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Last modified: April 14, 2008

Headline News From Our
Feb. 28, 2003 Issue

Don’t expect much tax relief if SVH is sold

  As any taxpayer knows, government at any level, from the Village of Williamsburg to the Federal Government of these United States, will almost invariably and inevitably continue any tax once created, even when the specific purpose for a given tax no longer exists.

JPC plans to sell hospital to ‘Blackhawk’

  The Joint Powers Commission on Wednesday signed a letter of intent to sell Sierra Vista Hospital to Blackhawk Health Care of Austin, TX.

The Cuchillo Pecan Festival drew its largest crowd ever last Saturday. Click on photo to enlarge and to see the photo series on this popular event.

Andregg’s prison term
ordered cut by 7.5 years

Sheriff’s office arrests man for allegedly raping a child

  Deputies of the Sierra County Sheriff’s Office last Friday arrested an 18-year-old Truth or Consequences man for the alleged rape of a 12-year-old girl on Feb. 18 and 19 in T or C.

The Wall to make its home in T or C soon

  The half-scale traveling replica of the world-renowned Vietnam Veterans Memorial in Washington, DC, will be making a permanent stop in Truth or Consequences.

The Wildlands Project Comes to Hidalgo County

  In researching the Wildlands Project and The Nature Conservancy, I've become very uncomfortable with the working relationship the Conservancy has with our federal agencies.

CLICK ON PHOTO TO ENLARGE

…Orgytown, USA:

Do you know where

your kids are tonight?

OBITUARIES

   Death notices for Jack R. Cole, Eunice M. Bryant & Ernie Mills (New Mexico's famed radio commentator).

…Tickle Tree!?

These children play an intriguing game of “Tickle Tree,” something they apparently invented at the Monticello Fiesta last Saturday. Apparently, this new game is played with sticks, but a finger will work too as the little girl on the right demonstrates. The Ponderosa tree had a grand ol’ time and laughed with the breeze combing its needles.

DJ photo by Bill Johnson

Don’t expect much tax relief if SVH is sold

By Fred Mramor

of the Desert Journal

As any taxpayer knows, government at any level, from the Village of Williamsburg to the Federal Government of these United States, will almost invariably and inevitably continue any tax once created, even when the specific purpose for a given tax no longer exists.

Government can always find another way to spend your money, reasoning that taxpayers will be willing to keep paying any tax they have been trained to.

Such will probably be the case, for the most part, with the various local taxes that support Sierra Vista Hospital if it is sold to a private concern.

The Joint Powers Commission, comprised of elected officials from Sierra County, the City of Truth or Consequences and the Village of Williamsburg borrowed $2 million from the New Mexico Finance Authority in 1997 to purchase Sierra Vista Hospital, according to SVH Governing Board member Gary Whitehead.

The JPC purchased the hospital from Adventist Health Systems/Sunbelt for $1.5 million and used the remaining $500,000 borrowed from the NMFA for hospital improvements, Whitehead said.

The JPC makes annual payments of $170,000 to pay the NMFA note, which is scheduled for retirement in 2017.

With the community’s purchase of the hospital, the Sierra County Commission increased the county’s gross receipts tax (GRT) rate by one-quarter percent.

Revenues generated by the tax have been used to pay the hospital’s mortgage, currently about $1.5 million, according to Gary Whitehead.

Whitehead said the GRT revenues may also be used for hospital maintenance and operations at county commissioners’ discretion or toward reduction of principal if there are any revenues in excess of the minimum annual payment.

Whitehead said the tax generates $250,000 to $300,000 a year but that no payments above the minimum $170,000 per year have been made so far.

Whitehead and other JPC officials said the countywide GRT of one-quarter percent will be eliminated if Sierra Vista Hospital is sold to a private company.

Williamsburg Mayor and JPC Chairman Sue Jackson added that a private buyer may not assume the hospital’s note but must pay it off upon purchase.

When the community bought Sierra Vista Hospital, county voters approved a two-mil levy, which Whitehead said was created to provide for community health care.

Proceeds from the mil levy, or property tax, fund hospital operations and can be used also to cover the hospital’s deficits, according to SVH Chief Financial Officer Bill Watts.

The mil levy generated $336,102 in the fiscal year (FY) ending June 30, 2001; $345, 408 in FY ending June 30, 2002; and has generated $264,039 in the current FY to date, County Manager Adam Polley said.

The mil levy may be continued until it is scheduled to sunset in about two and a half years or may be eliminated by the county commission if the hospital is sold, Whitehead said.

