Home Care In Vado, NM

U.S. Border Patrol agents apprehended 134 migrants and seized more than $600,000 worth of methamphetamine over two days at three separate stash houses in San Elizario and New Mexico.

Agents located 67 migrants Thursday who were trying to hide inside a trailer in Chaparral, New Mexico, U.S. Border Patrol officials said.

Officials said 44 of the migrants were from Guatemala, 16 from Ecuador, five from Mexico, and one each from El Salvador and Honduras. Two of the Guatemalan migrants were unaccompanied children.

Agents also found a stash house Wednesday in San Elizario with 43 migrants hiding inside, officials said.

The migrants included 20 from Ecuador, 11 from Peru, 10 from Mexico, one from Honduras and an unaccompanied child from Guatemala, officials said.

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Agents also seized 19.85 pounds of methamphetamine worth an estimated street value of $635,200 found inside the stash house, officials said.

The same day, agents found another stash house in Vado, New Mexico, with 24 migrants hiding inside.

The migrants included 18 from Ecuador, four from Guatemala and two from Mexico, officials said.

According to Border Patrol officials, of the 134 migrants apprehended over the two days, 131 were single adults and three were unaccompanied children.

The three unaccompanied children from Guatemala were taken to the El Paso Central Processing Center for further processing, officials said.

Officials said the children were “rescued from dire conditions that are commonly found in stash houses.”

The other migrants were deported to Mexico, officials said.

“Our Border Patrol agents will continue to work together with other law enforcement agencies to rescue migrants from these deplorable living conditions where they are held for long periods of time,” U.S. Border Patrol El Paso Sector Chief Patrol Agent Gloria I. Chavez said in a statement. “No human being should be treated like a commodity.”

The investigations into the stash house were conducted by the U.S. Border Patrol, U.S. Homeland Security Investigations, U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration, and the Don?a Ana County Sheriff’s Office.

Aaron Martinez may be reached at 915-546-6249; [email protected]; @AMartinezEPT on Twitter.

LAS CRUCES — There's no question the post-Christmas blizzard in eastern New Mexico will have a long-term impact on the state's dairy industry.

While southern New Mexico dairy farmers were largely spared from the large-scale loss of livestock seen around Roswell, Clovis and Portales, the effects of the storm will be felt in Don?a Ana County as well, said Jeff Witte, New Mexico's secretary of agriculture.

Witte spent the latter part of last week surveying storm losses in the eastern portions of the state, and said the number of head of cattle lost was still being determined, and the infrastructure losses still being tallied. Some estimates put the number of cattle deaths, largely in the dairy industry in New Mexico and West Texas, as high as 20,00 to 40,000, Witte said those numbers might exaggerate the actual losses. The federal government has implemented disaster relief eligibility for impacted ranchers and farmers.

"Farmers and ranchers play a critical role in our state's economy. I encourage New Mexico families who have suffered financial hardship due to the winter storms to utilize these relief programs so they can rebuild their herds and continue our rich agricultural traditions," said U.S. Sen. Martin Heinrich, D-NM. "For more information about eligibility and applying for disaster assistance, New Mexicans should contact their local U.S. Department of Agriculture Farm Service Agency office, or visit fsa.usda.gov."

"We don't know," Witte said last week of the overall amount of loss. "Early on, there was tremendous speculation using percentages. We are finding that's not the case. We are finding better numbers in some cases. We are looking predominantly at dairy folks. Anything in a confined condition, and they had winds up to 80 miles per hour. It happens so fast there is no way to prepare for Goliath."

While losses in the southern regions of the state were minimal, many dairy operations have vested interests in both regions and will likely see a shift, moving stock from the southern areas to the eastern dairies and, in the short term, increasing production to fill the needs for the state's dairy industry, including value-added agricultural products such as cheese or yogurt.

New Mexico has become a national leader in cheese and milk production, averaging more than 672 million pounds of milk per month and a total of more than 8 billion pounds in 2014, the last year for which statistics are available from the Department of Agriculture. This tallies out to over 168,000 tanker loads of raw milk a year generated in the state of New Mexico alone.

