City Of Rio Rancho – Doesn't Fit In

April 2, 2013

Standing In Line In Rio Rancho

Rio Rancho Police by Rescuenav, on Flickr

On the City of Rio Rancho’s page about “Kamp Out for Kamp Rio” there is about 10 paragraphs on how to stand in line. This is so people can sign up for Rio Rancho’s apparently popular “Kamp Rio 2013” summer day camp for kids.

“Standing In Line” Rules and Etiquette

The Parks & Recreation Department staff makes every attempt to ensure that the registration for summer camp is a fair process for everyone. The summer camp line is nothing unique. Throughout life, we are all subject to “standing in lines”: Black Friday shopping, theme parks, concerts, at the grocery store, etc. As with every aspect of life, there is a protocol that should be followed.

Stay In Line At All Times. Anyone who has claimed a spot in the registration line is required to stay in line with the exception of short restroom breaks. If an individual, who has claimed a spot in the registration line, needs to leave for any reason that person needs to be replaced temporarily by a family member or friend until the person returns.

A Tent Or Chair Does Not Hold Your Place In Line. An individual will not be allowed to place a chair or tent to claim their spot in the registration line. Do not leave for work/school/home/shopping/restaurants or anything else until your registration has been accepted by Parks & Recreation staff or your tent and chairs will be removed by city staff.

Do Not Reserve Or Hold Spots For Others. Think how annoyed you would be after hours of waiting, suddenly and out of nowhere, five friends join the person in front of you making your wait even longer?

Be Patient – Everyone in line is in the same situation. Don’t be come irritated with others in line or with the Parks & Recreation staff.

Restroom Break – If you leave the line for any amount of time longer than short restroom breaks, you cannot expect to come back and take up your old place.

Respect Personal Space Of Others – While there is no need to stand body-to-body in the line, there is also no need to extend your tent/bbq grill/chairs/picnic-tables, etc. amongst a large space. Doing so will only irritate people and heighten tensions.

No Smoking In Line! If you are a smoker, now is not the time to light up – save that until you get home.

No Line Jumping – Quite simply – don’t!

“Standing in line” has universally understood rules and etiquette, but there are still those who break the rules mentioned above. With that said, the above rules apply and everyone’s cooperation and attention to this matter is sincerely appreciated.

February 21, 2013

Wrong Items Donated To Rio Rancho Goodwill

From the Rio Rancho Observer “Bullets, pipe donated to Goodwill“

Someone donated bullets and a duffle bag holding smoking paraphernalia to Goodwill last week.
According to a Rio Rancho Police report, an officer went to Goodwill at Southern and Unser about 10:45 a.m. Feb. 12 after employees sorting through anonymous donations found a glass pipe in a black Adidas bag and various calibers of ammunition in other property. There were 50 .22-caliber rounds, three 12-gauge shotgun rounds, a .410-shotgun round and what appeared to be one .22-caliber rifle round.
The items were entered into evidence at RRPD.
About 3 p.m. the same day, the officer went back to Goodwill after dispatch was told a man claiming to own the Adidas bag was at the store. The man told the officer he’d just gotten out of the hospital and a friend told him his property had been dropped off at the store.
The store manager said there was no way to verify who left the bag in the donation trailer, and the officer couldn’t charge the man claiming to own the bag because he couldn’t verify the owner of the pipe, according to the release.

January 25, 2013

Where Is The Village At Rio Rancho?

The Village at Rio Rancho goes here someday

According to a Albuquerque Business First Article “Unser corridor bursting with retail, office activity” the Village at Rio Rancho was support to start “This Summer”. Since the article was written in May 2012 that would make it last summer. Currently all we have is a lot of cleared desert that will turn into atmospheric dust come this spring. The City of Rio Rancho only mentions this special tax deal from 2009.

Meanwhile down the road in Albuquerque “Construction starts on new Westside ABQ plaza“.

