A northern New Mexico city with a population of just over 10, 500 people may soon see the construction of a new fire department training facility. Members of the New Mexico State Legislature have given their approval to a proposal calling for $2.2 million in funding to build the facility, which will belong to the Espanola Fire Department. More specifically, the capital outlay will pay for the planning, design, and construction of the new building. The fire department, with its station Number One located on the site of the Espanola City Hall at 806 Veterans Memorial Park Road, has long been in need of a separate facility that would exclusively house-training programs. The department has done well with lawmakers in past legislative sessions: in 2022 a capital outlay of just over $3.1 million was approved for the construction of a new Fire Station Number 2, otherwise known as the La Joya station, and upgrading of the existing more than 50-year-old facility. The funding for the new Espanola fire station is one of around 80 individual projects for Rio Arriba County passed by lawmakers and awaiting the final approval of Governor Michelle Lujan Grisham. By Garry Boulard
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In a move to expand federal funding opportunities for Native American-owned businesses, the Small Business Administration has announced an outreach effort under the auspices of the Biden Administration’s Investing in America Agenda. A just-concluded roundtable conducted at the White House with representatives from the Small Business Administration, Department of Commerce, and Treasury Department, among other agencies, outlined “commitments to, and strategies for, reducing barriers to accessing capital, building on the current system of Native community development financial institutions, and improving economic development in Tribal communities.” Interior Secretary Deb Haaland, according to a White House press release, underscored the importance of both “public-private partnerships and interagency collaboration in expanding capital access,” while also supporting “Tribal sovereignty and self-determination.” Haaland, a former member of Congress representing New Mexico's 1st District, is the first Native American to serve as a cabinet secretary. She has pushed for greater federal investments in Indian Country, and last year remarked that "we are working to remedy decades of underfunding," noting that up to $1.4 billion in federal contracts were awarded to Native American businesses in 2023. An emphasis is particularly being made with what is officially called the Tribal Community Vision Fund, which is tasked with promoting economic and community development in Indian Country. A second effort comes in the form of the Initiative for Inclusive Entrepreneurship, designed to accelerate the flow of State Small Business Credit Initiative capital to Native entrepreneurs and Tribal enterprises. In November the Small Business Administration released figures showing that during fiscal year 2023 it had backed around five hundred loans to Native-owned small businesses, for a total dollar value of some $278 million. According to U.S. Census figures Native Americans, Alaska Natives, and Native Hawaiians currently own just under 57,000 individual businesses across the country, representing some $65 billion in revenue. By Garry Boulard Plans are underway for the construction of a new 105-room hotel in the Oro Valley, just under 20 miles to the north of Tucson. The four-story hotel will be branded as a Hampton Inn and Suites and will go up on a currently vacant 2.8-acre site near the northwest corner of Oracle Road and Water Harvest Drive in the shopping and entertainment district known as the Oro Valley Marketplace. Opened in 2008, that marketplace includes restaurants, a furniture store, bank, and variety of department stores, among other offerings. According to city documents, the hotel will measure around 59,500 square feet and will "incorporate tilted flag-shaped accents to reference architectural elements consistently used throughout the Oro Valley Marketplace." Project designer is the Tucson-based Eglin+Bresler Architects. A conceptual site and landscape plans for the project were approved last November by the Oro Valley Town Council. The architectural plans for the project are now under review before the Oro Valley Planning and Zoning Commission. Launched in 1984, Hampton Inn and Suites, with headquarters in Memphis, is trademarked by Hilton Worldwide and has over 2,600 locations globally. It caters to an upper midscale clientele. By Garry Boulard Plans for the building of a new animal shelter in Las Vegas have taken an important step forward with a funding vote in the New Mexico State Legislature. Lawmakers approved a $780,000 capital outlay request to build the city-run shelter. In an interview with the Las Vegas Optic newspaper, Las Vegas Mayor David Romero remarked: "The animal crisis that we have in our community is a big issue." The current one-story shelter is located at 1680 N. Grand Avenue and is owned by the city. But the animal control aspects of the operation are handled by the San Miguel County Sheriff's Office. City officials have said that the existing shelter, which has at times housed as many as 60 homeless animals, is out of date and often overcrowded. Late last year it was announced that the city planned to submit a $2 million request to plan, design, and construct a new shelter. The $780,000 that lawmakers ultimately passed for the animal shelter project was part of a larger $5.1 million in capital outlay funding for San Miguel County that was approved for a variety of infrastructure projects. The capital outlay package is now awaiting final approval by Governor Michelle Lujan Grisham. By Garry Boulard Construction jobs funded through