and non-artists, can thrive from living like that. The coming weeks will be an excellent time to give yourself to such an approach with eagerness and devotion. I urge you to think hard and feel deeply as you ruminate on the question of how to work steadfastly along the nerve of your own most intimate sensitivity.

Homework: What element is most lacking in your life right now? Your assignment: Get more of it. Newsletter. FreeWillAstrology.com

Go to RealAstrology.com to check out Rob Brezsny’s Expanded Weekly Audio Horoscopes and Daily Text Message Horoscopes . The audio horoscopes are also available by phone at 1-877-873-4888 or 1-900-950-7700. © COPYRIGHT 2023 ROB BREZSNY

PSYCHIC/TAROT READINGS

& SPIRITUAL COUNSELING

“We saw you around this time last year and you were so accurate. We were hoping to schedule another session” S. W. , Santa Fe. For more information call 505-982-8327 or visit www.alexofavalon.com.

What we feel, know, and see is true. Sometimes we need a spiritual guide to assist in seeing our truth. Osara, an African water deity is your natural mirror, come see yourself/come see Osara. 505-810-3018

CHANGES?

Wouldn’t it be great if the answers were more clear? They can be with intuitive training. I’m Ryan Glassmoyer, Intuitive Life Coach teaching you a unique method to access deep truth and direction within yourself. abstracttherapie.com

Text to learn more. 505-231-8036

I’m a certified herbalist, shamanic healer, psychic medium and ordained minister, offering workshops, herbal classes, spiritual counseling, energy healing and psychic readings. Over 30 years’ experience helping others on their path towards healing and wholeness. Please visit lunahealer.com for more information or to make an appointment.

ARE YOU A THERAPIST OR HEALER? YOU BELONG IN MIND BODY SPIRIT! CALL: 988.5541 OR EMAIL: SJ@SFREPORTER.COM TODAY!

SERVICE DIRECTORY

CHIMNEY SWEEPING

COMMUNITY ANNOUNCEMENT

MODERN BUDDHIST MEDITATIONS

LEGALS

A-1 Self Storage New Mexico Auction Ad

Notice of Public Sale Pursuant to NEW MEXICO STATUTES

CASEY’S TOP HAT CHIMNEY SWEEP

Thank you Santa Fe for voting us BEST of Santa Fe 2022 and trusting us for 44 years and counting. We are like a fire department that puts out fires before they happen! Thank you for trusting us to protect what’s most important to you.

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PERSONAL & PROFESSIONAL SERVICES

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Creating a World of Wealth: The Practice of Giving Buddha taught that from giving comes wealth. Maintaining a tight mind, strongly wishing to hold on to our possessions, our time and even our love actually creates causes for future suffering and not having the resources we need. If we really want to be happy all the time, we need to overcome our miserly attitudes through the practice of giving. Through developing our wisdom and improving our mindfulness, we will learn how to create the causes for future wealth, inner and outer, as well as leading us on a path to permanent happiness and inner peace. Gen Khyenwang, Resident Teacher of Kadampa Meditation Center New Mexico is a close disciple and student of Venerable Geshe Kelsang Gyatso and has been teaching under his guidance for many years. Her teachings are clear, heartfelt and extremely practical. With warmth and sincerity, Gen Khyenwang is an inspiring example of putting time tested teachings into practice in daily life. Everyone welcome! No experience necessary. Drop in for a class or attend the whole series and get the most benefit. Meet likeminded people!

Mar. 14 - Overcoming a Tight Mind

Mar. 21 - Give to Others Skillfully

Mar. 28 - Protecting Others from Fear

Apr. 4 - Giving Love & Practical Advice

Santa Fe Women’s Club

1616 Old Pecos Trail

6 - 7:30pm $10

Stephen J Koehler

Education Program Coordinator

505.292.5293

epc@meditationinnewmexico.org

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Introduction to Wicca: A Path of Nature, Spirit, and Magick

You have probably heard of Wicca, but have you ever wondered what it is really all about?

