The Commons recently established the “College Culinary Club” to help find a way to better meet the needs of food insecure college students. The goal is to teach students how to make homemade healthy meals and to make extras to be served to other students who might be food insecure. This service learning club works to broaden the students’ knowledge of cooking by providing them with the space, ingredients and support to fully prepare a meal and helps address the needs of students in a fun and educational way.
The Unitarian Universalist Fellowship of Silver City will be having a presentation on snakes called “Rattlesnake Family Life” on Sunday, October 22nd at 10:00 a.m. Melissa Amarello, Co-founder and Executive Director of Advocates for Snake Preservation will be speaking on the importance of snakes to the natural world, focusing on rattlesnakes and will also show videos of wild rattlesnakes exhibiting behaviors that we normally do not see snakes do. The presentation will take place at 3845 North Swan Street and is open to all those interested.
The Silver City non-profit organization, Frontier Food Hub, recently received the “Golden Chile Award” in recognition of their efforts in promoting good nutrition and supporting New Mexico’s farming economy. The Frontier Food Hub has several key functions aimed at realizing a more cohesive, inclusive and thriving food system in Southwest New Mexico and all their profits go directly back into supporting the local food system through jobs, food donations, education opportunities and more.
This past week, The USDA Forest Service began an environmental cleanup effort at the Mineral Creek Tailings Pile, which is located within the Mogollon Mining District, near the Glenwood Ranger District of the Gila National Forest. Approximately 175,000 cubic yards of mine tailings were transported to the area from the Little Fannie Mine via a flume sometime between 1895 and 1934, which contains elevated levels of lead that may be eroding into Mineral Creek. In June 2023, the USDA Forest Service made the decision to pursue an environmental remediation to address potential threats to human health and the environment caused by elevated levels of lead in the waste. Work will include re-grading the material to stable shape and armoring it with a minimum of 18 inches of locally sourced rock riprap. The project is estimated to be completed by December 2023.
In State News: Governor Michelle Lujan Grisham recently announced her intention to pursue tax credits for electric vehicles and signed an executive order directing the state fleet to transition to zero emission vehicles (ZEVs) by 2035. The executive order signed by the governor directs departments to purchase zero-emission vehicles for all new acquisitions where one or more options are available. Agencies with ten or more vehicles will work with the Transportation Services Department to develop and submit a data-driven strategic plan to the Office of the Governor that includes proposed annual ZEV acquisition and charging equipment deployment targets annually. Part of New Mexico’s electric vehicle transition funding is expected to allocate an estimated $38.6 million to the state supporting the use of electric vehicles.