December 28, 2012

CD Piracy In Rio Rancho

From KOB “Large scale CD piracy operation suspected in Rio Rancho“:

Rio Rancho Police arrested Wands on Dec. 19, in what they call a large scale CD piracy operation.

Police suspect Wands copied CDs and then sold the music at area flea markets.

According to a criminal complaint Wands sold undercover investigators 4,000 bootleg CDs for $1,300.

He got a warning from the RIAA he was being investigated and he didn’t know it was illegal.

September 26, 2012

Don't Hit A Cow In Rio Rancho

There are too many issues with cows in northern Rio Rancho. It surprises me that the owners of the cows aren’t more concerned with where the cows are. If they don’t care about potential car accidents with someone being harmed or killed, I would expect they would be concerned about what is their lively hood. I’m afraid that someone will die before something is done about it.

This letter to the editor of the Rio Rancho observer “If you hit a cow, make sure you have NMLB phone number to verify owners” documents one persons attempt to hold someone accountable.

I want to share the following information with my fellow Rio Rancho residents. On Sept. 20, 2010, about 8 p.m., I slammed into a cow on Unser Boulevard near Progress Road.
In 2010, there were 10 accidents involving cows and, luckily, none of us was killed. I’ve spent the last 2 years working to hold someone accountable, including the City of Rio Rancho, to keep residents safe, but to no avail.
Also, I’ve also done lots of research to help us. I contacted the New Mexico Livestock Board (NMLB) after my incident and gave the NMLB administrator the cow’s ear tag number that the Rio Rancho police officer retrieved after my incident; the administrator told me it was a King Ranch cow and that the “family should be sued for negligence.”
I took the King Ranch brothers to court but the administrator testified that she never told me it was a King Ranch cow and that the cow’s ear tag is not the identifier. The case was dismissed on Sept. 20, 2012 with still no one held accountable.
If you or someone you know has an incident involving a cow, ask the officers to contact the NMLB at 841-6161 to identify the cow by its brand; the NMLB is the only entity that can identify cattle. Also, Rio Rancho is a “fence out” area meaning that cattle owners have the responsibility to keep their cattle fenced out of our highways.
We only have ourselves to help with the cow situations; let’s keep passing valuable information to each other.

September 22, 2012

Kick Me Sign Get's Police Involved At Intel

From the KRQE story “Workplace prank no kicks for co-worker“

“This is definably a strange one,” Sgt. Nick Onken with Rio Rancho police said.

Onken said a man in his 40s filed a police report this week saying he had enough from his pranky co-workers at the plant in Rio Rancho.

“He stated that he is to the point with this tomfoolery that he doesn’t feel safe any longer in his work environment,” Onken said.

And the tomfoolery that pushed the man over the edge was a sign taped to his back that read “Kick me.”

July 26, 2012

Intel Sends Scary Letter About Hydrogen Fluoride Emissions

From KOB.com “Rio Rancho residents concerned over Intel emissions“

Rio Rancho residents said they are worried about breathing toxic fumes after receiving a letter from Intel on Wednesday.

Thousands of residents found a monthly update from Intel in their mailbox, mentioning hydrogen fluoride emissions.

David and Aimee Thurlo said Intel has been a good neighbor, but the letter has them questioning their safety.

“The letter has absolutely no information on there. It is, to me, ambiguous,” Aimee Thurlo stated.

Good Job Intel. Send out a ambiguous letter about a chemical you have been emitting for years and freak every one out. No mention if it was also sent to residents of Corrales, who really hate Intel.

July 2, 2012

Overnight In the Ojito Wilderness

Limestone formations along a hiking trail in the Ojito

The Ojito Wilderness is about 11,000 acres of Sandoval county, New Mexico that was designated wilderness by congress in 2005 throught the 1964 Wildness Act. It is located west of Rio Rancho, New Mexico and is managed by the Bureau of Land Management.

Albuquerque glow from the Ojito — The glow from Albuquerque can bee seen east of the Ojito. The Sandia’s can bee seen to the left of the short mesa and right of the tall light tower. The small red lights are from the radio towers on top of the Sandias.

