New Mexico In Depth 2022 Legislative Special Edition

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Legislative Special Edition

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New Mexico In Depth • 2022 Legislative special edition

Contents

New Mexico In Depth 2022 Legislative special edition • Jan. 21, 2022 Trip Jennings

Marjorie Childress

Reporters

Special thanks to our columnists:

Executive director

Bryant Furlow

Design

Bobby Brier

Jason V. Harper

Managing Editor

Paul Gessing, Amber Wallin, Hailey Heinz, Regis Pecos, Mario Atencio, Kathleen Sabo, Mario Jimenez, and Leland Gould

New Mexico In Depth is dedicated to journalism in the public interest that tells in-depth stories of people who represent our diversity and examines systems and institutions in a way that informs and empowers people and communities.

INTRODUCTION..................................................................... 3 ARTICLES

State eyes role of hydrogen amid net zero push ............ 4 Historic revenue boosts public education dollars ............. 7 With record revenue, risk of waste, fraud rises ............... 9 Lawmakers hope to address housing issues .................... 14 Health councils key but chronically underfunded ........... 17

COMMENTARY

Diversify state’s economy using oil/gas surplus ............

Prioritize opportunities for women of color ...................

Common Cause NM goes back to basics .......................

Ethics reform efforts face roadblocks .............................

Adopt tribal remedy framework for education ............

State should benefit from two years of innovation ......

Hydrogen is false solution for climate change ..............

NM must embrace strengths, opportunities ....................

20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27

New Mexico In Depth • 2022 Legislative special edition

Introduction

Big dollars, hot energy debate and COVID Dear Readers,

the summer and winter of 2020 to adjust to new Here we are, a second financial realities. This year into a pandemic year’s budgetary outlook is that has killed more than bright.

6,000 New Mexicans and Thanks to an oil and hoping 2022 will bring Trip Jennings gas boom and a massive relief from a historic infusion of federal dollars, plague. the state’s financial picture Like 12 months ago, COVD-19 is so gilded that policy makers looms over this year’s session, but are blue skying how to address unlike in 2021, when the Roundlong-standing, systemic challenges house was closed to the public, it’s — public education and the state’s open this year. But COVID-19 has digital divide. There likely will be left its mark. Visitors must show a push to address the state’s lack proof of vaccination and walk of housing for low-income New through metal detectors before Mexicans from some lawmakers, entering. The precautions liketoo, but its success isn’t assured. ly mean the usual crowds won’t At the same time, a recent trend swarm the Roundhouse over the by the state to increasingly use next month. Instead, thousands no-bid contracts to spend public of New Mexicans are expected to dollars exposes New Mexico to tune in to senate and house floor greater risk of waste and fraud, sessions and legislative committee according to analysts, who repeatedly have warned of the rising meetings via ZOOM. My, what danger. Why haven’t state lawmakchanges COVID-19 has wrought. ers exerted their oversight powers, Until a few years ago many lawmakers resisted webcasting legisla- and what will they do this session? tive business.

You’ll find a story in this edition For the second year in a row, that poses those questions. webcasting will be the default Another story showcases Gov. method for following the state’s Michelle Lujan Grisham’s push business. to make New Mexico into a clean Another change from last year is energy state. She envisions the financial. A year ago, New Mexstate’s ample natural gas reserves ico was overcoming a disastrous as a foundation for converting global economic shutdown that the state into a hub for hydrogen forced the Legislature to meet in production. Hydrogen is expected

to become a major source of energy in the 21st century. But many environmental organizations aren’t on board, saying her plan to use oil and gas to produce hydrogen doesn’t move the state quickly enough into a cleaner energy future. Expect a robust debate.

Beyond those stories, you’ll find eight guest columnists. They cover disparate subjects: the state’s finances; the importance of the state’s public schools becoming multicultural institutions receptive to wisdom and knowledge from New Mexico’s tribal communities; what to learn from two years of education innovation; why the state should require public servants to publicly disclose more about their personal finances; and the significance of protecting the state’s new ethics commission’s funding and improvements to state election laws. In addition, there also are dueling essays on the merits of Lujan Grisham’s hydrogen hub vision.

We hope this publication helps you understand the disorienting world in which we find ourselves as well as some of the key issues lawmakers will be grappling with over the next several weeks.

Thanks for reading. We hope you’ll follow along with us during the session, at www.nmindepth. com.

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New Mexico In Depth • 2022 Legislative special edition

NET Zero Striving toward net zero, New Mexico grapples with role of hydrogen

By Marjorie Childress New Mexico In Depth

When Governor Michelle Lujan Grisham announced during the New Mexico Climate Summit in late October she would champion a law to achieve “net zero” greenhouse gas emissions by 2050, she received accolades from the environmental community.

“Net zero” refers to a movement

to reduce and offset through environmentally friendly policies and practices the greenhouse gases that would otherwise reach the earth’s atmosphere. Lujan Grisham’s stated objective builds on an already ambitious goal set in 2019 by the Legislature and her administration to transition New Mexico by 2045 from fossil fuels to renewable sources of energy to power its electricity grid.

Getting to net zero by 2050 has become a global rallying cry to halt

warming to 1.5° degrees Celsius above pre-industrial levels, in order to arrest catastrophic impacts of a changing climate. Impacts are increasingly evident now: high-severity drought and wildfires, increasing hurricanes, melting glaciers and rising sea levels.

