To the Editor,
As the new executive director of Marfa Public Radio, and on behalf of our entire team, I want to express my sincerest gratitude to everyone in our community who donated and supported us during our recent Spring Membership Drive. This consistent commitment, month after month, is the bedrock of our operations. It’s what allows us to plan for crucial needs and provide the highest quality programming for our listeners. Thank you for making our work possible.
For two decades, Marfa Public Radio has been a vital part of our vast region, from Midland and Odessa to Alpine and Marfa, Presidio and Fort Davis. We provide trusted journalism, local news, and critical emergency and weather updates. In just the last year, Marfa Public Radio has issued 73 extreme weather warnings. We are a lifeline, delivering crucial information even when other communications fail. This is the essential, always-on service we strive to provide 24/7.
Beyond emergencies, Marfa Public Radio is an essential source for rigorous, local reporting and the unique stories of West Texas –– stories you simply won’t find anywhere else. Unlike corporate broadcasters driven by advertisers, our focus is squarely on public service and addressing the specific needs of our neighbors. Our community of sustaining members and donors ensures we can continue to deliver this vital local content.
As we approach July 4th, we face a critical threat: an effort in Washington to eliminate federal funding for public radio. Just last week, on June 25, the Senate Appropriations Committee debated rescinding nearly $1.1 billion in already-approved funding for the Corporation for Public Broadcasting (CPB). For rural stations like ours, this funding isn’t just helpful; it’s indispensable.
It’s important to understand how CPB funding works for us. Marfa Public Radio is a proud recipient of the CPB’s Community Service Grant, recognizing our significant public service. To qualify, we meet rigorous annual standards for legal compliance, financial transparency, and community accountability. The fact that Marfa Public Radio meets this benchmark is a testament to the indispensable services we provide and your incredible belief in our mission. Federal funding then effectively matches this proven local impact, representing over $450,000 for us — a sum incredibly difficult to replace.
This week, we celebrate our nation’s independence. What better way to uphold the principles of informed citizenship and community strength than by protecting the voice that serves us all? Your past support proves you value Marfa Public Radio. Now, we need your voice. Please call or email your senators today and urge them to protect vital federal funding for public radio.
Marfa Public Radio is your radio station in Marfa, Midland, Odessa, Alpine, Presidio, and Fort Davis. We cannot thank our community enough for its unwavering support. We will continue to do everything we can to serve you and deliver the programming you love and rely on.
Sincerely,
Anne E. Marozas, Executive Director, Marfa Public Radio
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This is an open letter to senators Cornyn and Cruz and Representative Gonzalez:
Last night I watched a video of the arrest of Narciso Barranco, an undocumented migrant who has lived in the U.S. for decades and fathered three United States Marines.
He was chased by masked, armed, plain clothes officers. They displayed no patches or other markings except on their back which Barranco would not have seen coming at him, so he swung a weed whacker he was carrying one time that I saw. He obviously did this in self defense, and I would have done the same.
AFTER he was on the ground with several officers on top of him, one of those officers struck him in the head several times with a closed fist. I speak as a Marine who served as a rifleman in Vietnam for 12 months and 29 days. I speak as a retired deputy sheriff who spent a career answering graveyard 911 calls.
That officer should be fired and charged. But that won’t happen for two reasons. First is the apparent prevailing attitude and lack of discipline of the officers carrying out these raids. Second is the fact that HE CAN’T BE IDENTIFIED BECAUSE HE WAS MASKED! This video turned my stomach. It makes me sick to the heart. I heard Karoline Leavett or somebody say that they are masked for their protection. I wish I had known that when I was a deputy. I could have taken off my name tag, badge, and shoulder patch. I could have masked up and if someone asked my name and badge number I could have told them to “F off.” I could have justified it all by saying it was for my “protection.” Fact is, I did none of that, and I dealt with people far more dangerous than some tiny landscaper, father of three of my brothers, THREE UNITED STATES MARINES! Is America now the land of the free and the home of the secret police?
Bill Case
Fort Davis
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Another morning’s pet drama
A micro story
Early this year, I was away for three months at MD Anderson for a serious procedure. Friends in Terlingua kept my two doggos. Thunder (Malinois/Weimaraner) and Lily (Malinois/Staffordshire pit)
Since I left for Houston, this white tomcat had been sneaking in the cat door, beating up my little Levi kitty and eating his food (according to my pal who was cat sitting).
