Fire Destroys Motel in Reserve

By John Larson

Fire crews were called out in Reserve to fight a fast moving fire early Tuesday, Dec. 14, that destroyed the village’s only motel, the 22-room Rode Inn. The primary blaze was battled for about six hours by 35 firefighters from seven volunteer fire departments.
A spokesperson for Reserve Fire Chief Donald Weaver said the business is believed to be a total loss.
According to the Catron County Sheriff’s office, there were no serious injuries to the nine motel occupants, although two people jumped from the second floor into a pickup truck bed.
“EMTs were on hand, and the victims were treated at the clinic. No one had to be transported to the hospital,” Undersheriff Ian Fletcher said. “The Sheriff’s office primarily worked traffic control. At first we had one lane open on Main Street, and then had to shut it down and divert traffic. At one point we shut down Bolke Street by the post office.”
Elena Gellert, owner of the Black Gold Emporium, watched the firefighting efforts from across the street.
“We opened at 6 a.m. and the fire must have started about 15 or 20 minutes before,” Gellert said. “It looked like it started in the west wing and involved the whole building pretty quickly. The entire building is gutted.”
As of Mountain Mail press time Wednesday, crews were still working on smoldering areas. “There was one room where they stored mattresses,” Gellert said.
Gellert said she and other merchants in town donated food and drinks to the emergency workers.
“This will really hurt the town, especially in the summer,” she said. “There are always tourists, hunters, travelers, those bicycle tours coming through.
“Eight people have lost their jobs, and in a town with a population of 400, it will be felt.
“Also, the motel had the only Laundromat in town. This means people will be having to drive to Cruzville, nine miles away,” Gellert said.

Henry Martinez of Henry’s Corner agreed that the absence of the motel will impact the village’s business community negatively.
“It was a busy business,” Martinez said. “The loss of revenue from people staying there will be immediately be felt. They bought gas, shopped, ate at the restaurants, and went to Uncle Bill’s bar.”
Martinez said those who were staying at the motel are, as of Wednesday, still searching for lodging. “Those people don’t have a place to stay,” he said.
The Rode Inn is owned by members of the Kiehne family, which operates three other motels in Arizona.
Max Kiehne told the Mountain Mail in a telephone interview that the family was shocked to learn the building burned.
“I am very appreciative of all the efforts from the fire departments and all the fire fighters,” he said. “It was such a loss to the community, as well as our family.”
The Rode Inn started out as a six-room motel and opened in 1971 by Emil and Beverly Kiehne, according to Gary Kiehne. “A few years later it was torn down and the larger motel was built,” he said. “The rooms and service were designed to be on par with the national chains.”
He said it was too early to estimate the dollar loss, but “the insurance investigator is expected to arrive Thursday morning. The state Fire Marshal investigator is still on the scene.”

Photos courtesy of Alex Smith

Fire Destroys Motel in Reserve

Off The Wall Generosity

Cooks Richard Beltran and Leonard Rivera (background) remove one-dollar bills that have been tacked on the walls of the Owl Bar and Café over the course of the past year by tourists and locals alike. Owner Rowena Baca’s annual philanthropic project has raised more than $21,000 for various charities and organizations including the American Cancer Society, St. Jude Children’s Hospital, Good Sam’s, and the Boys’ and Girls’ Ranch.