On paper, the path toward Net Zero sounds simple: drastically curtail current greenhouse gas emitting activities while increasing clean energy and activities that capture

greenhouse gases before they enter the atmosphere.

But it’s not simple. Achieving Net Zero encompasses altering all sectors of the economy.

And the battle over which path to take toward it can prove vexing.

Lujan Grisham has found herself at odds with a who’s who of environmental and community groups over her signature piece of legislaContinued on 5 ➤

New Mexico In Depth • 2022 Legislative special edition

tion in 2022, a proposed Hydrogen Hub Act, which would provide state incentives like tax credits to support creation of a hydrogen fuel industry.

The governor’s view is that building a hydrogen fuel industry can be a win/win if done right. “For an energy state, it’s more jobs,” she said on a September podcast about hydrogen, and it “gives us a clean energy platform.”

Hydrogen, when burned, doesn’t emit greenhouse gases. Although it can be made from water, most often it’s produced from natural gas.

The principal component of natural gas is methane, a potent greenhouse gas composed of hydrogen and carbon. For hydrogen derived from natural gas to truly be clean, no greenhouse gases must escape into the atmosphere as the carbon is separated and captured, which afterward would be stored in the ground. That’s a tall order.

While acknowledging the potential that hydrogen can be produced from brackish water or wastewater, the governor’s vision counts on tapping the vast natural gas reserves in New Mexico while maintaining jobs that depend on fossil fuel extraction. “...you’re using what typically could be a problem–methane, natural gas,” she said on the September podcast, to create a cleaner energy source that helps the state energy transition.

New Mexico is poised, she said, to turn methane in natural gas into “a fuel cell on the spot.”

This is where the governor and many environmental groups part ways.

Groups opposing the Hydrogen Hub Act characterize her plan as an attempt to prop up the fossil fuel industry and say the state should develop its economy in other directions, leaning into a future based on energy from renewable sources.

The technology to capture car-

“

We need every local community across our state… to do its part to get to net zero or carbon reduction, because the only way that we avoid catastrophic impacts from climate change is collective action across every sector of our society and every form of government and economic sector.

— U.S. Rep. Melanie Stansbury, NM-01

bon dioxide and inject it into the ground isn’t proven, they add. Nor is the ability to capture all methane emissions or make the production process clean, a point supported by recent research from scientists at Cornell and Stanford.

And, the proposal is a rush job, they say, that would award tax incentives for more fossil fuel production without careful analysis or hearing from communities most impacted by the proposal–those living within a stone’s throw from natural gas fields.

They have a point. During 2021’s 60-day legislative session, there was little, if any, discussion about hydrogen despite a plethora of bills addressing climate change.

Getting to Net Zero

A net zero bill was introduced last year by then-state Rep. Melanie Stansbury, and several of her colleagues, called the “Climate Solutions Act.” Now serving in the U.S. House of Representatives, Stansbury continues to express urgency for New Mexico playing its part in arresting global warming.

“We need every local community across our state… to do its part to get to net zero or carbon reduction, because the only way that we avoid catastrophic impacts from climate change is collective action across every sector of our society and every

“

Continued from 4 ➤

form of government and economic sector,” she said in an interview.

Rep. Nathan Small, D-Las Cruces, has filed a bill this session, which started Tuesday, to mandate New Mexico achieve net zero emissions by 2050.

Other lawmakers have filed several pieces of climate change legislation that, taken together, get across how ambitious and economically diverse the Net Zero movement is.

A bill introduced by Senate President Pro Tem Mimi Stewart, D-Albuquerque, would create a clean fuel standard for New Mexico that would gradually decrease over several decades the amount of greenhouse gas emitted from transportation fuel. It speaks to the global effort to move from combustion engines to electric batteries in vehicles.

Sen. Pat Woods, R-Broadview, meanwhile, is re-introducing a bill to create a New Mexico Reforestation Center to address the impacts of climate change. The center would establish a seed bank, a nursery, and a planting program.

That speaks to efforts in the state to create greater “carbon sinks,” which absorb more carbon dioxide than they emit. One example: trees.

“There’s been a number of studies that show the huge potential for New Mexico to become a net carbon sink, particularly in forestry and reforestation,” Stansbury said.

5 The way we do that, she said, is to scale up a massive reforestation program across the state as well as forest treatments, like thinning of trees, to prevent forest fires.

In her budget recommendation, Lujan Grisham proposed $2.5 million for a new Climate Change Bureau that would implement climate related laws and develop additional policies “to get New Mexico to netzero emissions by 2050.”

There will likely be additional bills aimed at decreasing greenhouse gas emissions. Like the Hydrogen Hub Act. Stansbury’s New Mexico Democratic colleagues in the U.S. Congress gave full-throttled support to building a hydrogen economy in New Mexico in a letter to the Biden administration last May, before she was elected. New Mexico is ideally suited for an emerging hydrogen economy, senators Ben Ray Lujan and Martin Heinrich, and congresswoman Teresa Leger Fernandez wrote, because of both robust renewable and natural gas resources.

In their letter, the trio focused on regions of the state with large oil and gas reserves for locating hydrogen development, in particular San Juan County in the northwest, which they said was one of the most coal-dependent communities in the nation. The region is facing extensive job loss as power companies seek to move away from coal as an energy source.

“Private industry is already at work developing several forms of hydrogen production in Northwest New Mexico, and the addition of a robust federal investment will drive this important momentum forward,” they wrote. “Clean hydrogen investment in Northwest New Mexico is also critical to workforce development and securing good-paying American clean energy jobs in this economically challenged area.”

