Nick Seibel, editor and publisher of the Silver City Daily Press, covers top stories each week in the Silver City Report. This week he talks about the Mule Creek Post Office possibly closing permanently, the Grant County Commission considering raising rates on solid waste and taking over management of the local convention center and Silver City as the grand finale of a burro race and more.
Susan Morée:
Nick, you've got some burro kind of stories for us this week. Let's start with the Mule Creek Post Office. What's going on there?
Nick Seibel:
Yeah, so Mule Creek is a tiny little community that's right on the border between New Mexico and Arizona. There's not much there besides the post office. It's a small agricultural community. And that post office really serves as the hub of that rural area. But back in April of 2024, a car actually crashed into the post office. And ever since then, the folks in Mule Creek have been stuck. For a while, they were having to go to Buckhorn for all of their postal services. And now it looks like the U.S. Postal Service has hit on the solution that they want, which is they've started a feasibility study on permanently closing that post office and consolidating everything at Buckhorn. Obviously, the folks in the Mule Creek community are really upset about this. The drive between Mule Creek and Buckhorn is about 18 miles. So Representative Gabe Vasquez has been really engaged in this process since the beginning. And obviously he's demanding answers from the Postal Service.
Susan Morée:
Okay, part of a larger trend of closing small community post offices, I think.
Nick Seibel:
Indeed it is. Yep.
Susan Morée:
And last week there was a meeting with the Grant County Commission and they postponed a vote on increasing solid waste rates, but they did pass something involving the convention center. Tell us about that.
Nick Seibel:
Yeah, solid waste rates have been a big issue all across Grant County in the unincorporated areas and in the community because the Southwest Solid Waste Authority, which is basically an independent body made-up of representatives of county government and all the municipal governments, basically decided that they were going broke here earlier this year. And so they've basically done a 100% increase to all of the member governments. All of that, of course, basically has to get passed on to the ratepayers, the folks who are actually disposing of waste in the landfill. Every municipality in Grant County and the Grant County government have been having to look at the big hikes to the rates that they charge folks for their trash disposal. There's a lot of concern about that, obviously, as prices of everything are going up. Folks from the community are pushing to have that phased in and to better have explained why such a big increase is necessary. County commissioners, after a lot of public input last week, decided they were going to postpone their vote on the new ordinance until September 24th. One of the county facilities that's very popular is the Grant County Veterans Memorial Business and Conference Center, which is kind of out on the edge of town. Originally, it was built to be Silver City's first Walmart store. And most of the space is now this large conference center used for all sorts of public meetings and then also for community events. And ever since the county renovated that, it's been operated by the Silver City/Grant County Chamber of Commerce. Well, that contract was up for renewal and the county's basically decided that they're going to take over operation of that facility themselves which will be a big change there, but they think they can save some money and do that effectively. So that transition is going to be ongoing here over the next couple of months.
Susan Morée:
And there was a burro race this past weekend. Tell us who won.
Nick Seibel:
From Mule Creek to the burro race. That's right. Yes, the Silver Load Scramble. This was the second year for that burro race, which was part of a series of burro races that takes place across mostly New Mexico. It's a thing, you know, people have burros, so the race course in Silver City starts on Broadway near the Silver City Museum and goes up onto the trail system on Boston Hill. This year, the Silver Load Scramble, which is the name of the Silver City race, was the final race with folks turning out for that, and a good fit for Silver City and its mining history. It's one of those things where it seems kind of wacky when you first do it, and then once it got started, I think everyone is kind of wondering how we ever got along without it. It seems like such a natural play.
Susan Morée:
Did you go for the burro race, Nick?
Nick Seibel:
I was actually out of town.
Susan Morée:
Sounds like a lot of fun. Where can readers find these stories, Nick?
Nick Seibel:
And a whole lot more at scdailypress.com.
