Santa Fe, NM, quiet on bus drivers' deaths as state launches investigation
Mayor Alan Webber’s administration doesn’t have much to say about a COVID-19 outbreak that recently took the lives of two city bus drivers and sickened many others.
More talkative are staffers in the New Mexico Environment Department’s Occupational Health and Safety Bureau. They are investigating the city transit system. “Specifically, we are gathering additional information on COVID-positive cases among Santa Fe transit division workers. If information reveals the city did not take necessary steps to prevent worker exposure to COVID, NMED will take appropriate enforcement action and seek corrective measures,” agency spokeswoman Stephanie Stringer told me Tuesday.
Mayor Webber liked to say his most important job was keeping the city safe. It was a promise and a sound bite during his successful reelection campaign. This was before two unidentified bus drivers died of COVID-19, a third was hospitalized and an undisclosed number of others were infected.
Webber’s administration wouldn’t discuss the routes drivers traveled, when they were infected, if they were vaccinated or when they last worked. I had more questions. Thomas Martinez, operations director of the Santa Fe Trails Bus System, who makes $111,400 a year, didn’t want to hear them. He referred me to the city’s main spokesman, David Herndon. Herndon told me Martinez said he’d already answered my questions. Not so. A clunky conversation followed with Herndon, who makes $77,000 a year. Herndon had heard enough. He cut off our phone interview, then sent an email telling me to submit my questions in writing.
The city’s information blackout contrasts with the forthright system used by the Santa Fe Public Schools. Their administrators notify the public when a student or employee tests positive for COVID-19. The infected person’s school is identified, and the last day he or she was on campus is pinpointed. Whatever deficiencies exist in the school system’s notifications are insignificant compared to the city’s opaque style.
https://www.santafenewmexican.com/news/legislature/city-quiet-on-bus-drivers-deaths-as-state-launches-investigation/article_b937be4a-5ced-11ec-b5d7-97f1d6e34317.html