Whitehead and other JPC officials said also it is legal to contribute the mil levy revenues to the hospital after it is sold to a private concern and that the new owner may ask the county commission and the county’s voters for a new mil levy when the current mil levy expires with those revenues continuing to subsidize hospital operations.

County officials have not said what their intentions are for the current mil levy if the hospital is sold although Commission Chairman Jim Coslin agreed that most county residents who are in favor of selling the hospital will want as much tax relief as possible with that sale.

Commissioner John Young suggested the money could be used to create more economic and recreational opportunities to keep more of the county’s younger people at home.

To contribute to the hospital’s operations and equipment purchases, the City of Truth or Consequences increased its GRT rate one-quarter percent when SVH was purchased from Sunbelt.

With the proceeds from that tax the city has allocated $132,000 to the hospital for the current FY ending June 30, 2003, according to City Finance Director Carol Arnold.

T or C Mayor Jimmy Rainey said that if the public hospital is sold, revenues from the quarter percent tax should go into a secure reserve fund set aside to buy back the hospital or build a new one in case the buyer doesn’t build a new one as expected.

Rainey said the revenues from this tax shouldn’t go into the city’s general fund to be used any way the city commission sees fit and that the question of tax relief if the hospital is sold should be put the citizens of Truth or Consequences in a referendum.

City Commissioner Lois Reaver-Black said, “It would be nice” if the city’s GRT were to be reduced if the hospital is sold but that she doesn’t think that will happen. She said the city’s funds are limited and everyone has a wish list.

Reaver-Black said she doesn’t know how the quarter percent GRT revenue will be spent, but that it may be used for some kind of health care facility.

Although agreeing that most taxpayers will want some tax relief if the hospital is sold, Reaver-Black said she will have to study the impacts of a tax reduction before determining whether she will favor any reduction.

Commissioner Bud Stevenson said the city’s GRT rate should be reduced by one-quarter percent if the hospital is sold and that the city shouldn’t keep taxing people when the purpose for a tax disappears.

Stevenson said the only reason he could see for maintaining the tax would be to establish an emergency fund in the event that the community has to buy back the hospital, but he doesn’t expect that to happen.

Like the City of T or C, the Village of Williamsburg increased its GRT rate one-quarter percent for hospital operations and equipment purchases. The village, which owns five percent of the hospital, contributes about $6,000 a year, according to SVH CFO Bill Watts.

Village Trustee Don Childers said he has a feeling the tax will be maintained to provide for community mental health care and to assist indigent and Medicaid patients.

Trustee Carol Woods said that if the amount of money the tax generates was more significant, she would favor eliminating the tax and returning the money to village residents.

Woods said that if the tax is maintained, she would like to see it used for the Village Hall’s expansion and improvement or to improve the medians on Broadway to make Williamsburg more attractive.

Woods suggested a public meeting be held to determine if village residents would prefer to eliminate the tax or use it for other purposes if the hospital is sold.

<<<   >>>

Nancie Ferguson of Nogal spins yarn in a demonstration during last Saturday’s Cuchillo Pecan Festival. The 12th annual event was the most successful with about 2,000 visitors, 500 more than last year’s record breaker.
DJ photo by Bill Johnson

JPC plans to sell hospital to ‘Blackhawk’

By Fred Mramor

of the Desert Journal

The Joint Powers Commission on Wednesday signed a letter of intent to sell Sierra Vista Hospital to Blackhawk Health Care of Austin, TX.

SVH Administrator Dee Rush, who will retire in July, said start-up company Blackhawk expressed an interest in buying the hospital with a desire to get into the Critical Access business.

A relatively new hospital reimbursement program, Critical Access has been instrumental in SVH’s ability to go from operating in the red to becoming a profitable hospital and one of the main reasons that Blackhawk is interested in buying SVH, Rush said.

Rush said Blackhawk has been looking for a community that has a high percentage of Medicare recipients and has a hospital but needs a new one.

Blackhawk has examined demographic information from all over the country and Truth or Consequences rose to the top in meeting the criteria of their business model, Rush said.

“I’m not here to say ‘sell’ but I do think that as citizens we should consider their offer,” Rush said.

SVH Governing Board member Ted Pape said the letter of intent is not a sales contract but is a document that outlines a general agreement between the JPC and the prospective buyer.

JPC and Governing Board members could reveal little of what is contained in the letter of intent, such as the dollar amount Blackhawk is offering to purchase the public hospital, but Ted Pape did say that the letter includes a guarantee that existing SVH employees will still have their jobs if the sale is made to the private, for-profit health care company.

