The Eddy County Dispatch presented by KCCC930AMRadio

Community Forum picks back up with Paul Gessing of the Rio Grande Foundation, recorded in the same sitting as Part 1. This half turns to Albuquerque’s gross receipts tax fight, a minimum wage debate tied to inflation, and the rise of data centers in New Mexico — including Project Jupiter and the role produced water could play in powering them. Missed Part 1? It’s linked below. Aired on KCCC 930 AM...

Eddy County has a busy stretch ahead, and Mid-Week Matters rounds up what’s worth knowing (that we can find) — from family events and library programs to a few pieces of news that might catch residents off guard. Carlsbad Caverns National Park has a new way to watch its bat colony, oil and gas production numbers put Eddy County at the center of the state’s economy, and a proposed reclamation facil...

Community Forum host Johnny Chandler welcomes Paul Gessing, president of the Rio Grande Foundation, into the studio for the first time in person — and the conversation doesn’t hold back. Part 1 digs into the fallout from New Mexico’s recent primary election, the state’s oil-and-gas-fueled budget surplus, and a wave of business owners weighing whether to leave New Mexico altogether. Part 2 airs Thu...

Every life leaves an imprint on the people and places it touches. On this episode of In Memoriam, the community pauses to honor residents who lived or died in Carlsbad, NM, through abridged obituaries provided by West Funeral Home. In this episode, the community honors the memory of Donald “Don” Barnett, Adan Montez Ortega, Candelario Flores, Brenton Lee Rutherford, and Priscilla Faye Ortiz. For a...

Every life leaves an imprint on the people and places it touches. On this episode of In Memoriam, the community pauses to honor residents who lived or died in Carlsbad, NM, through abridged obituaries provided by Denton-Wood Funeral Home. These tributes offer a moment of collective remembrance, while extended life stories, service details, and spaces for family condolences remain with the funeral...

It’s Independence Day week in Eddy County, and Mid-Week Matters has the holiday weekend forecast, upcoming events from today through mid-July, civic notices, and micro-news from across the region. The heat is coming, fireworks conditions look good, and a lot is happening between now and the Fourth. Events this week open with a free family movie this afternoon at La Cueva 6 Cinema and run through a...

Community Forum welcomes Shannon Newton, the new Life Skills instructor for community education at Southeast New Mexico College. The conversation covers a three-part course she’s built from the ground up — and why she believes the skills it teaches are ones most people had to figure out the hard way. The program is divided into soft skills, financial literacy, and digital literacy. Newton told Hat...

This week, the Eddy County community pauses to reflect on the lives of residents who have recently passed. These abridged records serve as a respectful tribute to those who helped build and shape the local area. While these summaries offer a moment of collective remembrance, the full life stories, service details, and spaces for family condolences are maintained by the funeral homes serving our co...

This week, the Carlsbad community pauses to reflect on the lives of residents who have recently passed. These abridged records serve as a respectful tribute to those who helped build and shape the local area. While these summaries offer a moment of collective remembrance, the full life stories, service details, and spaces for family condolences are maintained by the funeral homes serving our commu...

This week’s Mid-Week Matters is packed. The days ahead are full — senior center bake sales, a golf tournament with the Mayor, three thousand rubber ducks hitting the water for a very good cause, and a calendar’s worth of summer reading programs at both the Artesia and Carlsbad libraries. And looking further out, the Fourth of July is shaping up to be something special as America marks 250 years. T...

In Part Three of the culinary series, Community Forum continues the discussion with three Carlsbad High School ProStart students — Camille, Avery, and Myka — for a wide-ranging conversation about the year behind the program’s state championship sweep. Camille competed on the management side; Avery and Myka on the culinary team. What unfolds is less a victory lap than an honest look at what a champ...

Today on KCCC930AM Radio, and available weekly in your inbox. Before The Conjuring made audiences afraid of antique furniture, the Perron family actually lived that horror movie. Their “dream farmhouse” in Harrisville, Rhode Island, came with creaky floors, creepy ghosts, and (allegedly) a witch named Bathsheba who did not come with the deed. This week, Sarah and Faren continue digging into what r...

