Santa Fe hotels are providing some financial help for the city's 400th-anniversary commemoration, thanks to an idea of Hotel Santa Fe general manager Paul Margetson.

The program, called Heads in Beds, lets hotels implement a voluntary, $1 per room per night surcharge, which is then donated to the city to support the events planned for the 16-month commemoration.

As a partner in the program, hotels then are able to post a live link, photo and descriptive paragraph on the city's 400th-anniversary Web site.

Margetson said his property has already received bookings from its listing on the site.

In addition to Hotel Santa Fe, other hostelries taking part in the program include Hilton Santa Fe, Residence Inn by Marriott and Rancho de San Juan.

The sponsorship opportunity is being limited to 15 hotels. The listing will be posted at least through Dec. 31, 2010.

For more information, call Dan Miller at 986-1610 or e-mail dmiller@santafe400th.com.


Hospice of the Sandias has opened a Santa Fe branch in an office at 635 Harkle Road, near Christus St. Vincent Regional Medical Center.

"If we have enough patients, we'll open a larger office," said David Fleming, the firm's patient-care coordinator. "We have 116 patients in Albuquerque."

Other Santa Fe hospices include Ambercare, Odyssey Healthcare of New Mexico, The Hospice Center-PMS and Mi Casa Bonita.

Hospice of the Sandias is part of a small California hospice group called Hospice Care of the West.

For more information, call 988-5900.


Santa Fe's hotel/motel occupancy rate took a dive in May compared with the same month last year.

The rate was 62.2 percent, according to the Rocky Mountain Lodging Report, while a year ago it was 71.2 percent.

Through the first five months of 2009 the rate is 50.1 percent, compared with 58.2 for the same period a year ago.

The average daily room rate was $101.70, compared with $110.87 in May 2008.