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Las Posadas procession draws hundreds to Plaza By Chris Quintana The New Mexican
Hundreds of locals and tourists gathered Sunday night on the Plaza to seek shelter with biblical figures Mary and Joseph. It’s not time travel. It’s called Las Posadas, which means “lodging” or “accommoda-
tions,” and it is a celebration that stems from Christian tradition and Spanish folklore. The gathering features actors playing Mary and Joseph as they journey from Nazareth to Bethlehem, struggling to find lodging before Mary gives birth to Jesus Christ. In Santa Fe, the crowd holds candles and follows the holy couple as men
Health insurance
Exchange enrollment falls short of goals
dressed as devils taunt the procession from the Plaza rooftops. At about 5:40 p.m, organizers started lighting attendees’ candles. As soon as one person’s candle was lit, onlookers crowded the new flame holder, seeking a bit of fire for themselves. After five or 10 minutes,
Please see POSADAS, Page A-4
‘Lawrence of Arabia’ star O’Toole, 81, dies The reformed, but unrepentant, hell-raiser remembered for work, love of life. Page A-12
Tech gift guide Roger Atkins, portraying a devil, tells Mary and Joseph there is no room at the inn Sunday during Las Posadas on the Santa Fe Plaza. Clyde Mueller/The New Mexican
World Too much to be gentle? bids final farewell to Mandela City’s $559K bill for prairie dog relocation evokes mixed reaction
South African peacemaker buried in hometown after elaborate state funeral
By Staci Matlock The New Mexican
Fewer than 1,000 New Mexicans had enrolled in the federal health insurance exchange by the end of November — far short of goals for the problem-plagued program — and those who have gotten through have come away with mixed feelings. One Santa Fean who finally managed to enroll in the online exchange after weeks of trying was a bit dismayed to find her health insurance will cost at least $100 more a month under the new plan. Jessica Haynie, owner of Three Stones Consulting, is among those the exchange is depending on to help balance health care costs and keep insurance premiums down — she’s young, healthy and gainfully employed. But she’s also among those who will not qualify for subsidies and will pay more for health insurance. Haynie, who couldn’t keep her insurance coverage with Humana, chose a new plan with New Mexico Health Connections that was one of the cheaper options. The plan will still cost her $1,700 more per year than she was paying for her Humana plan, but she can keep her current doctors. Haynie said she understands she’s paying extra to help cover costs for those who can’t afford health
Please see SHORT, Page A-4
Today Mostly sunny and clear. High 46, low 26. Page A-12
Obituaries Sebastian Ortega, 25, Dec. 8 Page A-10
Pasapick www.pasatiempomagazine.com
Southwest Seminars lecture Our Spiritual Relationship With the Earth, by Leo Killsback, Arizona State University assistant professor of American Indian studies, 6 p.m., Hotel Santa Fe, 1501 Paseo de Peralta, $12, southwestseminars.org, 466-2775. More events in Calendar, A-2 and Fridays in Pasatiempo
Index
A quick guide to the most-wanted tablets and video games. TEcH, A-8
By Christopher Torchia The Associated Press
A prairie dog chirps a warning signal to other prairie dogs to take cover at the Railyard. An ordinance approved in 2001 protects prairie dogs within city limits and requires their ‘humane relocation’ if they live on property slated for commercial construction. New Mexican file photos
By Daniel J. Chacón The New Mexican
O
n farms and ranches across America, prairie dogs are target practice. In the city of Santa Fe, the furry little critters get bubble baths, leftover Big Macs and protection under an ordinance requiring their “humane relocation” if they live on property slated for commercial construction. Even the city government, which has a statue of its patron saint in front of City Hall making eye contact with a prairie dog, is loath to hurt the burrowing rodents. Since the ordinance passed in 2001, the city has incurred $559,000 in relocation costs, much to the chagrin of one city councilor. “I don’t hate prairie dogs, as many people have said I do. I just don’t want them in the fields, and I don’t like that this kind of money is being spent to relocate prairie dogs. The money should and could be spent better within this community,” City Councilor Ron Trujillo said. “It seems like every other place, the minute you get past Santa Fe, be it Pojoaque, Española, Taos, they kill the prairie dogs,” he said. But the city of holy faith has become a prairie dog sanctuary. Twice in recent years, visiting Tibetan Buddhist monks have blessed the prairie dog colony at Frenchy’s Field Park
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From left, Lynne Hough of People for Native Ecosystems and Paula Martin of Prairie Ecosystems try to flush out prairie dogs before relocating them from the campus of what is now the Santa Fe University of Art and Design in 2010.