Carlsbad High's state-champion teams sat down with Hattie again — this time with management competitor Camille Martin, and culinary team members Avery Padilla and Micah Char, alongside instructor Amanda Hale. The team breaks down exactly what goes into a ProStart competition — the rules, the roles, and what it’s actually like to pitch a fictional restaurant to judges who can’t say a word back to y...

It's a scorcher out there, Eddy County. A Heat Advisory is in effect through 9 PM tonight, with highs reaching 108°F, so check on elderly neighbors, keep pets and livestock hydrated, and never leave anyone in a parked car. Full details on this week's forecast and fire danger are in the episode. This week's lineup runs from book clubs and toddler splash time to a golf tournament for the Boys & Girl...

Carlsbad High School didn’t just win a state title this year. They won two — culinary and management, the first time CHS has swept both ProStart categories in the same year. Hattie went straight to the source: the Mountain Lion Studio hit the road to the CHS Culinary Arts Department the day after school let out, sitting down with instructor Amanda Hale and two of the students who helped get them t...

This week, the Carlsbad community pauses to reflect on the lives of residents who have recently passed. These abridged records serve as a respectful tribute to those who helped build and shape the local area. While these summaries offer a moment of collective remembrance, the full life stories, service details, and spaces for family condolences are maintained by the funeral homes serving our commu...

This week, the Carlsbad community pauses to reflect on the lives of residents who have recently passed. These abridged records serve as a respectful tribute to those who helped build and shape the local area. While these summaries offer a moment of collective remembrance, the full life stories, service details, and spaces for family condolences are maintained by the funeral homes serving our commu...

It’s hot, it’s busy, and a lot is going on in Eddy County this week. Today’s Mid-Week Matters covers a CavernFest-packed weekend at Lake Carlsbad Beach Park — free admission, live music, a 5K, a volleyball tournament, and a yoga class before the vendors even open. There are also free family events at the library and Cavern Theatre, a Father’s Day dance for the 40-and-up crowd, and a plant swap for...

Community Forum | Tuesday, June 9, 2026 There’s a lot happening in downtown Carlsbad right now, and Denise Green, director of Carlsbad Main Street, stopped by the Mountain Lion Studio to break it all down on Communnity Forum . From a beach stage headliner to a neon alley project funded by the Creative Industries Division, the organization that quietly powers much of what makes downtown worth visit...

ICYMI due to our post-monsoon technical issues at noon: Today’s Mid-Week Matters is here! Mid-Week Matters is live for Wednesday, June 3, 2026 — covering Eddy County from Artesia to Carlsbad and everywhere in between. This week’s event calendar is stacked. The Rumble on the Pecos Car Show kicks off Friday with a cruise, a free screening of American Graffiti , and a full judging day Saturday. Caver...

Hannah Ornelas has been doing this work long enough to know that the kids in the room might look like they’re not listening. She keeps going anyway — because if even one of them walks up to her at Walmart ten years from now and says it changed their life, that’s enough. On this episode of Community Forum, host Hattie sits down with Hannah from Teens in Action — the youth arm of the Carlsbad Anti-G...

This week, the Carlsbad community pauses to reflect on the lives of residents who have recently passed. These abridged records serve as a respectful tribute to those who helped build and shape the local area. While these summaries offer a moment of collective remembrance, the full life stories, service details, and spaces for family condolences are maintained by the funeral homes serving our commu...

This week, the Carlsbad community pauses to reflect on the lives of residents who have recently passed. These abridged records serve as a respectful tribute to those who helped build and shape the local area. While these summaries offer a moment of collective remembrance, the full life stories, service details, and spaces for family condolences are maintained by the funeral homes serving our commu...

With the June 2nd primary one week away, Hattie Quinn sits down with Eddy County Clerk Cara Cooke — who has worked in the Bureau of Elections since 2007 — for a conversation about process, not candidates. How does a candidate get on the ballot? What happens when your ballot goes into the tabulator? Why do two locks with two different keys matter? Cara walks through all of it — same-day registratio...

Hattie brings this week’s community roundup from Carlsbad, the seat of Eddy County — what’s happening around the area, micro-news that affects your daily life, and a special community corner honoring Southeast New Mexico College’s inaugural Mountain Lion Student of the Month class. This week’s events run from a grand opening ribbon cutting and free summer movies at La Cueva to a veteran resource f...