three historic infrastructure bills are expected to surpass the 19 million mark over the course of the next several years, according to a new report. The National Skills Coalition and BlueGreen Alliance in a report titled Unprecedented Opportunity: Meeting the Workforce Demands of New Clean Energy, Manufacturing, and Infrastructure Investments is forecasting a $2 trillion federal investment in infrastructure projects within the decade. That investment is coming out of the Infrastructure and Investment Jobs Act, the Inflation Reduction Act, and the CHIPS and Science Act. Those three bills, forecasts the report, “will transform America’s physical landscape and our country’s workforce.” Altogether, the measures are expected to create just under 3 million new jobs a year, says the report, noting that in construction the “occupations that will experience the most significant increases are laborers, operating engineers, electrical power-line installers and repairers.” Just under 70% of the jobs created by the three bills will be available to “workers without a bachelor’s degree, compared to 59% of jobs in the entire U.S. workforce.” Of the 48 defined occupations that will see the most growth, 21 have “relatively low entry requirements regarding a formal post-secondary education credential but have significant skill requirements requiring shorter-term and/or on-the-job training.” Another 27 jobs have “significant entry requirements, which include some form of a post-secondary credential, related skills training, and/or apprenticeship.” Breaking down the forecast job growth via the individual legislative acts, the report predicts that the Infrastructure and Investment Jobs Act will ultimately result in 8.8 million new jobs; while the Inflation Reduction Act will create 8.5 million jobs; and the CHIPS and Science Act will be good for 1.4 million jobs. More specifically, nearly 81,000 new construction laborer jobs annually will be created, followed by 40,000 construction supervisors, and 34,500 electrical power installers and repairers. The National Skills Coalition is based in Washington and promotes high-quality skills training, while the Blue Green Alliance, also in Washington, is focused on union and environmental issues. By Garry Boulard A global housewares giant with longstanding ties to El Paso has announced that it is going to move its headquarters to a 20-story structure in the city’s central downtown area. The Helen of Troy company was founded in El Paso in 1968 and has seen more than $2 billion in annual sales. For years the company operated out of a massive complex along Interstate 10 on the west side of the city that included some 412,000 square feet of warehouse space, and a 115,000 square-foot office. Last fall the company announced plans to sell that property to the Eaton Corporation, a global power management company, for around $80 million. Now Helen of Troy officials say they are going to move their headquarters into the One San Jacinto Plaza Building, located at 201 E. Main Street. That structure, which was completed in 1962, is regarded as one of the mainstays of the modern El Paso skyline and is the second tallest building in the city, next to the Wells Fargo Plaza skyscraper at 221 North Kansas Street. Helen of Troy will occupy some 54,000 square feet of the One San Jacinto Plaza Building. In a statement, Noel Geoffroy, chief executive officer of the company, characterized the move as one that “continues our commitment to El Paso and our support of ongoing downtown revitalization efforts in the City, County, and the private sector.” Geoffrey added that the new space for the company will provide “modern amenities and meet our space requirements for years to come.” The move is seen as particularly important for a city that in recent years has been promoting the amenities of a vibrant downtown. “It demonstrates the power of vision and the power of working together to make our downtown the most dynamic in the country,” El Paso Mayor Oscar Leeser, in a statement, said of the Helen of Troy decision. The Helen of Troy company was originally launched as a wig store before expanding into a variety of hair dryers and curling irons offerings and entering into a licensing agreement with industry legend Vidal Sassoon in 1975. In subsequent decades Helen of Troy came to specialize in a wide variety of beauty, health & home, and housewares products. The company has annual sales of just over $2 billion. The company has other operating locations in Boston as well as Lausanne, Switzerland, and Shenzhen, Guangdong. Plans call for Helen of Troy to be in its new downtown El Paso location by early 2025. By Garry Boulard Homes in Tribal northwestern New Mexico and northeastern Arizona may soon have enhanced access to energy as a result of new federal renewable energy funding. In announcing that funding, Energy Secretary Jennifer Granholm said it was the “largest amount that the Department of Energy has awarded to tribes for energy projects.” A total of $366 million is being released for a variety of projects in 20 states and 30 Tribal Nations, with all of those projects centered on building clean energy deployment in rural and remote areas. The funding was folded into the 2021 Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act and will take on everything from building microgrids for community health centers to constructing hydroelectricity facilities. Granholm said the funding is part of a larger Energy Department initiative to help “revitalize communities across America,” while also “ensuring thriving businesses, reliable access to clean energy, and exciting new economic opportunities, now and for generations to come.” Exactly $8 million is going for the building of solar-powered battery-based systems in both Navajo and Hopi communities in Arizona, New