Hydrogen development would be Continued on 6 ➤

Continued from 5 ➤ a good fit for the region, said Arvin Trujillo, CEO of Four Corners Economic Development, a public-private partnership focused on economic diversification in San Juan County.

Trujillo held engineering and management positions at the Navajo, San Juan and LaPlata mines, and was later the manager of government relations for the Four Corners power plant. He also served for 11 years as executive director of the Navajo Nation Division of Natural Resources, during the Begaye and Shirley administrations.

“We see a lot of possibilities given the fact that we have a lot of natural gas in the region,” he said. There’s a lot of expertise in the area, including oil and gas workers, power plant experience, and an electrical grid in place.

Trujillo said hydrogen would help the area move away from fossil fuels, particularly coal, taking issue with those who argue that the energy transition should focus only on renewables like solar and wind without proposing ideas that maintain jobs for an entire middle class built up over decades.

For the Navajo Nation, he said, “... basically this industry built a whole middle class. How do you begin to transition that to a new way so that as this industry is being displaced, or slowly shut down, they have something else to go to?”

In an interview, Stansbury seemed to take a middle road when asked about hydrogen fuel, stressing the importance of following science.

“I believe strongly that if you can find a way to use these technologies to sequester carbon permanently and reduce our greenhouse gas footprint, that is a net benefit to the state and it’s a net benefit to global greenhouse gas emissions,” she said. “But if the proposal does not ultimately lead to a net reduction or carbon capture, then you know it’s

New Mexico In Depth • 2022 Legislative special edition

“

... basically this industry built a whole middle class. How do you begin to transition that to a new way so that as this industry is being displaced, or slowly shut down, they have something else to go to?

“

6

— Arvin Trujillo, CEO, Four Corners Economic Development, speaking about the benefits of the fossil fuel industry to Navajo people

not ultimately aimed at addressing our carbon footprint.”

Stansbury cautioned against a singular focus on one strategy. “… if we’re going to solve the climate crisis, it requires action across every sector of our society,” she said.

A spokesperson for Lujan Grisham echoed that sentiment. “Low carbon hydrogen is not “instead of ” – rather, it is “in addition to” all our other climate strategies,” wrote Maddy Hayden in an email.

The focus on hydrogen for Lujan Grisham might not be singular, but it likely will attract the most heat.

A comprehensive list of environmental and social justice organizations issued a public letter on October 5 to Lujan Grisham, the state’s congressional delegation, land commissioner, and legislative leaders, urging caution and conversation about whether investing in a hydrogen hub makes sense for the state.

In that letter they listed seven principles they hoped the administration would consider regarding whether hydrogen should be part of the state’s transition to clean energy. Top of the list was that the state should first put together a climate policy framework, before trying to create a new hydrogen industry with state resources. Second was that equity and justice shape and underpin any decisions.

Mario Atencio, who signed the letter as a board member of Diné Care, a Navajo-led environmental group, wrote in a commentary for New Mexico In Depth that the proposal would lead to more fracking and release carbon dioxide in the process.

“By promoting more fracking, this method of hydrogen production stands to perpetuate environmental injustice that our communities are already experiencing in the Greater Chaco region, cause further air and water pollution, and further damage sacred landscapes and public lands in New Mexico,” Atencio wrote.

Fast forward to December 10, after they received a draft of the proposed Hydrogen Hub Act. A similar grouping of environmental organizations submitted detailed remarks to state officials challenging the notion that hydrogen made from natural gas is necessary to get to net zero greenhouse gas emissions.

And they took umbrage at a lack of consultation with community groups, particularly those living closest to natural gas fields in the state.

“The discussion draft is conceptually and fatally flawed,” their remarks state. The groups said they were “disconcerted by the rushed process” and that meaningful con-

versations had not taken place, “in particular with frontline communities where a hydrogen hub is most likely to be located.”

“Boiled to its essence,” the groups wrote, the proposal is based on unsubstantiated assumptions. “It is unclear to us why a hydrogen hub, beyond chasing federal infrastructure money, is needed, why New Mexico taxpayers should prop up a hydrogen hub with subsidies, what the scale and true impacts of a hydrogen hub would or would not be, the resources state agencies would need to oversee this industry, whether those resources would entail opportunity costs, or the burden this would impose on local governments and communities.”

Hayden, the spokesperson for Lujan Grisham, said hydrogen is important for decarbonizing certain industries. “Long haul trucks, for example, cannot go electric without dedicating an enormous percentage of space and weight to batteries,” she wrote in an email. “In reality, electric long-haul vehicles are just not economically viable. Low carbon hydrogen provides the trucking, manufacturing, construction, and other industries a fuel source that is good for the environment when produced responsibly.”

But Erik Schlenker-Goodrich, executive director of the Western Environment Law Center, said in an email the discussion draft circulated in late 2021 didn’t target hydrogen to a few hard-to-reach industries.

And he said proposed policies at the federal and state levels don’t ultimately ensure that growing a hydrogen economy would decarbonize targeted sectors.

“So when the governor says hydrogen could be made low-carbon with regulation, my response is “maybe,” but that’s not what she proposed in her discussion draft,” he said. “The governor’s discussion draft bill simply offered taxpayer subsidies to prop up fossil gas hydrogen.”

