The New Mexico Route 66 Association, formed in 1989 to promote and educate the public about the so-called Mother Road, says it wants a seat at the table.
Verhines to head University of New Mexico Water Resources Program July 06, 2021
Amid a risk of the Rio Grande going dry through Albuquerque this summer and growing threats to the state’s water supplies, The University of New Mexico has named Scott Verhines to be the next director of the UNM Water Resources Program.
A New Mexico native, Verhines brings a lifetime of experience in water management to the job, culminating with service from 2011-2014 as New Mexico State Engineer and Secretary of the New Mexico Interstate Stream Commission – the state’s top water management jobs.
“Scott has worked on water resources challenges in every part of New Mexico for over three decades,” said UNM Dean of Graduate Studies Julie Coonrod, who oversees the program. “His experience ranges from holding public meetings with different interest groups in rural areas to serving as the State Engineer whose office is charged with administering the state s water resources. Verhines’ focu
John Fleck
Fleck has been director of the program since 2016. His work, as an academic and a writer for popular audiences, is focused on the Colorado River Basin - its problems as climate change collides with population growth, and its solutions, as communities learn to collaborate in the task of using less water.
His service as Water Resources Program director is an extension of that work, helping a new generation of water managers develop the technical skills and policy understanding needed to solve the region s problems.
“The job has exceeded the idle fantasies of my younger years,” Fleck wrote in a recent blog post. “So much fun to teach, and learn from, UNM Water Resources Students. So much fun to spend my days on a university campus with all the thinking and libraries and trees.”
Agency OKs funds for Gila diversion report Written by Geoffrey Plant on December 28, 2020
Two days before Christmas, the Gila diversion group got what it had been asking for, as the New Mexico Interstate Stream Commission voted unanimously during its regular monthly meeting to approve a line item budget transfer of $25,500 requested by Anthony Gutierrez, executive director of the New Mexico Entity of the Central Arizona Project, in order for the group to secure a ※technical compilation report.” Depending on who one asks, the proposed report is either a sensible coda to the failed attempt to divert Gila and San Francisco river water that played out over the past five-plus years, or a belated and possibly inaccurate preliminary report that should have been done in the early stages of the planning process. The N.M. CAP Entity is made up of representatives from a group of 14 ditch associations,