Mexico, and Utah. A community solar project for the Hopi Nation in Arizona is in line for $9.1 million in funding; while a microgrid project in Arivaca, Arizona, among other locations, is getting part of a big $45.2 million in funding. Another microgrid project at Fort Lupton in northern Colorado is receiving $6.1 million in an effort, according to the Energy Department, to “increase the reliability of the municipal water treatment plant and replacing the aging diesel generator.” A press release from the Energy Department said that the projects upon completion will create “safer, more resilient communities,” while enhancing Tribal sovereignty and delivering “new economic opportunities in every pocket of the nation.” By Garry Boulard Single-family starts will be on the upside for the duration of the year, even as the nation remains challenged by a lack of new housing units, said several experts during a panel sponsored by the National Association of Home Builders. Roughly “80% of builders anticipate starting more homes this year, and more than half expect that starts will be up more than 10% compared to 2023,” remarked Ali Wolf, chief economist with the home building prop tech company Zonda. In fact, according to a recent Zonda survey, nearly half of builders questioned said they are currently moving “full steam ahead” with building projects, while another 46% were also heading in the same direction, but cautiously so. The new home construction push is in no small way connected to home sales, with a Zonda study showing that nearly 665,000 new homes were sold in January, an increase of 11.7% over January of last year. “We need to build more than 1.1 million single-family homes a year to reduce the nation’s housing deficit,” remarked Robert Dietz, NAHB chief economist, in noting that the need for new housing remains historically pressing. Dietz additionally observed that home builders are looking hopefully on the direction of interest rates, which are giving every indication of heading south in the months to come. “By the end of this year, NAHB projects mortgage rates will be below 6.5% and by the end of 2025, we expect rates to be in the high 5%,” continued Dietz, who also noted that the downward rate decline is not only a good thing for builders, but also a positive response to housing demand and general housing affordability. Altogether, the number of new single-family starts are expected to increase by around 4.7% before the end of the year, comprising some 988,000 new units. The numbers look even better for 2025, with an anticipated 1 million new single-family starts. But, it was noted, even with the way forward looking promising for the home building industry, the simple cost of trying to build remains formidable, with building codes and zoning issues, among other factors, spurring an anticipated 24% increase in the asking price for a new home. By Garry Boulard New Colorado Legislation Will Allow for the Use of Fire-Resistant Materials in Home Construction3/1/2024 Colorado residents in neighborhoods governed by a homeowners’ association may soon be allowed to opt for fire-hardened building materials in the construction of their homes. A bill introduced in the Colorado House of Representatives has now been passed in both legislative chambers making it possible to use such material even if it goes against the building dictates of the homeowners’ association in question. The legislation is significant for the simple reason that homeowners’ associations in the Centennial State, as well as other states across the country, can often dictate not just the color and landscaping of a new home, but also the materials that go into it. That prerogative, however, has been attacked in a state that has seen an increased number of wildfires of varying proportion in recent years, including the Cameron Peak fire of 2020 which burned nearly 210,000 acres. That fire started near the Chambers Lake reservoir in northern Colorado and eventually destroyed nearly 500 structures. As sponsored by Democrat Representative Briana Titone, the legislation, HB24-1901, will make it illegal for homeowners’ associations to prohibit the use of fire-hardened building materials ranging from fiber cement siding to some types of stucco and metal in home construction. The use of such materials, according to its supporters, would be in keeping with National Fire Protection Association standards, as well as the International Wildland-Urban Interface Code. The legislation has now been sent to Governor Jared Polis for his signature. By Garry Boulard A project that would take wastewater and convert it into non-potable water usage is still very much in the planning stage in Albuquerque. But members of the New Mexico State Legislature this winter voted to approve a portion of the preliminary design funding needed to get the water treatment plant built. The project belongs to the Albuquerque Bernalillo County Water Utility Authority and will go up on a 4.5-acre site near the intersection of Coors Boulevard and Montano Road. The project is part of the ABCWUA's 100-year plan which places an emphasis on water reuse for the growing west side of the Duke City. According to a report compiled by the department called Water Reuse--The Wave of the Future, the new facility, once built, has the potential of diverting up to "seven million gallons of wastewater daily" for use on parks and golf courses. Excess water, meanwhile, will be "treated to regulatory standards" and discharged into the Rio Grande. It is thought that it may ultimately cost as much as $300 million to build out what is being called the Bosque/West Side Water Reclamation Plant. ABCWUA officials have earlier intimated that construction of the project could be funded through bonds. By Garry Boulard |
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