Along with the letter of intent, the SVH Governing Board, pending legal review, will enter into a management consulting agreement with Kendra Health Care who will begin managing the hospital for Blackhawk in April.

Kendra will manage SVH for as long as Blackhawk is interested in buying the hospital and will continue to do so after a sale is completed; but if Blackhawk goes, so does Kendra, Dee Rush said Thursday.

Sierra Vista Hospital will pay for Kendra’s management services until Blackhawk buys the hospital or it is decided that there will be no sale.

Dee Rush said that due to a confidentiality agreement, she could not reveal how much Kendra will cost SVH until then.

The JPC’s primary motivation for selling SVH, if it does, seems to be the need to replace the existing hospital with a new hospital without raising local taxes.

SVH Administrator Dee Rush relayed, as she has for the past few years, that the 50-year-old hospital building is obsolete, badly in need of repairs, and was built in a way that does not lend itself to needed improvements, remodeling and expansion.

JPC officials said local gross receipts taxes would have to be raised as much one percent to fund construction of a new public hospital for $12 million to $15 million, while county residents will still be burdened with paying off SVH’s existing mortgage, currently about $1.5 million.

JPC officials said if they buy Sierra Vista Hospital, Blackhawk will build a new hospital within five years at their - and not taxpayers’ - expense.

JPC member and Truth or Consequences City Commissioner Lois Reaver-Black said with a one percent increase over current rates, T or C and Sierra County would have the highest gross receipts taxes anywhere in New Mexico.

Commissioner Bud Stevenson said it will be hard to attract new businesses to T or C and Sierra County and that existing businesses may leave if taxes are increased.

JPC and other officials were met in the SVH auditorium by a throng of elderly local residents who strenuously objected to any sale of their public hospital. Residents said they will be willing to pay the cost of building a new hospital.

Residents’ primary fear about selling the hospital was that the new owner could do what the previous owner, Adventist Health Systems/Sunbelt, did: suddenly close Sierra Vista Hospital and leave the community scrambling to provide for its own health care.

JPC and Governing Board members assured residents that if the hospital is sold, provisions will be made so that the community can buy SVH back if Blackhawk ultimately closes the hospital.

Addressing the Rev. James White’s concern, Dee Rush said any owner of Sierra Vista Hospital will be obligated by federal law to take patients regardless of their ability to pay once the hospital accepts its first Medicare dollar.

Further, indigent funds will continue to be available to the hospital no matter who owns it, Rush said.

Residents complained they have been left out of the process and suggested JPC and Governing Board members exceeded their authority by entertaining an offer to buy the hospital with little or no public participation.

Ted Pape and fellow board member Gary Whitehead said the JPC never set out to sell SVH but were approached by Blackhawk who expressed their interest buying the hospital.

Pape and Whitehead said it was their duty to give due consideration to any legitimate offer to buy the public facility.

Pape said the JPC will not vote on whether to sell the hospital before providing as much information to the public as possible.

In addition to signing the letter of intent, JPC members moved to hold a public forum with Blackhawk representatives before any final agreement to sell the hospital is reached.

<<<   >>>

About 2,000 visitors descended on Cuchillo for the 12th annual Cuchillo Pecan Festival, beating last year's record breaker attendance by 500 people, said event host Bernice Ritch of Ritch's Pecans & Candy Shoppe. Also, she said Thursday she was 20 shy of selling all 400 of her deliciously famous pecan pies, and that some may still be available by either calling her or dropping by her shop. Proceeds from the festival benefit the New Mexico Boys and Girls Ranches.

DJ Photo by Bill Johnson

Andregg’s prison term

ordered cut by 7.5 years

By Fred Mramor of the Desert Journal

Judge Kevin Sweazea reluctantly granted a motion to reduce convicted murderer Sam Andregg’s prison sentence from 30 to 22.5 years in District Court Thursday.

Andregg, 26, had pleaded guilty to charges of second-degree murder, larceny, unlawful taking of a motor vehicle and tampering with evidence following the brutal stabbing death of Truth or Consequences business owner and attorney David Johnson in May 2001.

Sweazea sentenced Andregg last September to 22.5 years in prison with an additional 7.5 years for aggravated circumstances, which the prosecution added to the 22.5-year sentence after the defense signed a plea agreement with the state.

Andregg petitioned for a reduction to his sentence on grounds that he was not fully informed of the sentence he would receive upon entering into a plea agreement with the prosecution.

District Attorney Clint Wellborn said he isn’t happy about it but conceded that case law is against the prosecution as the provision for aggravated circumstances, with its additional 7.5-year prison sentence, was not contained in Andregg’s plea agreement.