You are invited to find out, in a free series of introductory classes on Wicca, to be held Wednesday evenings in Los Alamos, weekly from March 29 to April 26. Anyone is welcome to attend either out of simple curiosity, or because you might be interested in becoming involved. Wicca is a spiritual path that has roots in ancient shamanic practices but is part of the modern Neopagan movement. It is a benign, ethical form of witchcraft, and is recognized as a religion by the U.S. government and the Parliament of the World’s Religions. The series is sponsored by Our Lady of the Woods, a Wiccan coven serving members in northern New Mexico for over thirty years. Classes will include

• What Wiccans believe

• What we do

• How we live

As well as basic Wiccan history, connection with nature and ecology, gods and goddesses, magickal practices, ethics, and more. These classes are offered as a public service. There is no fee for attending, and no obligation of any sort. We will include information for those who may be interested in possible membership.

CALL 988.5541 TO PLACE YOUR AD TODAY!

– 48-11-1-48-11-9: Notice is hereby given that on the 23rd day of March, 2023 At that time open Bids will be accepted, and the Entirety of the Following Storage Units will be sold to satisfy storage liens claimed by A-1 Self Storage. The terms at the time of the sales will be Cash only, and all goods must be removed from the facility within 48 hours.

A-1 Self Storage reserves the right to refuse any and all bids or cancel sale without notice. Owners of the units may pay lien amounts by 5:00 pm March 22, 2023 to avoid sale. The following units are scheduled for auction. Sale will be beginning at 09:00 am March 23, 2023 at 3902 Rodeo Road Unit#D023 Wolf Hunter 804 Alarid st, Santa Fe, NM 87505; Clippers, skateboard, boxes, bag, picture frame, shoes. Followed by A-1 Self Storage 1311 Clark Road

Unit#1016 Delia Quinonez 1327 Maez Rd, Santa Fe, NM 87505; Appliances, boxing bags, treadmill, whiteboard. Followed by A-1 Self Storage 2000 Pinon Unit#805 LaVonn Tafoya 33 Vista Alegre, Belen, NM 87002; Speakers, amplifier, mattresses, totes, bags, furniture. Unit#204

Marcia King 3357 Cerrillos Rd, Santa Fe, NM 87507; Backpack, luggage, bags, shopping cart.

Unit#703 DG Okpik 51975

Lost Elk Ln, Charlo MT 59824; Boxes, tote, chair, kettle.

Unit#712 Dora Martinez 2523

Camino Espuela, Santa Fe, NM 87501; Furniture, bags, boxes, vacuums. Unit#108

Tobias Roybal 1520 Luisa St #3, Santa Fe, NM 87505; Bags, pillows, cart, boxes, cooler, bucket. Followed by A-1 Self Storage 1591 San Mateo Lane

D-101-CV-2023-00400

IN THE MATTER OF A PETITION FOR CHANGE OF NAME OF DANIEL MICHAEL WOLFF, A MINOR CHILD.

NOTICE OF CHANGE OF NAME TAKE NOTICE that in accordance with the Provisions of Sec. 40-8-1 through Sec. 40-8-3 NMSA 1978, et seq. The Petitioner, Suzane Wolff will apply to the Honorable Francis J. Mathew, District Court Judge of the First Judicial District at the Santa Fe Judicial Complex, remotely via google meet at 10:00 am, on the 28th day of March, 2023 for an ORDER FOR CHANGE OF NAME of the child from DANIEL MICHAEL WOLFF to DANIEL MICHAEL

MIJANGOS WOLFF

KATHLEEN VIGIL, District Court Clerk

BY: MARINA SISNEROS Deputy

Court Clerk

STATE OF NEW MEXICO

COUNTY OF SANTA FE

FIRST JUDICIAL DISTRICT

COURT CASE NO: D-101-CV-2023-00502

IN THE MATTER OF A PETITION FOR CHANGE OF NAME OF MATTHEW DAVID SLAUGHTER

NOTICE OF CHANGE OF NAME TAKE NOTICE that in accordance with the Provisions of Sec. 40-8-1 through Sec. 40-8-3 NMSA 1978, et seq. The Petitioner, Matthew David Slaughter, will apply to the Honorable Francis J. Mathew, District Court Judge of the First Judicial District at the Santa Fe Judicial Complex, remotely via google meet at 11:45 am, on the 10th day of April, 2023 for an ORDER FOR CHANGE OF NAME from MICHAEL DAVID SLAUGHTER to JORDAN MATTHEW ROCKLAND

