Mayor appoints Navajo to homelessness task force

ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. (AP) – Albuquerque Mayor Richard Berry has appointed Navajo Nation President Ben Shelly’s former chief of staff to chair the city’s new Native American Homelessness Task Force.

Berry says Sherrick Roanhorse joins the task force with extensive knowledge of Native American affairs. In addition to his role with Shelly, Roanhorse has worked as a policy analyst for the New Mexico Indian Affairs Department and as and a government and legislative affairs specialist with the Navajo Nation in Washington, D.C. He currently works in the state government affairs office of PNM.

Berry and Shelly agreed to create the task force following the brutal beating deaths in July of two homeless Navajo men in a vacant lot on Albuquerque’s southwest side.