New Mexico In Depth • 2022 Legislative special edition

By Trip Jennings New Mexico In Depth

Lawmakers will appropriate a record amount of state money in 2022, thanks to unprecedented oil and gas production. Revenue to pay for year-over-year spending, versus one-time costs, in the fiscal year that begins July 1 is projected to go up by 11%, and most of that — 60% — is due to New Mexico’s dominant industry.

We’ve been here before — entering a legislative session flush with cash with projections that an oil and gas boom will last years. But budget leaders at the Legislature know better, precisely because they’ve experienced first-hand the volatile roller coaster of the oil and gas industry’s notorious boom-bust cycles.

A graph put together by the Legislative Finance Committee (page 8) demonstrates the past turbulence aptly.

Two years ago, in 2020, state lawmakers went on a spending spree

Historic revenue boosts public education dollars, but deep challenges remain due to robust oil and gas production that economists and industry experts predicted would continue for a decade or more, only to return to Santa Fe a few months later to adjust spending after COVID-19 shut down the global economy.

It was an extraordinary moment, one that demonstrated the wisdom of caution when betting on longterm strong oil and gas production.

And, yet, this is where state law-

makers find themselves in January 2022 as oil and gas production has climbed to its pre-COVID peak.

Despite aspirations to wean itself from over-reliance on fossil fuels, New Mexico continues to reap the benefits of oil and gas production, to the tune of $1.6 billion in new money. That’s the amount of dollars coming in for fiscal year 2023 over the expenses of this fiscal year, which ends June 30.

7

The debate over how cautious to be is playing out in talks about the state’s public education.

As the single-largest item in New Mexico’s state budget, public education commands a central role in every legislative session.

This year is no different, except perhaps in the size of the windfall New Mexico is experiencing and how much cash Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham and the Legislature want to give public schools and classroom teachers.

The Legislature’s budget arm, the Legislative Finance Committee, proposes spending $421 million more — 12% — over this fiscal year.

The governor is in the same vicinity.

Part of the reason for the intense focus is the state’s continuing attempt to right generational education inequities identified in a 2018 landmark court ruling that found New Mexico guilty of violating its responsibility to educate all children equitably.

Continued on 8 ➤

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New Mexico In Depth • 2022 Legislative special edition

Recurring General Fund Revenue & Appropriation Annual Growth 20%

17.5% 15.8% 13.7%

12.7%

11.9%

11.0% 7.4%

8.6%

7.3% 4.2%

5%

???

6.3%

10.9%

5.8% 4.5%

4.2%

3.5% 0%

4.2%

2.9%

.08%

-1.7%

-1.6%

-2.7%

-5%

4.2%

2.6%

5.3%

4.3%

3.1%

-0.4%

-1.9%

-0.3% 1.0%

-11.6% -11.2%

-10%

-7.8%

Yr/Yr Recurring GF Appropriation Growth

FY21

FY20

FY19

FY18

FY17

FY16

FY15

FY14

FY13

FY12

FY11

FY10

FY09

FY08

FY07

-15%

FY06

-9.8%

FY23 est.

10%

FY22 est.

15%

Yr/Yr Recurring GF Revenue Growth

Source: LFC Files

Significant volatility in revenues impedes on the state’s ability to plan and execute based on stable budgeting.

Continued from 7 ➤ That generational inequity has contributed to differing education outcomes for groups of students by race or ethnicity, with fewer nonwhite students graduating than their White peers and performing poorer in reading and math proficiency.

A consensus has emerged in recent years among policy makers that more should be spent to address these inequities. You can see it in both the legislative and governor’s budget recommendations for the state’s fiscal year that starts July 1.

The battle will focus on the amount of the spending increase — a coalition of advocates from disparate communities, including the state’s tribal nations, will push the Legislature and Lujan Grisham to spend

Current Starting and Average Teacher Salaries State

Starting Teacher Salary

Texas $44,582 Utah $43,026 New Mexico $41,214 Arizona $39,057 Oklahoma $37,992 Colorado $35,292

State

Average Teacher Salary

Colorado $57,706 Texas $57,090 Utah $54,678 New Mexico $54,256 Oklahoma $54,096 Arizona $50,782

Source: National Education Association, 2021

more than they’ve recommended. And whether to fold whatever increase emerges from this year’s session into the budget as a yearover-year cost — called recurring in statehouse lingo — or as one-time money — called nonrecurring — that advocates must fight each year

to include in state spending.

As the Tribal Education Alliance noted in a recent handout, “the ultimate goal is to create a permanent source of state funding for Tribes that requires no applications and does not revert back year after year.”

But a large portion of this year’s

proposed new education spending is about the state’s teachers. Both Lujan Grisham and legislators want to make them the best paid in the region when compared to states like Texas, Utah, Arizona, Oklahoma and Colorado.

They’re about middling right now.

To that end, Lujan Grisham and the Legislature have proposed spending around $200 million more to increase salary minimums for Level 1, 2, and 3 teachers — to $50,000, $60,000, and $70,000. The Legislature’s recommendation is slightly larger, with their proposal paying Level 1 teachers $51,000.

The proposed pay increases aren’t being made in a vacuum.

Currently, New Mexico is hemorrhaging teachers. There’s an explosion in vacancies — there are 1,048 vacant teaching positions, nearly double the 571 reported last year, according to the state Public Education Department. And there is a coming surge in retirements.

Turns out. stress is up in a job that is already tough thanks to a hardto-shake pandemic, according to a recent RAND corporation survey of teachers, and New Mexico is no exception.

