Until a few years ago, the town of Questa lacked a newspaper based in its own community.
The Taos News occasionally covers the village and surrounding areas, but there wasn’t frequent, community-wide coverage until the Questa Del Rio News was founded in 2018.
Two years ago, Questa-raised journalist Mikayla Ortega took over as editor-in-chief, after working in TV news in Albuquerque and Denver.
With the KSFR signal going live all around the Questa area this week, we bring you today portions of our recent interview with Mikayla Ortega.
As we join the conversation, Ortega describes the character of the region.
“Questa and Taos County as a whole are really where a lot of New Mexico's origination story began. It was where our Spaniard ancestors came and settled the area. There were Native Americans, obviously, in the area, and in Taos Pueblo, and really the two cultures combined.
And that is what you have in Questa right now. You have people who are very proud of their culture, their history—they're very proud of our ancestry, just very, very humble, yet proud. And so, if you head out to Questa, you're going to find there's going to be a big agriculture community.
It's currently in a post-mining type of environment. The Chevron mine ceased operations in 2014. And so in a lot of ways it's been working to reinvent itself, the identity of Questa, with a lot of different initiatives and efforts that have been ongoing over the last several years.
And so while the identity may be a little bit in flux, the people and the pride and the culture are certainly not. “
While the mine closing had worried some Questeños that their home might turn into a ghost town, there’s a lot of reasons for optimism these days. One is the recent announcement of more than $230 million in federal funding for a massive green energy project.
“ This is an initiative which was on the behalf of the Village of Questa. It was on the behalf of Kit Carson, which is the energy provider in the northern area of New Mexico.
They essentially said, 'There's the space, there's the resources, and this is going to create jobs.' And so really, what green hydrogen is, it is an eco-friendly way to provide energy to customers.
Now, the great thing about this is, for example, if there's a wildfire like we're seeing in Los Angeles right now, many people who may have, you know, their houses may have not burned down, but they were in the area of Southern California and they've been without electricity for days on end.
Now, the Green Hydrogen Project is going to ensure that, say that there's a fire in Taos, God forbid. There's still going to be the ability to have energy. It's just gonna be from the Green Energy Hub. So it's really exciting. There's a whole lot of technical terms that the engineers have talked to me about and we've covered it quite a bit.
But it's really exciting because it is going to bring a lot of opportunity to the community of Questa. It's going to create jobs, it's going to create longevity for the people in the area."
Has there been a bit of an unemployment challenge in the area. Have people been struggling to get jobs and live good lives in some parts?
"Absolutely. Yes. I would say that that has been a struggle. Many people that I just know in my personal life, they'll take odd-end jobs. My dad, who's a contractor in the area, he saw a decrease in his business because he used to do a lot of contracting work for the mine.
"So you see the impacts; it's a ripple effect that you've seen. It's caused some people who have been generational Questeños to leave Questa and go to places like Arizona or Texas to get mining jobs. So this is really going to just create a really sweet, great opportunity for people, so that they're able to live and work and enjoy the lives that they're creating in Northern Taos County.”
Another recent regional development is a new festival to replace a now-defunct annual motorcycle rally in nearby Red River that was the site in 2023 of a shootout between two gangs leading to three deaths. The transition from bike rally to "Mayfest in the Mountains" is another local story that Mikayla Ortega covered, including interviews with the mayor of Red River.
“The Memorial Day rally is something that was truly embedded in our culture, not just for Red River. Business is booming at that time. The streets are full. You don't find a place to park.
It is just completely hustling and bustling in that area, so when the shooting happened, it cut the weekend short. A lot of vendors who had traveled from far away places—they had to shut down their operations. They lost out on the opportunity to make money. Local businesses lost money. It was a lose-lose situation for the entire community, including the workers in Red River.
Because of that situation, the mayor, along with the council, decided that they wanted to make it more family friendly. So they completely transitioned the Memorial Day biker rally to Mayfest in the Mountains.
Now Mayfest in the Mountains is truly just a celebration. There was jumping castles in the park. There was entertainment. It was much smaller than what the community's been used to. And so there was a lot of people who were complaining about that:
'You just killed one of the biggest times of the year that we have to make money.'
We heard from a lot of, and not only businesses, but, service workers, people who counted on those tips every May to start off their summer.
There was quite a bit of opposition. I remember the board meeting for the town of Red River immediately after Memorial Day. It was packed. People don't go to board meetings often. But it was packed because people wanted to voice either their endorsement or opposition to this new direction that Red River is taking.
So that was something that we talked to (the mayor of Red River) about. Something that she said in the interview, which she has not said before on record:
'We're really excited about inviting bikers. This is a family friendly event. We just don't want gangs.'
And that was interesting, and it was good to hear that on record. It's something that you want to ensure that people know they can come. They're not disinvited just because they wear leather jackets and ride a bike.”
Mikayla Ortega is the editor-in-chief of the Questa Del Rio News. Our station now comes in clear as bell up there, on KSQR, 91.3 FM.