"There are going to be losses on the east side of the state and they will be coming out of Don?a Ana County," Witte said. "There's going to be some opportunity to move yearlings and younger dairy cattle to the eastern side of the state. The unique part of New Mexico's dairy industry is many Don?a Ana County dairies also operate in Roswell and on the eastern side of the state.

"The biggest thing was getting feed to the stock," Witte added. "The rail system was down, roads were blocked and people couldn't move the feed. Supplies were there, so that was good."

The days of disruption while farmers struggled to account for and feed stranded cattle did have an impact on the state's cheese making plants, including F & A Dairy Products on Las Cruces' west mesa, although to a much lesser degree and not enough to slow production, said Bob Snyder, vice president of F & A.

"Locally we weren't impacted like they were on the east side of the state," Snyder said. "They lost a lot of milk, lost a lot of cows. As far as F &A, we are fine. We met our projection needs but couldn't get the milk we wanted to get. I don't know what we'll get for next week. I've got calls in" to the dairies to see what they can deliver.

It will take some time for dairy farmers to recover from the loss of stock. Beverly Idsinga, the executive director of Dairy Producers of New Mexico, a trade group that also has members in West Texas, told the New York Times that it may take a year to return milk production to its pre-storm levels in eastern New Mexico, which is home to 75 percent of all dairy farms in the state.

However, with southern New Mexico producers moving stock back to the eastern plains and ramping up production, and given a well-established flow of milk from across the United States, the impact will be minimal, despite a brief shortage due to the lost herds and the inability to move milk from farm to factory during and immediately after the storm.

"There were days of disruption that impacted cheese-making facilites who were not getting milk, but every cheese factory is back up to speed," Witte said.

Meanwhile, dairy farmers and beef cattle ranchers are still recovering from the storm.The health of their animals is their primary focus.

"What happens in a deal like this is initially a period of 48 hours farmers can't get cattle back to milking parlors, then trucks couldn't get in so they had to dump the milk," Witte said.

The industry term of "dumping" milk does not mean the milk is wasted. Instead, it is used as a feed supplement for livestock. Now, dairy farmers are again milking their remaining cows and shipping that milk to processing facilities where it is pasteurized and packaged in jugs or cartons, or turned into value-added products like cheese and yogurt.

Ranchers are now better able to access the far reaches of their pastures. They are getting feed to their cattle to supplement their grazing, and breaking the ice that forms in water troughs so their animals have water to drink. Aside from herd health, longer-term concerns for dairy farmers and beef cattle ranchers include rebuilding their herds, as well repairing barns and other agricultural buildings that were damaged by the storm’s heavy snows and high winds, Witte said.

Dubbed in media reports as Goliath, the record snowstorm was not without an upside for New Mexico agriculture. Wet snow likely benefitted cold-season crops such as winter wheat, which is grown in the state’s eastern counties. Another silver lining for southern New Mexico is an opportunity to ramp up production and move stock to the decimated dairies in eastern New Mexico as those farmers and ranchers recover from the loss.

But the New Mexico agricultural community, as it always has, will come out to support their neighbors.

"The biggest thing was it was heartwarming to watch the community come together, opening roads, life and safety issues," Witte said. "Every storm has a silver lining and I guess that was it. It brings people together for the common good."

Jason Gibbs may be reached at 575-541-5451. Follow him on Twitter @fjgwriter.

As two protestors mocked and insulted the long line of Bernie Sanders supporters, Bertrand Perdomo urged the media and others to focus on the reason they were at Vado Elementary in Vado, NM.

“Don’t feed the negativity,” Perdomo said. “Media, don’t give them the attention they want.”

Perdomo, a native of Los Angeles, now lives in New Mexico and is a teacher in Anthony. He, along with other residents of New Mexico, will take to the polls to vote in the state’s primaries on June 7.

Thousands of supporters from the state and its surrounding areas came out to support Senator Bernie Sanders from Vermont, who is also a Democratic presidential candidate.

Sanders began the rally by addressing New Mexicans and some of the issues the state faces. He also spoke about the state’s high school graduation rate being the lowest in the country. Sanders said that over 30 percent of students in New Mexico are dropping out or are not graduating when they should.