Judge Sweazea said that while the basis for aggravated circumstances was appropriate, and that he doesn’t like to change his decisions, he had no choice under the law but to grant the motion to reduce Andregg’s sentence.

Sweazea said that aggravation was not presented to the defense or the court until after the plea agreement was signed.

Sweazea suspended the 7.5-year additional sentence for aggravated circumstances to five years probation after completion of Andregg’s 22.5-year prison term.

<<<   >>>

…Jamming down hard & heavy

Dennis Riddle and his Electric Campfire Band perform in grand style last Saturday for the Cuchillo Pecan Festival crowd.
DJ photos by Bill Johnson

Sheriff’s office arrests man

for allegedly raping a child

Desert Journal Staff Report

Deputies of the Sierra County Sheriff’s Office last Friday arrested an 18-year-old Truth or Consequences man for the alleged rape of a 12-year-old girl on Feb. 18 and 19 in T or C.

Deputy Sheriff James Coulter leveled a criminal complaint Monday in the Magistrate Court against Shannon Blood, 18, of 610 W. Third Ave.

Charges filed against Blood include first-degree criminal sexual penetration of a minor, criminal sexual contact of a minor and enticement of a child. The latter two charges are a third degree felony and misdemeanor, respectively.

District Judge Kevin Sweazea set no bond for Blood after Coulter arrested him a week ago, pending Blood’s first appearance, which was held Tuesday before Magistrate Thomas Pestak who set bond at $125,000 cash.

The victim’s father and his fiancé reported Feb. 19 that the victim’s grandmother called them to advise that the girl and Blood had engaged in sexual activity during the early morning hours.

The father and fiancé then went to the school the victim attends and spoke with the victim, according to Deputy Coulter’s affidavit for an arrest warrant.

The girl then told them that Blood came into her bedroom, woke her up and they went into the living room. They were laying on the floor together watching a movie when the incident occurred, the affidavit states.

The girl said the man had arrived at her home at about 4:30 p.m. on Feb. 18 and the both of them walked around town for a while before returning home. She said she bathed, ate dinner and then went to bed at about 11:30 p.m.

The girl said Blood woke her up after midnight when they went into the living room. After watching the movie an hour, she said he began trying to pull her shorts down but that she pulled them back up. She said that after a few minutes of the same, he finally pulled her shorts below her knees and then he “had sex.”

Sierra County START program advocates spoke to the victim before Deputy Coulter’s interview with her. The girl told them she thought Blood was trying to play a game pulling her shorts down and that she was lying on her side with him behind her. She said after he pulled her shorts down the last time, he was “inside” of her.

Consensual sex is a mute point since the defendant is six years older than the minor child, constituting statutory rape.

<<<   >>>

Okay, some may say these two musicians of Dennis Riddle’s Electric Campfire Band, performing at the Cuchillo Pecan Festival, are getting a lot of play. But look at the head at the end of the neck of the old cello. I didn’t even notice it when I took ample shots of the band and when I first saw the photo, I thought it was actually someone standing over the car in the background. The details we miss but thank God our cameras are smarter than us blind guys!

DJ photo by Bill Johnson

Vietnam Veterans Memorial Wall

to make its home in T or C soon

The half-scale traveling replica of the world-renowned Vietnam Veterans Memorial in Washington, DC, will be making a permanent stop in Truth or Consequences.

The T or C/Sierra County Chamber of Commerce and four local businessmen have secured the purchase of the 250-foot The Wall That Heals from the Vietnam Veterans Memorial Fund (VVMF), the Washington-based nonprofit organization that spearheaded the effort to build the original Memorial more than 20 years ago. The Wall That Heals is one of a handful of Wall replicas traveling the country.

"We are excited that Truth or Consequences, NM, will be the home of one of our most recently retired Traveling walls. We are hopeful that this Memorial will serve as a common gathering place for New Mexicans - both young and old – to learn and discuss the Vietnam War," said Jan C. Scruggs, VVMF founder and president.

VVMF, founded in 1979, was authorized by Congress to build the Vietnam Veterans Memorial in Washington, D.C. Today it works to preserve the legacy of The Wall to promote healing and to educate about the impact of the Vietnam Conflict.

Over the Veterans Day 2001 weekend)

The New Mexico State Veterans Home in T or C hosted The Wall That Heals during the Veterans Day 2001 weekend. More than 3,000 visitors, including many from nearby states, welcomed the Wall with open arms.

Carol Wilson of the NMSVH inquired as to when this particular Memorial was scheduled for retirement. She was told that it would not be much longer and that if Truth or Consequences was interested, they could apply for the purchase of this Memorial.