Levi is a runt, very small especially for a male, and neutered. The tomcat is normal size, male intact. The dogs were away, so … opportunity presented.
Thunder has been trying to chase that white tom down on the regular since we got back. This morning at dawn, the white tom attacked Levi and had him pinned down in the yard.
So, I let Thunder out the screen door and he caught the white cat off guard … tossed his punk ass 5 feet high and 8 or 10 feet yonder. Thunder gave a glance to Levi, then gave a futile half-hearted chase as the tomcat bolted through the hog wire fence. Levi was fine, he and Thunder trotted back to the house together.
A bit later, on the way back from morning café at Cedar, Thunder and Lily started their very boisterous wrestling in the overgrown vacant lot along the tracks, per usual.
But suddenly the sounds were different. Not fun. They were deep in the Johnson grass, where I couldn’t see them. But I knew something was wrong. I found them following the sounds of ruckus, with not a minute to spare.
Thunder’s tooth was caught in a belt hole of Lily’s collar and she had flipped over trying to escape, twisting the collar super tight around her neck. By the time I got to them she had already gone limp. Thunder whimpering, lying next to Lily, helpless to move. I got them unhooked and Lily started heaving. Thankfully, she came to quickly.
If not for recognizing the distinctive sound of distress, over rough play, it would be over the rainbow for poor Lily.
Another happy ending, but too close to tragedy. I was shaken all day.
Thom Thinn
Alpine, Texas
May I salute you?
Thank you note to “National Park People”
Dear National Park People:
May I salute you? I know that this is a particularly challenging season of service for you, and while mine is certainly not the only voice crying in the wilderness to acknowledge that and may even ring a bit hollow in the short view, but the option of silence is just not viable to me. So here we are.
I’m a card-carrying property owner and cherish our parks, monuments, historic sites and recreation areas. Thank you for making them available to us. In fact, for decades it has been my practice to express my gratitude when I’ve either coincidentally met or deliberately sought you in our visits — all of you: law enforcement and interpretive rangers, maintenance and administrative personnel, volunteers and entry gate staff.
Yes, I am indeed one of those geeky tourons that stare with dislocated jaws at The Canyon, geysers, hoodoos, mountain tops, caverns and battlefield cannons, but I swear I have never, ever asked you where the nearest bathroom was.
When I see the looks on the faces of the kids to whom you are leading in the Junior Ranger pledge, I cheer for you at least as much as I do for them. And, while I have been known to ask The Question you’ve known was coming during one of your excellent campfire talks, I assure you that I have never asked you a question that you knew I already knew the answer to. By the way, how is it that you are always able to act like I’m the first person who ever asked those things?
All that said, I do hope you remember the two things I’ve told you, even though I sort of joked about quizzing you on your memory if we were to meet again. First, THANK YOU. However poor a supplement to your “sunset pay” it is, please do remember my gratitude. Second, I really do feel like I am in fact a property owner and with that credential demand that you continue your worthy, noble, and often courageous work for the sake of our grandkids. We are counting on you. Will you do that, please?
I’ve been gifted by the friendship of several of your deceased, active duty, and retired fellow National Park Service employees and volunteers. Through them I’ve learned that you protect the parks from the people, the people from the parks, and the people from each other. When I have had this conversation with your people over the years the collective response by several hundred of you looked like this: “Nobody has ever said that to me before.” Tears well up (theirs and mine). “I needed to hear that today. Well, this is what we do. It’s all about your grandkids. I love this place.”
Well, Ranger, these days I’m particularly reminded of the restorative power inherent in our wonderful national properties and you folks who serve us in them, and I believe confidently that we need them, need you, desperately perhaps. We need knowing that they are there on the map, whether or not we have immediate plans or ability to get to them in the flesh.
I confess to violating the rule about taking only photographs and leaving only footprints. The fact is, the memories, sights, sounds (or lack of them) and smells have gone home with me and have become part of the geography of my life. If walking off with those treasures is a crime, I suppose that you Park People are abettors. May I salute you for being partners in it?
Remember those two things I told you. OK?
Steve Scarano
An Eagle Scout and former Marine Corps officer, after retiring from a 30-year career as a police officer, Steve Scarano is starting his 19th season as a Trail Angel on the Pacific Crest National Scenic Trail and is in his 20th year as a volunteer at a large San Diego area regional park. He writes from Vista, California.