Photo by John Larson

Off The Wall Generosity

County Clerks Push for Centralized Voting Sites

By John Larson

An initiative to change the state law concerning voting precincts has been put forth by a group of New Mexico county clerks, and the idea is to provide voters with one central location where to cast their votes.
Although Socorro County Clerk Rebecca Vega isn’t part of the group, she still says the proposal has merit.
“It would essentially do away with the multiple polling places, for instance, in the city of Socorro, which would be affected most,” said Vega, adding that the proposed plan would save the county a considerable amount of money.
She said that outlying polling places in the county would probably be unaffected by any changes brought forth by the group of county clerks. “But in Magdalena,” she said, “instead of two voting places there would only be one.”
The group is headed by Bernalillo County Clerk Maggie Toulouse Oliver, who said a draft of the proposed bill will be sent to the state legislature, which convenes for a 60-day session on Jan. 18.
“The way we are envisioning the legislation is that it would be optional for each county,” said Oliver. “All the voting precincts would be combined into ‘X’ number of centralized locations. Precinct boundaries would still exist, but only for addressing purposes and vote counting.”
She added that larger cities would have several centralized voting centers, but in smaller municipalities like Socorro “only one would probably be needed. This would solve some problems voters may experience on voting day.”
The proposal has at least one ally in the state legislature. State Rep. Don Tripp (R-Socorro) said in a telephone interview that he hasn’t heard any talk about the initiative in the Roundhouse, but feels the proposal has merit.
“It sounds like a very good idea,” he said. “It would make it easier for clerks to run elections, and, of course, save the taxpayers money. It would also end disruptions at schools where people have been voting. It just makes more sense. More people are getting used to voting early and this would just continue that through Election Day.”
Vega agrees, citing confusion with residents who move from one part of town, or one part of the county, to another.
“With centralized polling places, as long as someone is a registered voter in the county, they could vote at any of the voting locations in the county,” she said. “It would, in effect, be like early voting is now.” Early voting allows anyone in the county to vote at the Socorro County Clerk’s office prior to Election Day.
Also included in the proposal is the introduction of an auto-vote system, which would print out a ballot specific to one’s precinct.
“This would save the county money by reducing the costs of Election Day,” said Vega, “like reducing the number polling place workers and saving on the cost of pre-printed ballots for each of the 26 current voting places. We would print out only what is needed.”
The pre-printed ballots cost the counties about $1 each.

County Clerks Push for Centralized Voting Sites

Socorro Football Player Invited to Showcase Talent at Event in S.C.