People have been going to the Ojito for years before it was protected as a wilderness, it’s not one of the better known outdoor areas near the Albuquerque. The Ojito is a combination of desert; sand, cactus and scrub but also contains some pine trees and grasses. It’s sort of a transition area between the deserts in Albquerque and the forests of the Jemez. What makes the Ojito special is the number of impressive rock formations. There are a number of hoodoos formed by water millions of years ago, badlands and buffs.

I have had two trips to the Ojito, once in April of 2011 and this last time in June of 2012 and it will probably be a annual trip for me. Spring or Fall are good times to spend overnight in the Ojito, June is not. It’s hot, most plants have stopped flowering and there was a large number of nats and other flying insects. One of the reasons I like living in the desert is the lack of flying bugs so I was surprised at how many there was. There is no water, lakes or streams and people must bring it with them. As this is official Wilderness land no wheeled vehicles are allowed. Including bicycles. This probably keeps people away but backpacking a short distance in is well worth experience.

Firepit with hoodoos and a pine tree in the background

The area I camped included a group of hoodoos with a large area of sand and trees farther out. In the middle of the sand area there is a fire pit. Believe it or not while the rest of the state was under fire restrictions the Ojito was not. I verified with the BLM and was specifically told that the Ojito was not included with the rest of the state. Part of the reason might be because there is so little to burn. There are some pine trees spotted around the area the vegetation is pretty spares and well adapted to not getting water.

Trying to find out the fire restrictions in the Ojito was difficult. The official BLM webpage for the Ojito doesn’t tell a whole lot about restrictions in federal lands, as they are often different from the state lands. NM Fire Info lists state land fire restrictions and Public Lands Information Center lists federal fire restrictions.

FInally, New Mexico First District Representative Martin Heinrich created the Ojito.org website.

“Thank you for visiting the Ojito website. I hope you find the information here useful as you learn about and explore this unique and beautiful place. As someone who dedicated several years of my life to the creation the Ojito Wilderness, I also hope you will leave the area just as you found it. If we are all good stewards of this wild landscape, generations to come will continue to enjoy Ojito’s opportunities for hiking, hunting, photography and outdoor adventure. Enjoy. This is where the West is still wild.”

June 12, 2012

Extracting Gas From Air

A article on azcentral.com titled “Air Products grows to keep up with Intel” explains how Air Products makes air products and ships them to the Intel site in Arizona. This is probably similar to how it’s done for Intel in Rio Rancho, NM.

The company removes all components of air except nitrogen, oxygen and argon. Then in those white, angular towers, it separates out those three gases with very low temperatures. Oxygen turns to liquid at minus 297.3 degrees Fahrenheit, and nitrogen turns to liquid at minus 320 degrees.

Then the liquid is boiled, producing pure gas.

“We use compression and expansion, like the air-conditioning unit on the outside of a house,” Jordan explained.

Nitrogen gas made in Chandler goes directly into the pipeline, a structure intended to last 100 years.

May 27, 2012

No Hockey This Winter At The Santa Ann Star Center

The Santa Anna Star Center was built in Rio Rancho to primarily be a venue for the New Mexico Scorpions hockey team. Not only are the New Mexico Scorpions not playing there, the New Mexico Mustangs won’t be playing there either according the the Rio Rancho Observer “Mustangs ‘inactive’ for season“.

The New Mexico Mustangs, who called the Star Center home for the past two seasons of North American Hockey league competition, were officially “granted inactive status” by the NAHL and will not compete in the league in the 2012-13 season.

A ticket to a Mustangs’ game wasn’t exactly the hottest item in town: The team drew an average of 802 fans for each of its 29 home games in 2010-11 and then 721 fans for each of its 30 home games in the just-completed season.

The situation with the Santa Anna Star Center was covered by the New York Times in 2011. The company that convinced the city to build the center, Global Entrainment, went around the country getting a lot of cities to build similar arenas making promises that didn’t come true.