For more than a year, she and Bobby Allen, Vice-Chairman of the Board of Directors of the T or C/Sierra County Chamber of Commerce, remained in touch with VVMF, waiting for word of the memorial's retirement.

Finally in the winter of 2002 they received word that it was time. A committee was formed, correspondence followed and the Chamber and VVMF drew up a letter of agreement.

In January 2003, the excitement was building and preparations were being made for accepting delivery and storage of the Memorial. The Wall committee worked hard to secure the location for permanent placement of the memorial when the VVMF announced that the new replica that they had ordered was not going to be finished on schedule. Because of the machinery and the remarkably precise calibration required for this process, it was taking longer than anticipated. Thus, the Chamber will receive its replica later in the spring.

The City of Truth or Consequences has donated the 8.4 acres next to the NMSVH for development of The Veterans Memorial Park where the Memorial replica will be permanently placed.

Preparation of the land is already underway. The hope is that it will be ready to permanently place The Wall when it is received in April. There are plans being developed for placing other memorials in this park, representing past wars and future conflicts.

It seems the timing couldn’t be better. The Wall committee has been continuing to rally financial support to pay off the loan for this history making purchase.

Deposit accounts have been set up at State National Bank, First Savings Bank, Bank of the Southwest and White Sands Federal Credit Union for any and all donations.

For more information, e-mail cofc@riolink.com. The Wall committee seeks everyone’s participation in bringing this incredible new addition to the community.

<<<   >>>

Truth or Consequences quilt maker Marcella Loyd and husband Gene have made the Cuchillo Pecan Festival regularly as vendors over the years.
DJ photo by Bill Johnson

The Wildlands Project Comes

to Hidalgo County (Part 17)

A Country Girl's Musin'

By Judy Keeler

In researching the Wildlands Project and The Nature Conservancy, I've become very uncomfortable with the working relationship the Conservancy has with our federal agencies.

This relationship is not new; it has been developing over a period of years. Doug Fieder reports in his article, "The Eco-Regulatory Conspiracy," that "under a law known as the 'Intergovernmental Personnel Act,' the federal government 'lends out' 1,200 to 1,500 well paid federal bureaucrats to nonprofit organizations each year."

"They often trade employees back and forth - most of whom are on the federal payroll. Often, federal regulatory agencies even offer grants to nonprofit organizations that use the money to sue the granting agency."

No doubt, in the beginning, each organization benefited from the other's expertise. However, as the relationship grew cozier, problems began to emerge.

In the late 1980s the Illinois Chapter of the Nature Conservancy began a "joint venture" partnership to create one of the largest federal wildlife refuges in Illinois.

Working hand in glove with the U.S Fish and Wildlife Service through its National Wildlife Refuge division, the Conservancy shared office space with the Service on Shawnee College Road and had a telephone listing under U.S. Government Offices.

By 1993, with over half the funding for the refuge secured from state and federal governments, trouble began brewing.

Albert Pyott, Director of the Illinois Chapter, began flexing his partnership muscles in a letter to Professor Dieter Kuhn.

At the time, Dr. Kuhn was living abroad in Germany. Reluctant to sell his property to the Nature Conservancy, he avoided communicating with the organization.

In a May 26, 1993 letter, Pyott expressed his frustration at not being able to discuss the transaction with the landowner.

He writes, "The government agencies' intention during the acquisition phase of this project has been to deal only on a willing seller basis. [However] the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service - like other agencies - has the power of eminent domain which allows the use of condemnation to acquire lands and interest in lands for the public good."

As if he hadn't made his point, Mr. Pyott continued, "If your land is not acquired through voluntary negotiation, we will recommend its acquisition through condemnation."

Who is the Conservancy that they should be recommending condemnation proceedings to a federal agency? Of course this letter would become an embarrassment to the Conservancy's national headquarters.

Ultimately, Mr. Pyott would be removed as state director, but a pattern was emerging: form a "joint venture" partnership with an agency, contract with that agency to do the background work for the "joint project," present your recommendations, and make off with the goods. In the process you also get paid for your "work."

Apart from federal grants, the Conservancy received $146,689,449 from our federal government between 1997 and 2001. In 2000 alone, it received $60,085,455 in contract fees, plus $81,925,124 from the sale of private land to federal agencies.

Not a bad deal for the tenth largest nonprofit organization in our nation. Always able to project an image of outstanding environmental stewardship through the Conservancy's glossy magazine, anything the organization may have lacked in public relations they more than adequately made up through their lobbying efforts.

