Roswell Daily Record
Vol. 122, No. 189 75¢ Daily / $1.25 Sunday
INSIDE NEWS
DEATH SENTENCE POSSIBLE FOR HASAN FORT HOOD, Texas (AP) — On the first day Maj. Nidal Hasan went on trial in a fight for his life, he claimed responsibility for the 2009 shooting rampage at Fort Hood... - PAGE A6
THE VOICE OF THE PECOS VALLEY
August 8, 2013
Officials: Rural NM facing water crisis
ALBUQUERQUE — State officials have been fielding a steady stream of phone calls and emails from the managers of community drinking water systems around the state as drought refuses to give up its grip on New Mexico. The managers are looking to the state for help as they work to avert a crisis. Water levels are still dropping, aging infrastructure is being pushed to its limits and federal funding is growing more scarce. In all, the state has iden-
THURSDAY
www.rdrnews.com
tified nearly 300 drinking water systems that are considered vulnerable. Many of them depend on a single source of water and have no backup plan if conditions worsen. “We really have been experiencing calls for assistance and notifications of water shortages and outages throughout the state in a way that we haven’t seen in recent drought years,” Danielle Shuryn of the New Mexico Environment Department said during a conference call.
Reading to lead
Just last month, tens of thousands of gallons of water had to be trucked to the town of Magdalena after the community’s sole operating well failed, leaving about 1,000 residents and several businesses without water. A coalition of government agencies and nonprofit organizations is now trying to help water system operators prepare so they don’t become the next Magdalena. The groups have teamed up to help communities with engineering
work to identify backup water sources, monitor existing sources and develop emergency plans in the event of a water outage. An initial round of letters will be sent to 290 community water systems determined to be at the greatest risk, but Shuryn said the state plans to make the program open to any interested water system. With drought putting pressure on supplies, small communities around New Mexico are seeing wells filling with silt and failing,
said Matt Holmes, executive director of the New Mexico Rural Water Association, a partner in the project.
“There are a lot of factors and I think the drought is sort a stressor. That adds an additional stress, and it might be the straw that breaks the camel’s back,” Holmes said. “In many of these communities where we see these water shortages, it’s really infrastruc-
Yemen’s govt says it uncovered al-Qaida plot
TOP 5 WEB
For The Past 24 Hours
•.Singleton arrested for drugs, attack... •.Do you know this man? •.1 Dead in Shooting •.Despite some difficulties, Roswell Pride... •.Ramos arrested in kidnapping case
INSIDE SPORTS Mark Wilson Photo
New college cadets to New Mexico Military Institute read their required knowledge and skills qualifications handbooks during the school's matriculation process, Wednesday morning.
See WATER, Page A3
SANAA, Yemen (AP) — Military and intelligence officials in Yemen said Wednesday they uncovered an al-Qaida plot to fire missiles at foreign embassies in the capital and to attack naval forces guarding international shipping in the Red Sea. Details of the plot, which was reminiscent of the suicide attack on the USS Cole in 2000 that killed 17 American sailors, emerged as Yemen remains in a heightened state of alert that has seen the U.S. and British embassies evacuated and a new suspected U.S. drone strike that killed seven alleged militants from the terrorist group. The discovery of the alQaida plot prompted the Defense Ministry to step up See YEMEN, Page A3
Obama cancels Putin summit amid Snowden tensions
MLBPA APPEALS A-ROD’S SUSPENSION CHICAGO (AP) — The Major League Baseball Players Association formally appealed Alex Rodriguez’s 211-game suspension Wednesday, sending the... - PAGE B1
TODAY’S OBITUARIES
• Virginia R. Bartlett • Michael Wayne “Fadgie” Langston • Earlene Roberts - PAGE A6
WASHINGTON (AP) — Already faltering, President Barack Obama’s fiveyear effort to reboot U.S.Russian relations finally crashed Wednesday, as the White House abruptly canceled his planned faceto-face summit with Russia’s Vladimir Putin. The ef fort to upgrade the relationship has fallen victim to the rapidly shrinking common ground between the former Cold War rivals, including extreme differences over the Syrian civil war, Russia’s domestic crackdown on civil rights and — the final straw — the asylum granted to NSA leaker
Edward Snowden. The U.S. and Russian foreign and defense ministers will sit down in Washington later this week, but Obama canceled his planned early September summit in Moscow with Putin because of what the White House called a lack of “recent progress” on a wide array of critical issues. Such steps are not taken lightly, and the decision will almost certainly herald a new frostiness in already chilly ties. “We have informed the Russian government that we believe it would be more constructive to postpone the summit until we
have more results from our shared agenda,” the White House said in a statement, citing deep differences over missile defense, ar ms control, trade, global security and human rights. “Russia’s disappointing decision to grant Edward Snowden temporary asylum was also a factor that we considered in assessing the current state of our bilateral relationship,” it added.
The Kremlin responded quickly, voicing its own disappointment with the
See OBAMA, Page A3
Pecos Elementary receives supplies
HIGH ...98˚ LOW ....69˚
TODAY’S FORECAST
CLASSIFIEDS..........B6 COMICS.................B4 ENTERTAINMENT.....A8 FINANCIAL .............B5 GENERAL ..............A2 HOROSCOPES ........A8 LOTTERIES ............A2 NATION .................A6 OPINION ................A4 SPORTS ................B1 WEATHER ..............A8
INDEX
Mark Wilson Photo
Jon Hitchcock of Pioneer Bank announces the donation of school supplies to Pecos Elementary School's principal Dr. Barbara Ryan during an employee luncheon, Wednesday afternoon.
AP Photo
President Barack Obama meets with Russian President Vladimir Putin, June 17, in Enniskillen, Northern Ireland.
Powerball official: 3 win $448 million pot
DES MOINES, Iowa (AP) — Powerball luck has struck three times — once in Minnesota and twice in New Jersey — for the multistate lottery’s latest massive jackpot. Sue Dooley, senior drawing manager production coordinator for the MultiState Lottery Association, said late Wednesday night that three tickets matched all six numbers and would split the $448 million Powerball jackpot. “We had three grand prize winners,” Dooley said. “One was in Minnesota and two were in New Jersey.” She said it wasn’t yet clear where the tickets had been sold or who the winners where. She said that information would come from the individual states’ lottery officials.
The numbers drawn Wednesday night were: 05, 25, 30, 58, 59 and Powerball 32. At the time of the telecast, Powerball of ficials announced that the jackpot previously pegged at $425 million had grown to an estimated $448 million. The allure of capturing such a rich jackpot has had players in a ticket-buying frenzy, further confirming Powerball players often don’t get into the game until the jackpot offers big bucks. A recent game change increased the frequency of huge jackpots, and Wednesday’s third largestever jackpot comes only months after the biggest Powerball jackpot in history See POWERBALL, Page A3