Effort to expand Indian Pueblo Cultural Center advances
The U.S. Senate on Tuesday passed legislation that will allow expansion of the Indian Pueblo Cultural Center in Albuquerque. New Mexico Democrat Martin Heinrich sponsored the Albuquerque Indian School Act of 2026.
"This bill will allow the Indian Pueblo Cultural Center to build on its role as a cultural and economic hub for the 19 pueblos and communities across New Mexico," Heinrich said in a video.
New Mexico Democrats Melanie Stansbury and Teresa Leger Fernandez are sponsoring the House version of the bill.
The bill is the latest effort to transfer land and buildings from the former Albuquerque Indian School campus to the Pueblos that manage the cultural center. The effort has had bipartisan support since 2015.
NM poet receives MacArthur Fellowship
The MacArthur Foundation announced its newest class of fellows this week and Santa Fe-based poet Layli Long Soldier is among the 20 grant recipients. Each year the foundation issues grants based on exceptional creativity and the potential for future work and collaboration. This year's recipients include musicians, scientists, researchers and writers. Each one will receive a no-strings-attached $800,000 grant to support future creative endeavors.
Long Soldier is a citizen of the Oglala Lakota Nation and has taught at Diné College and Texas State University. In her 2017 poetry collection Whereas, Long Soldier repurposed text from congressional statements, newspaper articles and historical studies. Her aim was to examine how sanitized language can obscure violence and erasure. Long Soldier's next collection is titled We and will be released on October 6.
Poll reveals low trust in NM legislators
Only 43 percent of New Mexicans trust state lawmakers to do what is right all or most of the time. That's according to a new poll that Think New Mexico commissioned. The poll is part of the think tank's push for legislative ethics reforms.
Additionally, over three quarters of New Mexicans surveyed said they supported holding lawmakers to a higher ethical standard.
Think New Mexico said the call for higher ethics standards is part of a broader effort to modernize the state legislature. Other initiatives include paid legislative aides and the potential for legislator salaries.
The push comes amid a recent flurry of ethics complaints and lawsuits against state lawmakers. Those include kickbacks, embezzlement, favors and unauthorized campaign expenditures.
