NAVAJO NATION

Push underway to electrify more homes

HALCHITA, Utah — After a five-year wait, Lorraine Black and Ricky Gillis heard the rumblings of an electrical crew reach their home on the sprawling Navajo Nation.

In five days’ time, their home would be connected to the power grid, replacing their reliance on a few solar panels and propane lanterns. No longer would the CPAP machine Gillis uses for sleep apnea or his home heart monitor transmitting information to doctors 400 miles away face interruptions due to intermittent power. It also means Black and Gillis can now use more than a few appliances at the same time.

Many Navajo families still live without running water and electricity, a product of historic neglect and the struggle to get services to far-flung homes on the 27,000-square-mile Native American reservation that lies in parts of Arizona, New Mexico and Utah.

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For years, the Navajo Tribal Utility Authority has worked to get more Navajo homes connected to the grid faster. Under a program called Light Up Navajo, which uses a mix of private and public funding, outside utilities from across the U.S. send electric crews to help connect homes and extend power lines.

But installing power on the reservation roughly the size of West Virginia is time-consuming and expensive due to its rugged geography and the vast distances between homes. Drilling for power poles there can take several hours because of underground rock deposits while some homes near Monument Valley must have power lines installed underground to meet strict regulations around development in the area.

About 32% of Navajo homes still have no electricity. Connecting the remaining 10,400 homes on the reservation would cost $416 million, said Deenise Becenti, government and public affairs manager at the utility.

This year, Light Up Navajo connected 170 more families to the grid. Since the program started in 2019, 882 Navajo families have had their homes electrified. If the program stays funded, Becenti said it could take another 26 years to connect every home on the reservation.

ARIZONA

Wolf’s death alarms environmentalists

FLAGSTAFF — A federally protected female Mexican wolf was found dead in an area near the northern Arizona city of Flagstaff, alarming environmentalists who worry someone may have deliberately killed the animal.

The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service and Arizona Game and Fish Department announced in a joint statement on Nov. 15 that the animal known to biologists as Mexican wolf F2979 was found dead on Nov. 7. It was located outside the boundaries established along the Arizona-New Mexico border for managing the rarest subspecies of gray wolf in North America.

Officials did not release the cause of death except to say that it was “not related to agency management actions.” Up to $103,500 in reward money had been pledged for information “that leads to successful prosecution in the case,” they said.

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Mexican gray wolves are protected under the Endangered Species Act. Killing a Mexican wolf can result in criminal penalties of up to $50,000, and/or up to one year in jail, seizure of firearms, vehicles, and buildings involved in the crime, along with a potential civil penalty of up to $25,000.

The state and federal agencies said in the joint release that the female wolf was first documented outside the government-designated “Mexican Wolf Experimental Population Area,” located north of Interstate 40 near Flagstaff in the early summer of 2024.

Mexican gray wolves were first reintroduced into the Southwestern U.S. a quarter century ago. After a slow start, their numbers have grown in recent years to more than 250 in Arizona and New Mexico.

WYOMING

Lawmakers want ‘noncitizen’ label on IDs

CHEYENNE — The Wyoming legislature’s Joint Transportation, Highways and Military Affairs Committee voted on Nov. 15 to sponsor a bill draft that would add citizenship/residency status to state-issued identification cards.

If passed during the 2025 general session, the bill would require a complete redesign of ID cards issued by the Wyoming Department of Transportation in order to add a line reading, “Not a United States citizen” and colors that would indicate the citizenship status of a cardholder.

The number of these types of cards needed and the cost are unknown at this time.

The bill’s intent, according to Secretary of State Chuck Gray, is to take a “step in the right direction” by continuing to enforce voter security and make the jobs of county clerks easier when registering voters.

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Gray’s primary concern is addressing alleged instances of noncitizens registering to vote, even though there have been no recent reports of noncitizens voting.

In addition to concerns about need and cost, one issue with passing this draft bill is the limited information a physical ID provides.

WYDOT Deputy Director Taylor Rossetti testified that by the 2026 election cycle, there may be a more technologically advanced way to address the issue without spending the time and money redesigning ID cards.

NEW MEXICO

Retired research chimps headed to sanctuary

ALBUQUERQUE — The National Institutes of Health decided to relocate nearly two dozen retired research chimpanzees from a facility in New Mexico to a sanctuary in Louisiana, a move celebrated on Nov. 8 by animal advocates who have been fighting for years to get the animals moved.

NIH representatives confirmed in an email that the transfer of the 23 chimps from the Alamogordo Primate Facility at Holloman Air Force Base in southern New Mexico will happen in the coming months.

Staffing issues, namely the planned retirement of the chimps’ caretakers, prompted the decision to move the chimps, the agency stated. The animals have not been used as test subjects since 2015, when the NIH retired chimpanzees — humans’ closest relatives — from invasive research.

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More than 200 were previously moved to the federally supported sanctuary, but the NIH said it was decided in 2019 that some were too frail to be relocated due to their health conditions. They remained at the base under the care of contracted veterinarians and caregivers.

The chimps — which range in age from 34 to 62 years old — could have years ahead of them to enjoy life at the sanctuary, advocates said. The sanctuary has cared for hundreds of chimps since the first two animals arrived there in 2005. That includes 214 that were sent there from NIH-supported facilities following the agency’s 2015 decision.

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