This week on New Mexico in Focus, Gene Grant hosts the Line Opinion Panel live in studio to talk about the criticism Republican leadership is facing after a disappointing midterm election. Does the blame fall on the party chairman, or was the performance of New Mexico candidates a symptom of a larger national trend?

Host Gene Grant and the panel also discuss record-breaking cannabis sales as a new growing facility could be coming to Santa Fe County. 

Plus, the panelists talk through an array of new health concerns as winter approaches.  

Our Land Senior Producer Laura Paskus speaks with an attorney from the Elephant Butte Irrigation District about a proposed settlement in a major water lawsuit. If approved, it could have serious implications for water distribution in Colorado, Texas and New Mexico. 

Grant dives into the debate surrounding the New Mexico rental market in a conversation with the executive director of the Apartment Association of New Mexico. Alan LaSeck explains his group’s position on rent stabilization as a state lawmaker introduces a bill to repeal our state’s ban on the practice.  

New Mexico in Focus airs on NMPBS 5.1 (KNME HD) Friday, Nov. 18 at 7 p.m. and Sunday, Nov. 15 at 7 a.m., and streaming on the PBS video app.  

The Line opinion panel
Michael Bird, public health consultant 
Merritt Allen, Vox Optima Public Relations 
Edmund Perea, attorney and public safety consultant 

Host
Gene Grant

New Mexico in Focus is the New Mexico PBS prime-time news magazine show covering the events, issues, and people that are shaping life in New Mexico and the Southwest. NMiF takes a multi-layered look at social, political, economic health, education, and art issues, and explores them in-depth with a critical eye to give them context beyond the "news of the moment." 

New Mexico in Focus Senior Producer for Public Affairs is Lou DiVizio. "Our Land" Senior Producer is Laura Paskus. Co-producer of New Mexico in Focus is Kathy Wimmer. Funding for New Mexico in Focus is provided by the McCune Charitable Foundation and Viewers Like You.

Funding for the Your New Mexico Government Project comes from the Thornburg Foundation and New Mexico Local News Fund.

Funding for Our Land: New Mexico’s Environmental Past, Present & Future, is provided in part by the Neeper Natural History Programming Fund for KNME-TV. 

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