KRTS 93.5 FM Marfa Public Radio

For día de los muertos, Marfa Public Radio is asking listeners to share their memories of loved ones. The station will air your dedications and remembrances on Nov. 1.| Lea esta nota en español

A group of investors with ties to Presidio is pushing plans to build a new horse racing track in the West Texas border town, but the plan hinges on local voters legalizing gambling on the races within Presidio County.

Four seats on the Midland City Council are up for grabs this election season. One race is unopposed, in another an incumbent is facing a young challenger and five candidates are jostling for the council’s two at-large seats.

83rd District Attorney Ori White says he fired his one-time assistant prosecutor Jerry Phillips for refusing to follow a judge’s order in a burglary case. In court filings, Phillips says while he did refuse to follow the order, his firing over the matter was “pretextual.”

Seliger has served in the Senate since 2005 and led the higher education committee. He was seen as a champion of public education and local control but was derided as too soft on social conservative issues near the end of his tenure.

As the Texas Legislature’s third special session came to a close, lawmakers approved millions of federal funds towards building a new facility between Midland and Odessa dedicated to mental and behavioral health.

Even as the latest COVID-19 surge in the Permian Basin’s largest cities slows, deaths continue to rise. This has health officials continuing to urge locals to get vaccinated, especially as the region’s vaccination rates lag behind the state’s and nation’s.

A Midland woman appeared in court this week to enter into a plea deal with the federal government for participating in the Jan. 6 capitol attack.

Funcionarios de un condado fronterizo del Lejano Oeste de Texas han votado a favor de traspasar la propiedad de un cementerio histórico a la Tribu Lipán Apache, cuyos antepasados están enterrados en una pequeña parcela de Presidio, Texas. Sin embargo, el traspaso sigue supeditado a que los funcionarios de la ciudad transfieran primero al condado parte de los terrenos del cementerio. | Read this story in English

In the Permian Basin, thousands of oil and gas wells fill the landscape, and today some of that aging equipment is bursting and leading to uncontrolled leaks. 

Just this summer, one of these aged wells began leaking and spewing toxic water — more than 20 years after it was filled with concrete and abandoned — throwing one rancher into a bureaucratic nightmare filled with more questions than answers.