We now have several bills in Congress that will most certainly impact land ownership in our nation. Already approved by the Senate Finance Committee on Feb. 5, Senate Bill 256 will give a 25% tax cut on capital gains taxes gleaned from lands sales; but, only if the land is sold to an environmental group or to a government agency.

With an incentive like this, who would want to sell to a private investor? After all, 25 percent of one million dollars is $250,000. Any willing seller would prefer to keep this kind of change in his own pocket.

The other bill, HR 652, is sponsored by Robert E. Andrews from New Jersey.

The intent of the bill is to maximize large tracts of land for wildland recreational opportunities, habitat protection for native wildlife and natural plant communities, and to contribute to a preservation of water for use by downstream metropolitan communities and other users, through the establishment of a National Forest Ecosystem Protection Program composed of lands within existing wilderness areas and adjacent primitive areas.

The environmental community knows it takes only nine states with large constituencies to pass such a law in the House. It's only natural for those whose back you scratch to also scratch yours, but does it make it right?

What will happen when all the land is in federal ownership, or in the hands of a few elite nonprofit organizations? Are we headed on a collision course similar to Russia, China and other communist nations where we can no longer supply food for our citizens?

Certainly makes one wonder. It seems to me we should learn from history that government ownership of land does not work. It offers no incentive for individuals to invest their time or capital in production or making needed improvements.

Neither will ordinary citizens be able to sustain themselves from the land, or make significant contributions to a formerly "great society."

Has the environmental community become so intertwined with our elected officials, as well as our state and federal agencies they are selling us out to a "higher order?" In my opinion, Arthur Young in his book Travels, 1787, summed up his observations of the United States in one paragraph – “Give a man the secure possession of bleak rock, and he will turn it into a garden; give him a nine-year lease of a garden, and he will convert it to a desert.”

The magic of property turns sand into gold." Is it too late to turn back the clock?

<<<   >>>

The Shadow Advisory

By Bill Johnson

Editor

of the Desert Journal

…Orgytown, USA:

Do you know where

your kids are tonight?

Slow Death by Jim Fielder, Page 168 – “On Nov. 12, 1999, the Desert Journal ran an interview with Jeannie Astbury in which she claimed that Roy Yancy raped her at David Ray’s mobile home. The masthead for the Desert Journal read IN HOT PURSUIT OF THE TRUTH, but Jim Yontz always called it the ‘Deserted Journal’ because it had the smallest number of readers of the three weeklies in T or C.”

The book goes on to quote the interview of Astbury as published by the Desert Journal nearly four years ago.

P. 171 – In a conversation between Deputy District Attorney Jim Yontz and Sierra County Sentinel cub reporter Francis Baird, Fielder wrote, quoting Yontz again:

“In the state of New Mexico, you can’t prosecute someone without a body – and without any evidence. We don’t have anything other than Dennis (Roy Yancy) admitting to us that he did the dirty deed [kill Marie Parker in July 1997].”

“What about the article in the [Desert] Journal about Jeannie Astbury?” asked [Francis] Baird.

“No way,” said Yontz. “I couldn’t use her because the ‘Deserted’ Journal had her memory hypnotically refreshed. Juries don’t like that kind of testimony.”

It seems the author of Slow Death used our material without permission – I never gave Jim Fielder my nod, verbal or written, to take direct quotes out of the Desert Journal. I suppose we’re even now because his publisher didn’t give me permission to quote my own stuff out of their book, for which I’m not fairly compensated, oh well…

As was the case two weeks ago when I wrote my raving review that demonstrated and proved how four sentences in a single paragraph of Fielder’s book were pure hype with no truth, I since finished reading the entire book and found more falsehoods and deceptions, apparently all in the name of making Francis Baird look like the queen bee of reporters, maybe so she could go work alongside Jim Fielder at the Seattle rag.

Don’t get me wrong, I respect Francis and think she’s got a million times more smarts than her grandmother. At age 11 she was resolving publisher-editor related disputes in the newspaper office where she had grown up since the day she was born. And her asking Yontz about a Desert Journal article shows she still respected us, or else she would never have considered using us as her source for that particular quote in the book.

First off, Yontz is from Socorro and the only way he would think that we were the ‘Deserted’ Journal rather than the Desert Journal is if Francis or her grandmother or anyone at the Sentinel told him the same lie they’ve been telling everyone else, including all of our advertisers, thus clouding and prejudicing Yontz’s view.

I have caught their advertising sale representatives in the middle of this lie through phone calls made by my staff and they claimed we had a circulation of only 400 – I’m sure that’s what they’re still saying over there at brand X.