on Agua Fría Street. During the monks’ first visit, in 2006, the prairie dogs “responded by coming to the surface, moving closer to the praying monks and joining into the chanting and prayers,” according to People for Native Ecosystems, a Santa Fe-based prairie dog advocacy group. Only in extreme circumstances, such as when they contract bubonic plague, will the city kill the critters. Otherwise, the city works to control the population, with methods that include relocation. For several years, the city has been sending its prairie dogs to a remote spot of El Malpais National Conservation Area near Grants, which is managed by the
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Editor: Ray Rivera, 986-3033, rrivera@sfnewmexican.com Design and headlines: Kristina Dunham, kdunham@sfnewmexican.com
Bureau of Land Management. “As far as we know, no one has been disturbing them or bothering them at all,” said Edwin Singleton, the BLM’s district manager in Albuquerque. “They’ve got a pretty good life there.” The prairie dogs are part of a larger plan to reintroduce the endangered black-footed ferret, which preys only on prairie dogs, to El Malpais, he said. “They’re a natural and biological control of prairie dogs, and they keep the populations from exploding and [becoming] more susceptible to disease and things like that,” Singleton said. Santa Fe uses more unconventional — but gentle — methods to control the population.
Please see GENTLE, Page A-4
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Time Out B-11
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QUNU, South Africa — His flag-draped casket resting on a carpet of animal skins, Nelson Mandela was laid to rest Sunday in the green, rolling hills of the eastern hamlet where he began his extraordinary journey — one that led him from prison to the presidency, a global symbol of endurance and reconciliation in the fight against South Africa’s racist rule. Artillery boomed and military aircraft roared overhead as the simple and the celebrated gathered to pay their final respects in Mandela’s native village of Qunu at a state funeral that blended ancient tribal rituals with a display of the might of the new, integrated South Africa. “Yours was truly a long walk to freedom and now you have achieved the ultimate freedom in the bosom of your maker,” Brig. Gen. Monwabisi Jamangile, chaplain-general of the South African military, said as Mandela’s casket was lowered into the ground at the family gravesite. “Rest in peace.” “I realized that the old man is no more, no more with us,” said Bayanda Nyengule, head of a local museum about Mandela, his voice cracking as he described the burial attended by several hundred mourners after a larger funeral ceremony during which some 4,500 people, including heads of state, royalty and celebrities, paid their last respects. The burial ended a 10-day mourning period that began with Mandela’s death on Dec. 5 at 95, and featured a Johannesburg memorial attended by nearly 100 world leaders and three days during which tens of thousands of South Africans of all races and backgrounds filed past Mandela’s casket in the capital, Pretoria. For South Africans, it was also a time for reflection about the racial integration they achieved when Mandela presided over the end of apartheid, and the economic inequality and other challenges that have yet to be overcome and seem certain to test his legacy’s endurance. The burial site marked a return to Mandela’s humble roots, but the funeral trappings were elaborate. South African honor guards from the army, navy and air force marched in formation along a winding dirt road. In contrast to the military pomp, some speakers evoked the traditions of the Xhosa tribe, to which Mandela’s Thembu clan belongs. “A great tree has fallen, he is now going home to rest with his forefathers,” said Chief
Please see MANDELA, Page A-5
Nelson Mandela’s grandson Mandla Mandela, left, watches as military soldiers stand at attention over the former South African president’s casket before his burial Sunday in Qunu, South Africa. Elmond Jiyane/The Associated Press
Two sections, 24 pages 164th year, No. 350 Publication No. 596-440