VIDEO: Is it a spaceport, or a space ghost?

By Rob Nikolewski │ New Mexico Watchdog

New Mexico taxpayers alreadyhave sunk at least $212 million into Spaceport America.

But it’s been nearly three years since the facility had its grand opening, which featured billionaire Richard Branson rappelling down the façade of the massive hangar in the desert of southern New Mexico. We’re still waiting for Virgin Galactic — Branson’s company and Spaceport’s anchor tenant — to make its maiden voyage.

Branson’s a good salesman and he’s lined up a host of celebrities and the well-heeled to pay between $200,000 and $250,000 for a promised to be a two-and-a-half-hour flight beyond the earth’s atmosphere, allowing passengers five minutes of weightlessness.

After postponing earlier scheduled launches, Branson told reporters last month Virgin Galactic will send commercial passengers into suborbital space from Spaceport America by the second half of 2014.

Former Gov. Bill Richardson twisted arms in the state Legislature to fund the project, and Gov. Susana Martinez — who seemed cool to the idea at first — is on board.

But as New Mexico Watchdog reported in the past month, more concerns keep cropping up. A long story this week appeared on the Buzzfeed website, calling the project “Richard Branson’s Space Tourism Fantasy.”

Will New Mexico taxpayers ever see a return on their nearly quarter-billion investment?

That’s the topic of a web-extra edition of “New Mexico In Focus,” a weekly public affairs program seen across nearly all of New Mexico on KNME-TV, the PBS affiliate in Albuquerque. As editor of New Mexico Watchdog, I appeared as a panelist along with host Gene Grant, former state Sen. H. Diane Snyder, New Mexico Green Chamber of Commerce CEO Laura Sanchez and Richard Rogers, publisher of Santa Fe Monthly.

Here’s the segment:

You can watch the one-hour broadcast version of “New Mexico In Focus” Friday night. Among the panel topics? The Albuquerque police shooting of a homeless man in the Sandia foothills and the enrollment numbers across the state for Medicaid and individual health policies under Obamacare.

The show airs at 7 p.m. Friday and is rebroadcast Sunday at 7 a.m. on Channel 5.

Contact Rob Nikolewski at [email protected] and follow him on Twitter @robnikolewski