But at the time the David Ray sexual trail of torture story broke (of which the Desert Journal was among the first, if not the first, to report) and the months afterward, our circulation soared from 900 to more than 1,200 copies sold each week.

That may not seem like much to many, but for a recently established newspaper it was quite an unexpected growth.

The Desert Journal had a readership of 3.84 readers per copy, according to our March 1999 survey of 50 paid subscribers. With 1,232 copies sold weekly in 1999, that would mean our readership was 4,731 weekly – about half of Sierra County’s population then.

Our printer says the Los Angeles Times would be jealous over a market that took in 50 percent of the readers, never mind 50 percent of the entire population (not everyone is a reader) – that 25% of the share of the market is quite decent itself.

So, eat your words, Jim Yontz!

Let’s discuss Yontz’s workplace, the District Attorney’s office with whom the Desert Journal lost all of its respect and confidence while Ron Lopez was the elected DA. For those of our readers who remember, it was the DA’s office that screwed up the prosecution of the two suspects involved in the drive-by shooting of our office when we were still on Austin Avenue in October 1998.

The DA’s office intentionally lost evidence during the preliminary hearing for a local doctor, who police accused of doing the shooting. The investigator of the DA’s office at the time, John Ashbaugh, said after the two suspects’ arrests that the DA’s office had a solid case against both suspects, especially the doctor.

Then we watched the case fall apart in court, and on the stand the defense tried to make me – the victim - look like the villain, all without any objection from the DA’s office prosecutor.

So, you see, relations suddenly became strained and we made damned sure Ron Lopez would never be elected the DA again. Thank God the voters had enough sense to get him out of office.

Ron Lopez had hired Yontz to cover the David Ray et al case and so I’m sure Yontz heard a lot of prejudicial stuff against us – not from only the DA’s office but especially from the Sentinel people.

Yontz saying that we’re the “Deserted” Journal is a slap in the face to all small businesses who want to have a piece of the American pie, who dream that someday they’ll be big. He’s the type who never cheers for the underdog – he has to make the sure bet that he’ll be the winner. No risk there, is there? I call that cowardice. I always sing my loudest for the little guy because that’s where freedom starts and imperialism croaks.

Let’s talk about who the “shrimpy” (“deserted” in Yontz’s own word as quoted by Fielder) guys are now.

Well the “Deserted” Journal has grown tremendously the last year with the addition of its online version, www.desertjournalonline.com, and combined with the Desert Journal newspaper, both now kick the Sentinel’s and Herald’s butts in terms of readership. So, Mr. Yontz, you can sob in despair on your deserted corner of the gutter.

Author Jim Fielder also lies about the Jeannie Astbury interview and makes it look like we interfered in the investigation of the David Ray case.

First of all, Ms. Astbury never said she was raped by Yancy in Ray’s mobile home – she frankly never knew where it happened. And yes, the Desert Journal hired a local naturopath healer to do interviews of two women who couldn’t remember the events of their times with the David Ray gang, specifically Ray’s daughter Jessie Ray and their friend Dennis Roy Yancy, because both women had been drugged and they wanted to know if something happened to them while they were unconscious or semi-conscious.

So they were put under hypnosis (actually just a relaxation technique). Jeannie’s memory of the events became clearer but the other woman was still cloudy about the events in her dealings with Jessie Ray.

No memories were refreshed, as Yontz purports, because no suggestions were made to either woman. The women refreshed their own memories through relaxation and nothing else.

At no time did we ever discuss their ability to become witnesses or new victims in the David Ray et al case although Jeannie did talk to an investigator on a few occasions. We never even considered it.

The state and Yontz never would have known about Jeannie or her rape allegations against Yancy if it hadn’t been for our efforts at the Desert Journal.

Fielder’s book is vile and disgusting and paints Truth or Consequences, NM, as Orgytown, USA, where orgies and meth making are common place, no, I mean “rampant” among “all” of the people here.

He quotes Sierra County Sentinel Publisher Mryna Baird as saying through her granddaughter Francis that when she (Myrna Baird) and her husband Neil moved to Truth or Consequences [in the mid 1960s to buy KCHS radio station with money Neil’s half-brother loaned him] she was told by locals that if they didn’t swap wives they would be out of business in no time.

I’m sure this was true for Myrna. And look - she’s still in business today! And when I worked there at her barn for 11 years she said the same thing about police officers swapping their wives, which I never knew to be true, but maybe she knew something I didn’t.

But no one ever approached me, or my wife, and said or suggested the same about swapping wives to stay in business when we decided to establish the Desert Journal. At our open house celebrating our debut, good, honest people including then-Mayor Lois Reaver-Black, Bud and Betty Whitmore, and many others came. Never once was sex on the agenda but Fielder would have the world think that we in T or C are a bunch of perverts who cook up meth in our kitchens all day and screw each other in mass to no end.