Complicating this challenging environment is COVID. Earlier this month, the Public Education Department reported to state lawmakers that chronic absenteeism in public schools has nearly doubled since the advent of COVID-19. Meanwhile, the percent of students proficient in reading and math in schools participating in a survey declined by 3 percentage points and 8.4 percentage points, respectively, from 2019 to 2021.

The state’s rosy financial picture presents the perfect opportunity to strengthen public education in New Mexico, policy makers agree.

But it’s clear from the past that New Mexico’s rosy finances won’t continue forever, while the challenges the state confronts likely will take generations to address.

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New Mexico In Depth • 2022 Legislative special edition

no-bid contracts Amid record revenue, risk of waste and fraud rises with lawmakers’ failure to act

By BRYANT FURLOW New Mexico In Depth

Legislative analysts have repeatedly warned since 2016 that government agencies’ increasing reliance on no-bid contracting puts New Mexico at increased risk of waste and fraud. Their most recent admonition came a month after a state grand jury indicted a former powerful lawmaker for racketeering, money laundering and kickbacks related to a no-bid contract.

Lawmakers have largely ignored those warnings; in fact, a bill prefiled for the legislative session that started Tuesday in Santa Fe appears to create new exemptions to the procurement code. Nor is reform a high priority for Democratic Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham, whose three years in office have been marked by a sharp rise in no-bid contracting.

New Recommendations Legislative Finance Committee evaluators made three new recommendations to strengthen the procurement code. Previous LFC evaluator recommendations are listed in the chart on the Page 11.

• The Legislature should consider adding duties to Section 131-95 NMSA 1978, requiring State Purchasing to actively and annuallygather information from all governmental entities on sole source and emergency procurements.

• The Legislature should consider repealing the exemption “Such an item is not currently an element of the agenda,” said Nora Meyers Sackett, a spokeswoman for Lujan Grisham, who has the power to set this year’s 30-day legislative agenda, as lawmakers are otherwise limited to budget matters. “But the

under Section 13-1-98.1 (for healthcare-related purchases.)

• The Legislature should consider adding duties to Section 131-95 NMSA 1978, requiring State Purchasing to flag violations of purchases or procurements made by entities without a chief procurement officer. governor’s office will, as always, review and evaluate potential initiatives.”

Since 2019, Lujan Grisham’s first year in office, her administration has circumvented competitive bidding on at least 886 occasions, ap-

proving sole-source and emergency contracts worth more than $796 million, greatly outpacing her Republican predecessor, according to New Mexico In Depth’s analysis of reports from state agencies under Lujan Grisham’s control.

Such no-bid contracting is allowed under special circumstances, when services or goods are unique or needed quickly during an emergency, and Lujan Grisham’s tenure has coincided with a historic pandemic requiring quick action, a challenge Republican Gov. Susana Martinez never confronted. The biggest year for non-competitive contracting came in 2020, the year COVID-19 spread across the globe. The second largest year, 2021, wasn’t even close.

But the dramatic rise in no-bid contracting preceded the pandemic, records show.

Continued on 10 ➤

10 Continued from 9 ➤ The cost of no-bid contracts during the first year of Lujan Grisham’s leadership — $148.7 million in 2019 — was at least twice the value of such contracts for each of the six years for which New Mexico in Depth has data from Martinez’s tenure. (The state could not provide no-bid contracting details for years prior to 2013.) After peaking in 2014 at close to $60 million, nobid spending declined during each of Martinez’s final three years in office, which roughly coincided with a state budget crisis and lean years, to just over $20 million in 2018.

While there is no evidence of malfeasance by government officials in the recent no-bid contracting spree by the Lujan Grisham administration, legislative staff have warned state lawmakers repeatedly that agencies continue to rely on emergency spending, sometimes as a result of mismanagement rather than emergencies.

The warnings take on special relevance now, with a historic infusion of money flowing through the state’s procurement system. Adding to already-swollen state coffers thanks to an oil and gas boom is an unprecedented amount of federal money through COVID relief and infrastrastructure spending.

Lujan Grisham fully supports being transparent with public money and accounting for state spending, Sackett said, adding the administration’s use of no-bid procurement is “entirely within the scope of state law,” and can increase efficiency to the benefit of New Mexicans.

But one national expert said non-competitive procurement elevates risks of waste and fraud.

“Noncompetitive procurement is the single biggest risk for fraud, waste and abuse -- period,” said Tom Caulfield, a former member of the U.S. Department of Justice’s National Procurement Fraud Task Force.

“The speed and agility of emergen-

New Mexico In Depth • 2022 Legislative special edition cy procurement brings risk. While risks of fraud and corruption are always present in government activity, they are elevated in public procurement processes during a time of emergency.”

Normally, state agencies award contracts after a selection committee carefully reviews competitive bids or proposals. Competitive bidding is usually required for contract amounts above $60,000, to help ensure agencies hire the contractor best suited for a given task, and at the best possible price for taxpayers.

That is crucially important for earning and maintaining public trust, Caulfield said.

Not lost on longtime political observers is New Mexico’s rich history of public corruption.

Prosecutors have convicted a parade of current and former public officials for abusing the public trust over the past 20 years, including two former state treasurers, two state lawmakers, several public employees and insurance and electricity regulators. The abuse has included state procurement code violations.

In 2011, a former state prisons official pleaded guilty to 30 counts of bribery stemming from no-bid roofing contracts. More recently, former New Mexico Spaceport chief financial officer Zach De Gregorio has alleged widespread corruption at that agency, including procurement code violations, in a lawsuit filed this month.