By Patrick Jason Rodriguez

It’s about two o’clock in the afternoon on a Sunday in the middle of December and Socorro High School football player Ray Vaiza III is inside the weight room at New Mexico Tech.
It’s been about a month since the Warriors’ season ended catastrophically following a 63-21 loss at Albuquerque Academy in the Class 3A quarterfinals and next season won’t begin until late August, but by the way Vaiza’s been focused on lifting weights you’d think he’s preparing for a game later this week.
Already the 17-year-old junior has done arm curls, bench presses and leg squats, and now he’s taking a breather in order to talk to a reporter, but he’s got a busy schedule this afternoon. In a few minutes he’ll be going outside to the athletic field to run through some drills with his friend and Socorro High football teammate Chandler Benavidez. And there’s a good reason for all this urgency. The 5-foot-10 quarterback-slash-defensive back-slash-kick returner-slash-punter has been invited to participate at the National Underclassmen Combine in Charleston, S.C., later this month.
Challenging hurdles still lie ahead, though. Not the combine testing, which will include a 40-yard dash, shuttle run, broad jump, bench press, vertical jump, and a seven-on-seven tournament, but rather the logistics of just getting to South Carolina. The NUC event doesn’t provide invitees with travel expenses, so Vaiza and his father, Ray Vaiza Jr., are hosting a raffle and an enchilada dinner from 11 a.m. to 6 p.m. this Friday (Dec. 17) at the DAV Hall to raise some money for the trip to the east coast. For more information on the fundraiser, call 575-418-0156.    
The National Underclassmen Combine bills itself as being the longest running underclassmen event and the most respected combine and football camp in the country. And although there are other recruitment combines for collegiate prospects, Vaiza isn’t taking his invite to the NUC lightly. Playing for a small high school like Socorro in a small state like New Mexico, he knows that this event will be one of a few chances he’ll have to show scouts from some of the best college football programs in the country that in spite of his diminutive size – he wants to play quarterback and college quarterbacks shorter than 6 feet are rare – he has the talent play at a Division II or Division I school.
Vaiza says that his dream has always been to play for the University of Texas, which boasts one of the top college football programs in the country and has sent many of its players into the National Football League. But he’s realistic that because of his lack of height, his goal of playing for a school like Texas, or any Division I program for that matter, might not come to fruition. He’s so far garnered letters of recognition from a few college programs such as Texas A&M (Division I), Eastern New Mexico (Division II), and New Mexico Military Institute (Junior College).
Vaiza is the first player from Socorro to be invited to the National Underclassmen Combine, and only one of a few from New Mexico that received an invitation to the event for this year. “I’m very excited,” he says, “It’s a chance to not only represent the southwest and New Mexico, but to represent Socorro.”
Vaiza found out the night of the Warriors’ loss at Academy that he was invited to the combine. His father, Ray Vaiza Jr., received the invitation via e-mail about a week before, and withheld the information from his son because he wanted to wait for the right moment when to present the news. “I don’t like losing,” says Vaiza, “but getting the invite made me feel a little better.”
Vaiza first started playing football at age five, suiting up for a local flag football team, and has competed in organized football every year since. He even played football during his 8th grade year in Tifton, Ga., about 180 miles south of Atlanta. He and his family lived there for about seven months, the only time he’s ever lived away from Socorro. In Tifton, Vaiza’s coaches weren’t so welcoming at first, insisting that he should be playing soccer instead of football. Vaiza says the coaches in Tifton probably thought that way because he was from New Mexico.
In addition to football, Vaiza has participated in martial arts such as jujitsu and kick boxing, the latter in which he’s compiled an amateur record of 24-5. He’s scheduled to make his mixed martial arts (MMA) debut in February. He also played basketball his freshmen and sophomore years at Socorro. He was the leading scorer on a freshman squad that finished 18-2. He made six appearances as a member of the varsity team his sophomore year. And though Vaiza isn’t playing basketball this season, he hasn’t decided whether or not to play basketball his senior season.  
We’re outside on the athletic field at Tech and Vaiza has just put on his football cleats. His friend Chandler Benavidez arrives a few minutes later. While the two Socorro football teammates begin to toss a football around, the attention shifts toward Ray Vaiza Jr., who’s a noteworthy individual in his own right, and after a few minutes conversation with him you can understand why he’s pushing his son toward attending the NUC and making sure they have the means to get there.
Ray Vaiza Jr. has raised Ray Vaiza III, along with two younger children, pretty much by himself since Ray III was two. A former basketball player who sustained a career-ending ACL injury in high school, Ray Jr.’s athletic outlet for the past decade or so has been mixed martial arts and cage fighting. He also commutes from Socorro to Rio Rancho for work five days per week. He says he doesn’t mind the more than 130-mile roundtrip commute each day and the thought of moving his family closer to where he works is not an option because he would like to see his son finish out his high school career at Socorro. After that, though, he will base his decision on where Ray III ends up after Socorro.
Ray Vaiza III is done tossing the football around with his friend, Chandler, and is now ready to show off his arm strength. His father says that he can toss the ball at least 60 yards, and on a few throws this afternoon it is estimated that Vaiza either matches or exceeds that distance.
During his sophomore season on the junior varsity, Vaiza accounted for 20 touchdowns (both passing and rushing), threw for more than 500 yards, and rushed for 800 yards. This past season he played behind senior Zach Esquivel on the depth chart at quarterback. In his first season on varsity, he played defensive back and compiled some modest statistics – more than 50 tackles, three interceptions, eight pass break-ups, and one touchdown.
Kyle Henderson, who for the past six years has run the website NMpreps.com, which has Vaiza ranked No. 95 in the state as far as skills players are concerned, says that Vaiza is decent a underclassmen prospect and that the invitation to the NUC is a good opportunity for him to showcase his talent to not only Division I schools but to smaller Division II and III programs as well. “He’s the kind of athlete who can get things done,” said Henderson, who added that he thinks Vaiza would fit better at a smaller school like NMMI because of a lack of size, especially if Vaiza wishes to play quarterback, though says that Vaiza projects better as a defensive back.  
“A lot coaches say that I should play defensive back,” says Vaiza. “If I can’t play quarterback in college, that’s okay. I played strong safety this past season, and it was fun. I like the contact, I like to hit.”

Photo by Patrick Jason Rodriguez

Socorro Football Player Invited to Showcase Talent at Event in S.C.

