Tracie Leigh Hunteman

Tracie Leigh Hunteman (a/k/a “Race”) passed away peacefully in her sleep on August 22, 2025 in Las Cruces, New Mexico. She was 59 years old. Born on November 3, 1965 in Oklahoma City, she quickly became a child of “determined decisiveness,” idolizing the Muppets character Ms. Piggy throughout her life.

Tracie was gifted with a quick wit and an irascible sense of humor. She maintained a healthy dislike of bureaucracy and had a keen eye to detect the absurd with little to hold her back once she detected it. She graduated from El Dorado High School in 1983, and from New Mexico State University in 1988, with a degree in education. Tracie was a committed life-long learner. In 2015, she graduated from Dona Ana Community College with a degree in Diagnostic Medical Stenography. She worked in her communities as a communicator and as an educator. She taught elementary school in Omaha, Nebraska, and theater in Los Alamos, New Mexico. In later years, she continued her commitment to community service as a dispatcher for Mesilla Valley Regional Dispatch and the New Mexico State Police, where she designed the department’s Amber Alert training program. Tracie played the trombone and bassoon and was a member of the NMSU Marching Band. She loved all kinds of music from heavy metal to Queen, to musical theater. She was a talented researcher with an uncanny ability to unearth new information like no other. She excelled at and enjoyed writing and crochet. She was a lover of cats, having several pet cats throughout her life. A devout Oakland Raiders fan, she detested the Denver Broncos, describing them as “the ancestral enemies of my people.” Tracie was a woman of deep, if private, faith and maintained numerous friendships with many congregations throughout Las Cruces. She was secure in her faith, which allowed her to face her many physical challenges with a good and caring nature.

Tracie is survived by her mother and father, LaQuita and Bill of Waynesville, North Carolina, her sister Tambri of La Mesa, New Mexico, and her brother Philip of Albuquerque, New Mexico. As she taught us all: “From 10 feet, no one will notice; and in 10 years, no one will care.”

Tracie’s memorial service is scheduled for Friday, September 12, 2025 at 11:00 a.m. at Getz Funeral Home in Las Cruces. May her memory be a blessing.