Looming most prominently over this year’s legislative session, however, is the toppling of Democrat Sheryl Williams Stapleton, formerly the second most powerful lawmaker in the state House of Representatives, for alleged corruption.

The former Albuquerque Public Schools (APS) educator faces more than two dozen felony charges related to $5.36 million paid under a no-bid APS contract for vocational training services. According to the October Legislative Finance Committee staff report, the school dis-

trict is among public bodies across the state that have ignored a legal requirement to disclose sole-source and emergency purchasing to the Legislature’s budget-oversight committee, the LFC, and the State Purchasing Division.

Republican state Rep. Randall Crowder of Clovis touched on the state’s checkered history in October during a legislative hearing in Santa Fe. “In the past New Mexico has had governors and legislators that have utilized procurement to help friends, buy favor or seek contributions at a later date,” Crowder said at a Legislative Finance Committee meeting in Santa Fe. “It’s imperative that we look into this and make sure that is not going on this time.”

The risks are no secret

Analysts at the Legislative Finance Committee have warned lawmakers that procurement code exemptions are overused, and that state law and regulation changes are needed to better safeguard public funds. But lawmakers’ lack of action on the recommended reforms corresponds to mounting evidence of widespread departure from best practices in contracting.

In an October 2021 update to the LFC’s 2016 and 2019 evaluations of the state procurement system, LFC staff said the executive branch was not scrutinizing large purchases, and that agencies issue sole-source determinations frequently simply to buy from a vendor they prefer, instead of the contractor offering the lowest cost or best service. Agencies also sometimes award no-bid contracts simply because they’ve missed deadlines for issuing requests for proposals, they added.

Sole-source and emergency procurement are “the two most common ways that state agencies purchase goods and services without going through a competitive process or otherwise taking intentional

steps to find a good deal,” LFC program evaluation manager Micaela Fischer said in an October 28 presentation to lawmakers during the hearing at the Roundhouse.

“Agencies are misusing emergency procurements, not for true emergencies that threaten the health or safety of people, as the procurement code spells out,” she said.

As the COVID pandemic barreled into the state in 2020, public officials scrambled to acquire personal protective gear and hospital equipment and to stop the spread of the virus through lockdowns, testing, and by warning people exposed to the coronavirus that they needed to get tested and self-isolate, lest they infect others.

Not surprisingly, the number of no-bid contracts skyrocketed during 2020 and 2021, the LFC reported, driven largely by COVID-related emergency procurements. But the jump in no-bid spending was already evident in 2019 (Lujan Grisham’s first year in office), New Mexico In Depth’s analysis showed.

The LFC’s October report and New Mexico In Depth’s analysis arrived at similar findings about state agencies’ increasing reliance on no-bid contracting, but the numbers differed in part because the LFC compared contracting by the state’s fiscal year, which runs from July through June. New Mexico In Depth’s analysis compared contracting by calendar years, and was limited to spending by state agencies under Lujan Grisham’s control.

The value of state agencies’ no-bid agreements in 2019 exceeded the prior administration’s in 2018 by $128.5 million, records reviewed by New Mexico In Depth showed.

That was largely due to a $108.85 million extension of the Human Services Department’s sole-source contract with Conduent State Health Care to maintain and operate the state’s Medicaid ManContinued on 13 ➤

11

New Mexico In Depth • 2022 Legislative special edition

status

Previous LFC Evaluator Recommendations, 2016-2019 FINDING: New Mexico procurement has a decentralized system with confusing processes and differing practices.

The Legislature should consider moving the state purchasing division from GSD to DFA or another strategy for consolidation.

➡ progressing

The State Purchasing Division should require its purchasing specialists to conduct business analyses of all spending.

Specifically, before November 2020, the State Purchasing Division should undertake an effort to analyze spending on current price agreements and create an action plan for consolidating the number of price agreements into fewer, more frequently used agreements with fewer vendors. State Purchasing should report on the outcomes of the exercise to the Legislative Finance Committee at the General Services Department’s 2020 budget hearing.

X

NO ACTION

The State Purchasing Division should find a way to share certain information across agencies, such as contracted hourly rates by vendor and vendor type in a way that would help agencies strategically negotiate rates and deliverables.

X

NO ACTION

FINDING: Agencies use noncompetitive methods, sometimes violating statute, possibly resulting in higher costs.

The Legislature should consider repealing sections of statute granting broad authority for exemptions to state agencies and programs within state agencies due to the current situation of billions of dollars being used to buy goods and services outside provisions of the Procurement Code.

X

NO ACTION

The Legislature should consider setting price limits (e.g., $10,000 for advertising) to contracts eligible for exemptions from the Procurement Code.

X

NO ACTION

The Legislature should consider putting limitations into place around the amount a contract can be amended for and the number of times a contract can be amended. For example, a contract should not be amended for more than the original value of the contract. This should be done in conjunction with advisement from GSD and DFA around best practices for amending contracts. This could be more relevant to limits on sole source amendments than to RFPs.

X

NO ACTION

All state agencies should comply with statute requiring LFC be notified of all sole source and emergency procurement.

X

NO ACTION

The Legislature should consider giving statutory authority to GSD’s State Purchasing Agent to have sole source determination responsibility and exemption determination responsibility for state agencies requesting such purchases.