Judge Sets Schedule in Case Involving Co-op, Members

Mountain Mail Reports

Judge Albert J. Mitchell set a schedule in a case involving the Socorro Electric Cooperative and its member-owners during a status hearing in district court on Tuesday  (Dec. 13) in Los Lunas.
The co-op’s attorneys originally filed the lawsuit in June in an attempt to prevent three new bylaws that were passed by member-owners at the annual meeting in April.
Though the co-op’s attorneys later filed a motion to dismiss the case, Mitchell said he wouldn’t allow that.
The bylaws in question are:
• Call for the board to voluntarily follow the Open Meetings Act and Inspection of Public Records Act
• Allow members access to co-op books, records and audits, with the exception of records protected by the Privacy Act
• Allow members and the press to attend co-op board meetings and that a portion of the meeting is set aside for public comment. In addition, announcements of meetings are to be made in billing statements and advertised in local newspapers
Mitchell requested that all attorneys involved file briefs on the matter before the end of this month.

Judge Sets Schedule in Case Involving Co-op, Members

New Mexico Tech Loses Dear and Beloved Professor

By Thom Guengerich
New Mexico Tech

New Mexico Tech lost a dear and beloved professor on Saturday, Dec. 11, when Dr. Osman T. Inal passed away at his home after a long battle with illness. He was 70.
“Dr. Inal was not only a superb teacher, but an outstanding researcher and a close personal friend,” New Mexico Tech President Dr. Daniel H. López said. “The entire New Mexico Tech community is saddened by his death and he will be sorely missed.”
Dr. Inal joined the faculty at Tech in 1972 as an associate professor of materials engineering, and earned full professorship in 1980. He added the title of associate vice president and dean of engineering in 2001. He also served as department chair for more than 15 years.
He was a prolific researcher, and authored or co-authored more than 230 publications. He advised 40 master’s students and 18 doctoral students during his time at Tech.
“Osman’s enthusiasm for working with students and guiding them from undergraduate through postgraduate work was unmatched,” López said. “His dedication not only to students, but to this institution was total, deep and unabiding. Our farewells go to our great friend.”
A native of Turkey, Dr. Inal is survived by his wife, Serife, their daughter, Nazli, his siblings and nieces and nephews. As of Monday, Dec. 13, no services have been planned.
Osman Tugay Inal was born on Feb. 29, 1940, in Turkey. He was especially proud of having a birthday on Leap Day. On his most recent birthday in 2008, he accentuated the fact that he was celebrating his 17th birthday.
Dr. Inal earned his first bachelor’s degree in mechanical engineering from the Middle East Technical University in Ankara, Turkey. He then earned three degrees in metallurgical engineering from Columbia University: a bachelor’s degree in 1964; a master’s degree in 1965; and his doctorate in 1969. After working three years in Southern California, he joined the Tech faculty in 1972.
“Dr. Inal’s profession and career at New Mexico Tech was a huge part of his life,” said his fellow professor in materials Dr. Paul Fuierer. “His unique personality is legendary among students. As longtime chair of the Materials Engineering Department, Osman’s legacy will last for years to come.”
Dr. Inal’s specialties included explosive welding and forming, polycrystalline intermetallics, plasma and laser surface modification and the development of reactive solders and braze alloys.
Dr. Deidre Hirschfeld, another colleague at Tech, said Dr. Inal cared deeply about his students’ success and that he lived to teach. He was teaching classes this semester and planned on teaching classes again next semester, she said.
“He was a strong promoter of New Mexico Tech and an excellent recruiter,” she said. “Everyone knew of Dr. Inal’s cantankerous personality, but he did a lot for materials engineering at New Mexico Tech and he did a lot for New Mexico Tech in general.”
Dr. Inal and his wife always helped international students at Tech, welcoming them into their home and treating them like family.
“He was a deeply sensitive guy,” said Dr. Peter Gerity, vice president of academic affairs. “He and his family took in every international student who came to Tech. He gave selflessly to helping them financially and with culturalization to the United States. He was a deeply caring person for students. This is a loss of a good friend to New Mexico Tech – a loyal and dear friend in every way possible.”
Over the years, Dr. Inal established a pipeline of Turkish students who came to Tech, including several of his nephews. He was also an effective recruiter domestically.
“He’s well known and has many friends throughout the United States,” Hirschfeld said. “He’s closely related to many researchers at Los Alamos and Sandia National Laboratories. Many of his students have gone on to very prestigious positions.”
He was an active member in many professional and academic societies and regularly volunteered for service to New Mexico Tech, professional societies and government committees.
Dr. Inal won the university’s Distinguished Researcher Award at Tech in 1989. From the Alumni Association, he won the Distinguished Faculty Award in 2001 – the same year he was inducted as a Fellow in ASM International, the largest materials professional organization. Hirschfeld said Inal’s fellowship with ASM was an elite post and a crowning achievement for his career.
Dr. Gerity said Dr. Inal’s research is recognized and cited worldwide. He was continuously invited to deliver keynote addresses at international conferences throughout his career, he said.
Dr. López said, “As Adlai Stephenson said on the occasion of Dag Hammarskjöld’s death, ‘We will mourn his death until the time of ours.’”.

