School district contractor tests positive for virus

Three more restaurants in Santa Fe report COVID-19 cases to state, close

Santa Fe Public Schools announced a 10th contractor or employee has tested positive for COVID-19 since mid-July, and though all cases are believed to have been contracted outside of work, Superintendent Veronica García said it’s another reminder the district is too large to completely avoid contact with the disease.

The district began the 2020-21 school year online, with a potential return to the classroom targeted for October.

“With 13,000 kids and 1,500 employees, I don’t think we can prevent everybody from coming in contact with another who is positive,” García said. “That makes our own safety protocols so important because even if somebody does test positive, the exposure and risk of infection to others might be fairly low-risk if we’re wearing masks and keeping distance.”

García said the most recent positive test last week was a contractor from Overhead Door Company who was wearing a face mask while working in the district from Aug. 17-22 and did not have contact with employees.

Since mid-July, four employees and six contractors have tested positive for COVID-19 on their own accord, as the district is not mandating testing.

After each positive case, the district says it closes any

Smoke increased Monday afternoon around Santa Fe as crews battling the Medio Fire restarted burning operations that had been delayed due to weekend rainfall.

The Southwest Area Incident Management Team assigned to the nearly 3,500-acre wildfire, which was sparked by lightning in the hills east of Tesuque on Aug. 17, currently has 255 crew members and expects to steadily dismiss personnel throughout the week to fight other fires in the region. Officials said in a news release the fire is now 55 percent contained and did not grow Sunday.

A helicopter on Monday dropped plastic spheres filled with potassium permanganate, which accelerates burning, while crews on the ground carried out burns on the fire’s western edge.

“The western edge is really our sole focus right now,” said Steven La-Sky, spokesman for the Southwest Area Incident Management Team. “We’re feeling pretty comfortable with where we’re at and being able to turn the fire over to local authorities before too long.”

Over the weekend, La-Sky said crews hiked for over three hours into the Santa Fe National Forest to where the fire’s northern edge burned around 2 acres across the Rio Nambé, which officials previously hoped to hold as a containment line.

Officials said Monday they are no longer concerned about the fire escaping in that area due to a lack of ground fuel.

“We saw a lot of green up there, but it’s mostly in tree canopies,” La-Sky said. “Once we got on the ground up there, it was clear there wasn’t enough fuel on the floor for a fire to spread.”