X

NO ACTION

The Legislature should consider amending the Procurement Code in Section 13-1-129 NMSA 1978 such that: • Purchases against a price agreement for general services • Purchases of goods or general services between $10 over $60 thousand or professional services over $5,000 thousand and $60 thousand may only occur after the must occur under a separate contract with a defined scope agency has gathered and documented three quotes. of work between the agency and vendor according to the These quotes must be documented in a searchable form in the purchase order logged into the SHARE statewide terms of the price agreement. financial information system.

X

NO ACTION

FINDING: Procurement reform has had success but there is still room for improvement in contract management and best practices.

GSD should provide additional guidelines for price agreements asking agencies to put good faith efforts into trying to find better prices for large purchases.

The Legislature should consider requiring all sole source and noncompetitive procurement be posted on a single website. Additionally, post the following on the central website: • Winning and losing procurement bids • Procurement regulations • Annual reports

• Procurement manuals • S ole source and emergency procurement justification

X

NO ACTION

➡ progressing

12

New Mexico In Depth • 2022 Legislative special edition

Top Public Officials and Corruption 2005

Public access to information

Grade F (49)

Rank 19th

her gambling addiction. Duran, who as Secretary of State was the top campaign finance official in the state, was sentenced to 30 days in jail.

State Treasurer Robert Vigil, Montoya’s successor, was convicted on one count of attempted extortion.

Political financing

Grade F (48)

Rank 36th

2016

Electoral oversight

Grade D-(60) Rank 33rd

Executive accountability

Grade F (53)

Rank 41st

2008

Legislative accountability

Grade F (57)

Rank 39th

Former Senate Pro Tem Manny Aragon pleaded guilty to fraud and conspiracy charges for his role in defrauding the state out of nearly $4.4 million.

Judicial accountability

Grade C-(73) Rank 3rd

Budget processes

Grade C (74)

Civil service management

Grade D (65) Rank 14th

2008

Procurement

Grade D (64) Rank 38th

Deputy State Insurance Superintendent Joe Ruiz was convicted by a federal jury of multiple counts of mail and wire fraud, corrupt solicitation, and extortion.

Internal auditing

Grade B-(83) Rank 17th

Lobbying disclosure

Grade F (51)

Rank 43rd

Ethics enforcement agencies

Grade F (41)

Rank 45th

Pension fund management

Grade C-(71) Rank 17th

State Treasurer Michael Montoya pleaded guilty to extortion.

2006

2009 Gov. Bill Richardson withdrew his name from consideration as President Obama’s Commerce Secretary due to a federal corruption investigation.

2009 Former three-term Secretary of State Rebecca Vigil-Giron was indicted along with three others on dozens of counts, including money laundering and embezzlement for alleged misuse of federal funds meant for a voter education campaign. The case against VigilGiron was later dropped because it dragged on for too long, but the three others were convicted and received federal prison sentences.

CPI Assessment of systems in place to deter corruption in new mexico state governemnt

Rank 27th

Source: New Mexico’s scorecard, 2015 State Integrity Investigation, Center for Public Integrity

2011

2015

Public Regulation Commissioner Jerome Block Jr. pleaded guilty to identity theft, embezzlement and fraudulent use of a credit card, and election fraud charges.

Sen. Phil Griego resigned from the State Senate after an ethics complaint was filed against him because he shepherded (and voted for) the sale of state property in Santa Fe, and subsequently took a $50,000 broker’s commission from the purchaser.

2013 Vincent “Smiley” Gallegos, former head of the Region 3 Housing Authority, pleaded no contest to four misdemeanors, after being indicted in 2009 on fraud, embezzlement and conspiracy related to bond funds for housing projects.

2015 Secretary of State Dianna Duran resigned and pleaded guilty to six criminal counts, including two felony embezzlement charges, for using campaign donations to fund

New Mexico’s Taxation and Revenue secretary, Demesia Padilla, abruptly resigned one day after Attorney General investigators raided the state agency’s offices as part of an ongoing criminal investigation involving her and her husband.

2017 Senator Phil Griego was convicted of bribery, fraud, two counts of ethical violations and having an unlawful interest in a public contract. The criminal charges stemmed from his role in helping the Legislature authorize the sale of a public building from which he stood to gain. Griego accepted a $50,000 broker’s fee from clients but never publicly disclosed he stood to gain from the sale.

2021 House Majority Leader Democrat Sheryl Williams Stapleton of Albuquerque, the second most powerful lawmaker in the state House of Representatives, stepped down in July after being accused of public corruption. A state grand jury indicted Williams Stapleton in September on more than two dozen felony charges, including racketeering and money laundering, related to a no-bid Albuquerque Public Schools contract for vocational training services that has been valued at more than $5 million over 15 years.

13

New Mexico In Depth • 2022 Legislative special edition Continued from 10 ➤ agement Information System. But even if that contract is not included, 2019 saw a near-doubling of no-bid spending from the previous year.

(HSD amended Conduent’s solesource contract yet again in 2021, for another three years, for nearly $114 million.)

Then, in 2020, as COVID-19 began to overwhelm hospitals, nursing homes and public health workers across New Mexico, the state rushed to sign hundreds of emergency contracts through the New Mexico Department of Health worth more than $309 million.

It was part of an explosion in contracting that saw state agencies sign at least 59 no-bid contracts worth $1 million or more in 2020. Several of those (worth more than $209 million combined) were issued under an umbrella authorization for COVID spending.

The unprecedented public health response won New Mexico welcome headlines. Using the state’s emergency procurement code allowed the Lujan Grisham administration to award contracts for goods and services quickly, as state agencies struggled to respond.

But it was hard to handle.