Maybe that’s because Fielder listened to nothing but a bunch of pathological liars and then quoted them in his dirty, filthy book. What a sorry day for the townspeople of T or C to allow these bastards to reign over the town like they’re all our little gods.

In the book, Fielder quotes locals as saying the Full Gospel Tabernacle is the devil’s church, without justification or without backing up what he says. My wife’s son would really appreciate being called a devil worshipper when he never touched an illegal substance in his life and never engaged in any abnormal behavior, which according to Fielder, runs amuck in our city in orgy style, in the hot bath establishments on Austin Avenue.

I remember when Fielder told me on the phone in a factual tone of voice after the outbreak of the sexual torture case four years ago that everyone must be sexually deviant in T or C. I told him that’s a piss poor label to give to a town with mostly retirees and churchgoers.

Of course this town has its share of sexually perverted criminals, but every town in America has them, and I’m sure Seattle, Fielder’s hometown, has its share too. I’m beginning to think that with all of the vulgarity he wrote in his book he may be on the looming edge of becoming one himself.

Slow Death can burn in hell at Fahrenheit 351 along with David Ray and his likes.

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OBITUARIES

Jack R. Cole, 72, of Truth or Consequences, died Friday, Feb. 21, 2003, at the Sierra Health Care Center. He was born Dec. 6, 1930, in McNary, TX, to James Frank Cole and Orcha Matilda (Smith) Cole. The U.S. Army veteran served during the Korean Conflict. He was an active member of the First Baptist Church, where he had taught the Jolly Elders Sunday School Class and had sung in the Gospel Choir and Barber Shop Quartet.

Survivors include his wife, Joyce S. Cole of T or C; his son, Jack R. Cole & wife Debbie of Rio Rancho; his daughters, Carol Cole and Tylithia & husband Terry Paden, all of Albuquerque, and Sherrie Conner of Chandler, AZ; his step-children, Sandra Guthrie of Scottsdale, AZ, W. Allen & wife Christine Strickland of Albuquerque, and Leslie & husband Oscar Reyes of El Paso, TX; his “daughter of the heart,” Karen Henry of Grants; 11 grandchildren; and four great-grandchildren.

A memorial celebration service was held Thursday, Feb. 27, at the First Baptist Church in T or C with Rev. Shon A. Wagner officiating. Arrangements were by French Mortuary of T or C Inc.; phone 505-894-2574. The family requests memorial contributions in Mr. Cole’s name be sent to the First Baptist Church Building Fund in care of P.O. Box 329, T or C, NM 87901.

Eunice M. Bryant, 93, a resident of Truth or Consequences since 1952, died Friday, Feb. 21, 2003, at the Sierra Health Care Center. She was born July 20, 1909, in Nashwauk, MN, to John and Katie (Nurkka) Koski. She owned and managed the Blackstone Apartments in T or C for many years. She was a member of the Lutheran Church.

Survivors include her daughter, Kaye J. Jordan of Las Vegas, NV; five grandchildren, Scott Jordan of Gilbert, AZ, David Jordan of Sealey, TX, Sandy Johnson of T or C, Debra Criddle and Robert Jordan, both of Las Vegas, NV; 11 great-grandchildren; and 14-great-great-grandchildren. She was preceded in death by a son, Jack Dalhquist, in 1952.

Graveside services will be held at 11 a.m. Saturday, March 1, at the Hagerman Cemetery in Hagerman, NM, with Scott Jordan officiating. Casket bearers are Scott Jordan, David Jordan, Robert Jordan, Cordell Criddle and Jay Johnson. Arrangements are by French Mortuary of T or C Inc.; 505/894-2574.

Domenici calls Ernie Mills ‘one of a kind’

WASHINGTON, DC - U.S. Senator Pete Domenici on Wednesday issued a statement regarding the death of longtime broadcast journalist Ernie Mills in Santa Fe on Feb. 26.

Mills began statewide radio broadcasts in 1965 and continue those reports until recently being hospitalized.

“Ernie Mills was one of a kind, and his passing certainly marks the end of an era in New Mexico journalism. Ernie was a constant and steady voice for so long, and rightfully earned the status of a venerable commentator on our politics and our special way of life in New Mexico. I’ll miss visiting with Ernie and join the legions of New Mexicans who will miss hearing his voice over the radio.

“Nancy and I offer Ernie’s family our deepest condolences,” Senator Domenici said.

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