Throughout the rally Sanders hit some of his key platform points, which included income inequality, the decriminalization of marijuana, comprehensive immigration reform, climate change and raising the minimum wage.

Sanders echoed Pope Francis’ thoughts on American policy and said, “We need a moral economy not an economy based on greed.”

In addition to his other points, Sanders asked the crowd how many in the audience were in debt because of student loans. The majority in the audience booed and raised their hands.

“Young people are asking me, how does it happen that when we do the right thing and we go out and try to get the best education that we can,” Sanders said. “Why is it that we are ending up 30, 50, 70 thousand dollars in debt?”

Gabriella Moreno is a recent graduate of UTEP. She said that, although she did have the help of scholarships, she is still in debt and believes that Sanders’ outlook on education is necessary.

“There were some semesters where I had to pull out loans and I’m in debt now. Not huge debt, but it’s true what he says,” Moreno said. “If you want to improve your country, why hinder young people getting an education by charging them a ridiculous amounts of tuition when in reality it should be easily accessible to us?”

Sanders said that public universities and colleges should be free to anyone who wants to pursue higher education.

“We should be encouraging people to get an education, not discouraging them, and that is why I believe that in the year 2016 it is not good enough to talk about public education being first grade through twelfth grade, not good enough anymore,” Sanders said. “We need to make public colleges and universities tuition free.”

Sophomore education major Angelica Hinojos attended the rally with her mother and two younger sisters. They arrived at 8:15 a.m. to beat the crowds.

Hinojos said that Sanders offers opportunities to different minority groups and that this rally was a learning experience for her and her family. She said that she hopes that more young voters and students will attend events like the Sanders rally in Vado.

“Voice your opinion,” Hinojos said. “You should always try to find a way to make our society better.”

Amanda Guillen may be reached at [email protected]

Six New Mexico dairy farms, including four in Don?a Ana County, are alleging two dominant dairy cooperatives used their monopoly over markets for local milk to hold down prices over several years, even as producers struggled to stay afloat.

The farms are alleging violations of federal antitrust laws in federal complaint filed last week.

Dairy Farmers of America and Select Milk Producers are cooperatives whose members deliver their milk to the cooperatives' processing facilities and, ultimately, into milk cartons and other dairy products.

On its website, DFA claims more than 12,500 local farms as members nationwide. Select Milk, with a smaller geographic focus including Texas, New Mexico and the midwest, claims 87 family-owned farms as members.

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The federal complaint alleges the two entities have cornered at least 75 percent of the market for what New Mexico dairies produce. A third defendant, the Greater Southwest Agency, is an entity owned in part by the two cooperatives.

Based on milk production reports from the U.S. Department of Agriculture, the farmers claim the market for milk produced in New Mexico and Texas tops $3.5 billion, with New Mexico producing more than half of the 23 billion pounds of milk between the two states in 2020.

The complaint alleges that DFA and Select conspired to suppress prices for New Mexico members' milk at least as far back as January 2015, following a period of unusually high returns for farmers.

Drawing a picture of collusion based on their buying power and ownership of facilities where milk is processed for butter, cheese and other products, the complaint states the cooperatives schemed to boost their own profit margins while underpaying farmers.

Moreover, the plaintiffs point out that DFA's commercial investments division benefits when raw milk prices are lower, despite its obligation to benefit its members by seeking the best prices for their milk.

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"... The dairy industry is particularly susceptible to antitrust conspiracies due to high consolidation within the industry, incredibly complicated price formulas, and a lack of price transparency," attorneys for the farmers said in a written statement.

DFA, which has faced previous antitrust complaints in court, declined an interview request but issued a statement saying they were reviewing the 77-page complaint.

"We believe any allegations that we violated the intent of anti-trust laws lack merit, and we will vigorously defend ourselves in this case," the company stated.

Select Milk Producers did not immediately respond to a query from the Las Cruces Sun-News.

