By Lynn Janes
The town of Hurley had a regular meeting October 14, 2025. Mayor Ed Stevens, Mayor Pro Tem Reynaldo Maynes, Robert Candelaria, Pete Ordonez and Aron Phillips attended. Ben Young, attorney for the town of Hurley also attended.
Public input none currently. However, Sondra Berry had attended the meeting online and wanted to have public input but was told they didn't take it from people online.
The council approved the consent agenda that included minutes, and department head reports. They did move the closed session to the next item. The reason they moved it had been because Young had attended from out of town to participate in the closed session.
The council went into closed session to discuss police personnel matters.
The council came back into open session and no items had been discussed except what the agenda listed, and no decisions had been made.
George Esqueda, Stantec senior project manager, attended to address some projects. The council approved amendment 2, task order 8. This had to do with the GO building abatement RFP (request for proposal). This had been done before to request the abatement of asbestos and lead paint. One proposal came but not in the allotted time. This will just be the same request. The question came up if the town would be paying Stantec another fee. Esqueda said they do not collect a fee until they start working on the project.
Raymond De la Vega of Stantec attended to address another project. The council approved task order 12 for well 5 improvements and lighting. The project will also protect wells 3, 4 and 5 from lightning. Well 5 had been an exploratory well in 2022. Now the well will be equipped and connected to the transmission system and start production. Stantec will be doing the construction oversight for the entire process. The cost for this will be coming from capital outlay and use only a portion of it.
The council approved the proclamation for domestic violence awareness month. At the last meeting Dolores Charon, El Refugio, had made a presentation to the council and this will just be the proclamation recognizing October as domestic violence awareness month.
Jenny's Green Cleaning had put in a license application. This will be the second time, and she had not attended to present to the council what the business would be. No motion was made.
The council approved the purchase order from High Plains Fire Service for the annual pump, hose and ladder testing. This is done every year to make sure the equipment passes code. One other company will do this testing but charges a higher fee.
The council approved the purchase order from MES to do annual maintenance on the fire engine. This happens annually to test and make sure that all the equipment meets code.
The town tabled the water development project agreement with Freeport McMoRan. The agreements had not been finished yet and some questions had been proposed by the mayor and not answered at the time of this meeting.
The council approved the purchase order to Advanced Communications and Electronics Inc. for the purchase of police unit equipment. Kevin Vigil, police chief, had brought the answers to all the questions Candelaria had at the last meeting. This will provide the department with laptops for each unit and give them the capability to do many tasks in the field and not have to come back to the office keeping them on the street more. The company will come to Hurley to install everything and set it up. It will include the animal control vehicle.
The council approved for Vigil to attend the New Mexico Law Enforcement Conference in Ruidoso. Vigil went over all the benefits of the conference and legal updates he would be made aware of. Stevens noted one of the sessions being offered had to do with immigration border security updates and he wanted to know if that would be an issue. Vigil said he had between 2022 through the early part of 2024 detained between 300-400 undocumented immigrants in Grant County and the majority had been around highway 180 in Santa Clara. At that time, he worked in Santa Clara. After he started in Hurley, he had stopped a vehicle carrying 11 undocumented individuals in a U-Haul truck. Ordonez said he had attended this conference in the past.
The council approved the work order to PC Connection Sales Corp for support on migration of the email host provider. Darlene McBride, town clerk, said she and Candelaria had been looking into options for the email provider because of many continuous problems with the email service. Many having to do with storage availability. Candelaria explained the expanded services and options along with added security.
Mayor and council reports
None of the council member or Stevens had anything to report at this time.
McBride wanted to let the council know if they were interested in attending the rural infrastructure conference in November to let her know. The Southwest New Mexico Council of Governments will cover the registration fee and travel expense. She said the conference will have a lot of different seminars and on specific topics. Department of Finance and Administration (DFA) will be doing some on state funding. McBride said because of schedule conflicts she could not attend. The conference will be weeklong.
The next regular meeting would have been on November 11, 2025, but because of it being Veterans Day it would be canceled and moved to November 18, 2025.
Meeting adjourned.