KATHLEEN VIGIL, District Court Clerk

The general object thereof being: to dissolve the marriage between the Petitioner and yourself. Unless you enter your appearance in this cause within thirty (30) days of the date of the last publication of this Notice, judgment by default may be entered against you. April Greene 505-451-1763

STATE OF NEW MEXICO COUNTY OF SANTA FE FIRST JUDICIAL DISTRICT

Monique Clark Petitioner Plaintiff, Vs. Bryan Wayne Miller Respondent/Defendant. COURT CASE NO: D-101-DM-2022-00625

NOTICE OF PENDENCY OF SUIT. STATE OF NEW MEXICO to Bryan Wayne Miller

GREETINGS: You are hereby notified that Monique Clark, the above named Petitioner has filed a civil action against you in the above-entitled Court and cause. The general object thereof being: to dissolve the marriage between the Petitioner and yourself. Unless you enter your appearance in this cause within thirty (30) days of the date of the last publication of this Notice, judgment by default may be entered against you.

KATHLEEN VIGIL, District Court Clerk

By: Esmeralda Miramontes Deputy Clerk

STATE OF NEW MEXICO COUNTY OF SANTA FE FIRST JUDICIAL DISTRICT COURT CASE NO: D-101-CV-2023-00481

WANTED: Volunteers who love history to lead visitors and locals on walking tours of Santa Fe, starting in spring. As a storyteller and guide trained by NM History Museum, you’ll share true stories behind unique places, actual events and important figures that have shaped our capital and state. Learn more by attending a free introduction on Zoom on Saturday, March 25 at 11 AM to noon or Thursday, March 30 at 4-5 PM. Email your name and preferred date to: wthdsfmanager@gmail.com

Unit#1612 Tina Bernal 1801 Cerrillos Rd, Santa Fe, NM 87505; Luggage, microwave, boxes, bags, totes. Unit#2147

Roberto Baca 258 Urioste St, Santa Fe, NM 87501; Cabinets, furniture, bikes, canopy, shelves, boxes, bags, vacuums, fender, chain. Unit#1236

Michelle Montoya 1899

Pacheco St #1307, Santa Fe, NM 87507; Tent, bike, shovel, bags, extension cord, clothes.

Auction Sale Date, 3/23/23

Santa Fe Reporter 3/8/23 & 3/15/23

By: Marina Sisneros Deputy Court Clerk

FIRST JUDICIAL DISTRICT COURT STATE OF NEW MEXICO COUNTY OF SANTA

FE

April Greene Petitioner/Plaintiff, vs. Brad Stephen Duncan

Respondent/Defendant.

Case No.: D-101 DM-202200446

NOTICE OF PENDENCY OF SUIT STATE OF NEW MEXICO

TO Brad Stephen Duncan.

GREETINGS: You are hereby notified that April Greene, the above-named Petitioner/ Plaintiff, has filed a civil action against you in the aboveentitled Court and cause,

IN THE MATTER OF A PETITION FOR CHANGE OF NAME OF DEANNA TORRY MANDELA. NOTICE OF CHANGE OF NAME TAKE NOTICE that in accordance with the Provisions of Sec. 40-8-1 through Sec. 40-8-3 NMSA 1978, et seq. The Petitioner, Deanna Torry Mandela will apply to the Honorable Francis J. Mathew, District Court Judge of the First Judicial District at the Santa Fe Judicial Complex, remotely via google meet at 11:15 am, on the 3rd day of April, 2023 for an ORDER FOR CHANGE OF NAME of the child from DEANNA TORRY MANDELA to DEANNA VICTORIA TORRYMANDELA

KATHLEEN VIGIL, District Court Clerk

By: Esmeralda Miramontes Deputy

Court Clerk