Roswell Daily Record
Vol. 122, No. 280 75¢ Daily / $1.25 Sunday
THE VOICE OF THE PECOS VALLEY
November 22, 2013
www.rdrnews.com
Winter weather plows through region JILL MCLAUGHLIN RECORD STAFF WRITER
A winter weather patter n that arrived last night is expected to bring sleet, snow and freezing temperatures to Roswell into the weekend. “It’s going to be pretty chilly,” said Chris Luckett, meteorologist with the National Weather Service in Albuquerque. NWS predicts the region
will only reach 32 degrees today and Saturday, and drop to the low 30s or upper 20s at night. The city has a 50 percent chance to receive a wintery mix of freezing rain and sleet today, with an accumulation of sleet expected to reach half an inch, Luckett said. The sleet may continue through the night. Two weather systems have collided over the
state, creating cold arctic air and a wintery mix of freezing rain, sleet and snow. A backdoor cold front from the East is interacting with a low-pressure system from the West that has brought the moisture, Luckett said. Today’s moisture and freezing weather is going to continue into the night. A wintery mix of freezing rain and sleet is expected
to continue Saturday, with a high of 32 degrees predicted. “By Saturday night, the mix is going to change over to snow and sleet,” Luckett said. The low temperature Saturday night is forecast to drop to 26. Conditions should change by Sunday. NWS forecasters are calling for a 60 percent chance of snow, with a high of 37
Prepping a plane for paint
FRIDAY
degrees. The snow might taper off by Sunday night, Luckett said. The Ruidoso area is expected to see a 50 to 70 percent chance of snow throughout the weekend. “I’d say from Friday night until Monday night there’s a pretty good chance they could see some snow out of this,” Luckett said. AP Graphic
Councilors change city’s voting system JILL MCLAUGHLIN RECORD STAFF WRITER
Mark Wilson Photo
A work crew cleans a hangar at Dean Baldwin Painting on Wednesday that houses a recently arrived NASA DC-8 test plane scheduled to be stripped of its paint before undergoing maintenance work at AerSale.
6,000 Ariz. child abuse reports not investigated
PHOENIX (AP) — About 6,000 cases of suspected child abuse or neglect that were reported to a statewide Arizona hotline over the past four years were never investigated, officials disclosed Thursday, calling it reason for “grave alarm.” A team at Arizona’s Child Protective Services agency improperly designated the cases “N.I.” — meaning “Not Investigated” — to help manage the heavy workload and focus on the most severe cases, said Clarence Carter, chief of the state’s child welfare system. Under state law, all reports generated via the hotline must be investigat-
ed, Carter said. All the cases will be reviewed, officials said. At least 125 cases already have been identified in which children were later alleged to have been abused, they said. “I don’t know of any fatalities,” Gregory McKay, the agency’s chief of child welfare investigations, said of the botched cases. No one has been disciplined, but Arizona’s Department of Public Safety will investigate. “There must be accountability in this matter, and I will insist on further reforms to make sure that it cannot happen again,” Gov. Jan Brewer said. The practice of misclassi-
fying the cases and essentially closing them started in 2009, Carter said. The number rapidly escalated in the past 20 months as caseloads increased and other changes were made, and 5,000 of the 6,000 cases happened in that time, he said. “The idea that there are 6,000 cases where we don’t know whether or not children are safe, that’s cause for grave alar m,” said Carter, who as director of Arizona’s Department of Economic Security oversees CPS and other social welfare agencies. CPS has been one of the governor’s major priorities and has suf fered from understaffing and major
City councilors decided to overhaul the voting process for the city’s March elections at a special meeting Thursday night without holding a public hearing. On the advice of City Clerk Sharon Coll, councilors unanimously voted to implement new Voting Convenience Centers that will eliminate precincts throughout the city. The new centers will now be limited to eight locations. But voters will be allowed to vote at any of the locations, regardless of where they live. “This is a greater opportunity for them to be successful for voting, absolutely,” said Mayor Del Jurney. Chaves County Commissioners were also asked to consider the same system by County Clerk Dave Kunko in October but voted it down, citing concerns
that Kunko had not done enough analysis on where he located the new centers. Commissioners voiced concern that some polling places might not give voters equal access to vote. Six of the eight sites proposed by the city were identical to the sites proposed by Kunko. Another location, the Roswell Museum and Art Center, was selected instead of Kunko’s suggestion of the Civic Center next door. The Council also recommended changing two church locations to a school and an alter nate church. Commissioner Greg Nibert, also an attorney, raised a question about a conflict he found with voting centers and his interpretation of the state elections statute. Kunko had also not given commissioners See VOTING, Page A3
increases in abuse reports and workloads in recent years. Brewer got approval from the Legislature in January for emergency funding for 50 new caseworkers and regular funding for 150 more in the budget year that began July 1. In a statement, the governor called the mishandling of the cases “absolutely unacceptable.”
“The most urgent priority is to ensure that each one of the children involved in these cases is safe,” Brewer said. “Every case must be investigated — no exceptions, no excuses. It is not only the right thing, but it is the law.”
Mother-daughter duo caught with 40 pounds of pot JESSICA PALMER RECORD STAFF WRITER
The New Mexico State Police arrested two women, Wednesday, as part of an interdiction operation to stop drug trafficking. Uniformed officers from Roswell District 3, along with K-9 units, stopped a silver 2013 Hyundai fourdoor rental car on U.S. 285, near mile post 120. The driver Monica Villegas, 21, and the passenger Beverly Villegas, 55, of Santa Rosa, Calif., told
officers they were traveling from Santa Rosa to San Antonio, Texas. An NMSP officer detected the odor of raw marijuana.
Their investigation yielded 40.4 pounds of marijuana in the trunk of the vehicle. Both mother and daughter were placed under arrest on charges of distribution of marijuana and conspiracy.
They were booked into the Chaves County Detention Center on a $50,000 bond each.
HIGH 36 LOW 27
TODAY’S FORECAST
Apprehended
Beverly Villegas
• ROETTA OVERSTREET • CALVIN G. LASITER • FAUSTINO RODRIGUEZ
Monica Villegas
• ORBAN WAGGONER
TODAY’S OBITUARIES PAGE A8
Pamela Whitt, 44, who was wanted for using someone else’s debit/credit card without permission on two counts of remote financial service act violation, was arrested at 8:22 p.m. Wednesday, in the 1500 block of West First Street.
CLASSIFIEDS ..........B7 COMICS .................B6 ENTERTAINMENT ...A10 GENERAL ...............A2
INDEX HOROSCOPES .......A10
LOTTERIES .............A2 OPINION .................A4
SPORTS .................B1 STOCKS .................B5 WEATHER ............A10 WORLD ..................A9