The plaintiffs consist of Othart Dairy Farms in Belen; Pareo Farm in Socorro County; Desertland Dairy in Vado; Del Oro Dairy in Anthony; Bright Star Dairy and Sunset Dairy, both in Mesquite.

They are seeking class action status and a jury trial for damages under federal antitrust law plus interest and court costs.

Algernon D'Ammassa can be reached at 575-541-5451, [email protected] or @AlgernonWrites on Twitter.

An Oct. 26, 1975, article by C.R. Giles tells the story of Vado and the Boyer family.

In the late 1890s, Francis Marion Boyer was incensed by the slaying of a black barber and the subsequent trial, in which the barber's killer, a white patron, was acquitted by an all-white jury that took less than 10 minutes to decide the case.

Boyer recalled stories of a valley out West told to him by his father, who had served as a civilian wagoner with the U.S. Army during the Mexican-American War in 1847.

Henry brought supplies to soldiers stationed in the Southwest. He told his son about an area south of Las Cruces that had head-high grass and was filled with antelope, buffalo and whitetail deer.

The article says, "In 1899, Francis Boyer and a man by the name of Dan Keyes set out on foot for the promised land. It took them a year to walk the 2,000 miles across the southern United States. When they stopped, the place was Roswell, N.M. For Boyer, it was home. Keyes continued to walk on down the road into historical obscurity, relays fourth-born child of Francis M.

Boyer, Hobart Boyer, 76, another enduring relative of the pioneer."

In 1900, Francis Boyer, a college graduate, took his first job in the Southwest. He worked as a cook on a chuck wagon for about three months. His next job was as a ranch hand on the Chisolm "spread."

"It was almost a year before he sent for his family and settled them near Roswell in a place now known as Blackdom," the article says. "The town still stands, but like Vado, began to decline after its promising start.

"Francis and Ella Boyer had by now seven of the 10 children they would have. They homesteaded on 16 acres in the Pecos Valley for the next 21 years.

"It was 1921 when they finally moved over into the Rio Grande Valley, into what is now Vado, ccording to Hobart Boyer.

"As Hobart recalls, 'We were the first coloreds to move into this area and the first to farm in Dona Ana County. My dad was renting about 250 acres when he came across the Barite Land and Development Co.

"A man in the company asked him if he would like to buy some land. My dad said, 'I don't have the money to buy land.'

" 'The man replied, "I didn't ask you about no money." My dad listened,' Hobart said. 'The man went on to make a deal that if my dad would buy the land in 10-, 20- and 40- acre tracts "in the rough," he could pay for it as it was convenient for him.'

"The settling by blacks continued. The cotton had lured the people to the valley, and with the gentle yet powerful persuasion of Francis Boyer, they had been convinced this would be a good place to settle."

Boyer busied himself establishing the Valley Grove Masonic Lodge No. 9, a Prince Hall affiliate, the Auto-Literary Society and a church.

In 1924 a branch of the NAACP was formed in the Las Cruces area. The small chapter fought the School Proposition that "subscribed to the separate-but-equal doctrine."

"Although Francis Boyer didn't live to see the results of his efforts in the civil rights struggle," the article said, "the chapter was hailed in 1969 by the national office as the branch that had the strongest influence on desegregation throughout the nation."

In 1925 the Paul Lawrence Dunbar School was built in Vado. The school had four large rooms and housed 175 children.

"The Ku Klux Klan was a rather watered-down affair in the valley, and response to organize any sizable kleagle was unsuccessful in 1925," the article said. "A large part of the unsuccessful campaign could be attributed to the dense Mexican population in this area.

"Another reason the Klan was not able to wage a full-scale campaign was a New Mexico state law enacted in 1929 that forbade the wearing of '... masks, hoods and robes on public streets, alleys, highways or thoroughfares. ...

"Francis Marion Boyer had tried five times to settle towns. Four of those times, for varied reasons, the dreams he had for the town were stymied. These places were Afro, Fla.; Camps, Ala.; Ham City, Ga.; and Blackdom, N.M. It almost came to completion for him in Vado.

"When asked how his father stood the disappointment, Hobart replied, 'Well he settled four towns in the past, so he knew what he was getting into.' "