New Mexico Tech Loses Dear and Beloved Professor

Looking Ornamental

The Christmas Tree is up at Fidel Center at New Mexico Tech, and students have been asked to bring items to put on the tree. Adding their contributions are: Kristen Henricksen (left), an Environmental Engineer major, and Matt Wroblewski, a psychology major.

Photo by John Larson

Looking Ornamental

Toys From Cops to Tots

Capt. Angel Garcia of the Socorro Police Department received a carload of toys from Isabel Savedra, representing the ‘M’ Mountain Good Sam RV Club, on Monday, Dec. 13. Savedra said the club donates toys to the Toys From Cops To Tots every Christmas, as well as other charities and community service programs. The toys will be delivered to children of families in need on Dec. 23. Garcia said the police department appreciated the donation from the RV club. “Our kids here in Socorro will be happy,” said Garcia. “We also get support and donations from the Sheriff’s Department, DWI Compliance office, NAPA Auto Parts, Car Quest and Tripp’s Jewelry.”

Photo by John Larson

Toys From Cops to Tots

OBITUARY: Dyer Stephen Forbus

Dyer Stephen Forbus, 89, passed away, Tuesday, December 7, 2010 in Socorro, NM surrounded by his loving family.
Dyer was born on June 5, 1921 in Honey Grove, TX. to EP and Mary (Jackson) Forbus.
He is survived by his loving wife, Irene Forbus of Socorro; and his devoted daughters, Barbara Forbus of Socorro; and Darla G. Bryson also of Socorro.
Dyer was a Socorro resident since 1961 after moving from Capitan, NM.
He is preceded in death by his parents, three brothers, and five sisters. A Graveside Funeral Service will be held Saturday, December 11, 2010 at 12:00 pm at the Village of Capitan Cemetery.  Those who wish to send condolences may do so at www.danielsfuneral.com. Services have been entrusted to: Daniels Family Funeral Services, 309 Garfield, Socorro, NM  87801 (575) 835-1530.

OBITUARY: Dyer Stephen Forbus

OBITUARY: Albert Benavidez

Albert Benavidez, 60, passed away, Saturday, December 11, 2010 in Socorro, NM.
Albert was born August 7, 1950 in Magdalena, NM to Jose and Teresa (Marquez) Benavidez.
He is survived by his loving mother, Teresa; his devoted children, Teresa Mann and husband, Brian; Alberta Benavidez; Angel Benavidez; and Juan Benavidez; seven grandchildren, Nicole; Destiny; Adrianna; Kaya; Joseph; Julian; and Amanda; his brothers, Tony Benavidez; Joe Benavidez; and Donnie Woodard; his sisters, Ana Acosta; and Brenda Adams; and many nieces and nephews.
Albert was a Socorro resident since 2003.
He was preceded in death by his father, his wife, Hilde Benavidez, one grandson, Juan Benavidez, his brothers, Ray Benavidez, and Thomas Gonzales, and one sister, Rosella Moya. Cremation has taken place but no formal services have been arranged at this time. Services have been entrusted to: Daniels Family Funeral Services, 309 Garfield, Socorro, NM, 87801 (575) 835-1530.

OBITUARY: Albert Benavidez