Chronically understaffed and overwhelmed by the pandemic — and the sheer number of new emergency contracts — the health department saw an “apparent breakdown of internal controls,” according to a February 2021 state auditor’s report on emergency pandemic spending.

The governor’s office stepped in numerous times in 2020 to select vendors for emergency COVID-19 contracts, without health department review, according to the auditor’s office.

Such emergency contracting allowed the administration to respond quickly, but there were consequences.

“Rushed emergency procurement

■ See the full October 2021 LFC evaluation report, “Obtaining and Maximizing Value in State Procurement,” including the chart showing lack of legislative action, on the Legislative Finance Committee webpage at www.nmlegis.gov.

led to the state being defrauded, losing millions of dollars,” Fischer, the LFC analyst, reported. She estimated the state health department was swindled out of $6.5 million by vendors awarded emergency contracts in 2020. The state prepaid for masks and other personal protective equipment, some of which never arrived.

In the February 2021 report, the state auditor’s office described those masks, destined for New Mexico’s health care facilities, as “​​potentially fraudulent and/or substandard.”

(Because of slipshod record keeping, it’s not entirely clear where they all wound up, the health department’s own annual financial audit found.)

The COVID pandemic led to massive spending by government at all levels, and the potential for abuse was great, especially when procurement processes were bypassed.

“It is understandable that with such an intense sense of urgency, governments would place greater focus on emergency care of their citizens and less on the traditional safeguards for the prevention of corruption and fraud,” said Sheryl Goodman, a fraud examiner who served as Assistant Inspector General for the Congressionally-established Special Inspector General for Pandemic Recovery office in 2020 and 2021. (Goodman and Caulfield created Procurement Integrity Consulting Services in 2014 to advise the United Nations and governments around the world.)

“However, in doing so, they unintentionally created greater opportunities for criminal behavior, which has led, and continues to lead, to massive corruption, fraud, waste and abuse, especially against COVID relief funds,” she said in an interview

with New Mexico In Depth.

Examples elsewhere around the world include fraud in contracts for vaccine distribution, and the purchase of fake vaccines, Goodman and Caulfield noted.

Despite previous warnings, the Lujan Grisham administration continued to use no-bid contracting heavily in 2021, most of it unrelated to the pandemic.

All told, pandemic response-related emergency contracting across agencies (including $3 million for vaccination incentive gift cards) represented only about 19% of no bid contracts in 2021, New Mexico In Depth’s analysis found.

Repeated, widespread violations

existing vendor as an “emergency.”

This practice can continue with one vendor time and time again, with costs charged to the state increasing over time, according to the LFC October report.

Such mismanagement is just one of many issues analysts have flagged in their evaluations over the years of the state’s procurement code.

They’ve also pointed to lack of transparency, failures to track spending and otherwise enforce the procurement code, and they provide evidence that state agencies have been more lenient in defining an emergency than what’s in the procurement code itself.

In addition, they submitted evidence suggesting that state agencies may be splitting projects or amending small purchases to make contracts eligible for non-competitive bidding.

“In an ideal world, all the goods and services that New Mexico government entities buy with taxpayer dollars would be competitively sourced, with vendors competing to offer the best discounts to secure the state as a customer,” Fischer wrote in her October report.

“However, as highlighted by LFC over two evaluations in the past five years,” she continued, decisions made by the State Purchasing division and state agencies not following procurement rules has led to “overspending for purchases ranging from everyday acquisitions of laptops and cars to noncompetitively sourced contracts worth hundreds of millions of dollars.”

And the practice has only grown.

Sackett, the spokesperson for Lujan Grisham, said the LFC evaluation didn’t identify “any widespread abuse” of the procurement process.

Sole source and emergency procurement practices “are 100% legal processes built into state law,” she said. “If the state Legislature would like to change the processes surrounding sole-source and no-bid contracts, it is totally within their power to do that.”

Whether the abuse is widespread is open to debate, but the LFC’s October report, and previous evaluations, document repeated and widespread violations of the state procurement process. According to LFC analysts, state agencies have skirted procurement statutes and pushed millions out the door due to mismanagement.

For instance, state managers might miss deadlines to request New Mexico In Depth’s Marjorie public bids for a contract, or make other management mistakes, and Childress and Trip Jennings contribsimply reissue the contract to the uted to this story.

14

New Mexico In Depth • 2022 Legislative special edition

finding a HOME For low income New Mexicans, housing is scarce — a challenge state lawmakers hope to address this session

By Bobby brier New Mexico In Depth

New Mexico has a housing crisis.

Homelessness is up and the inventory of homes and apartments is down.

Ask Cree Walker, a 32-year-old mother of four children ages 5 to 12 who has experienced the crisis firsthand.

“I haven’t been able to find anything,” said Walker, who has hunted for housing for six months.

The 32 year old, who grew up in Pecos, moved to Idaho then returned to New Mexico but has scarce family to call on for help. Ailing from a back disability that limits motion, Walker can’t work, curbing what she can earn in income. She can’t lift much and it’s hard to stand or bend. She’s applying for federal disability after qualifying for a federal housing subsidy voucher called Section 8, which pays her full rent as long as it falls in her price range of $1,675.

But finding a place has thwarted her. So she, her children and two dogs cram into one room at an Albuquerque hotel that is full of families similar to hers, she said.

She’s thankful. Her kids attend a great school. They have winter jackets. And the city reimburses her for the mileage she drives her kids to and from school (The reimbursement is made through the Albuquerque Public Schools Assistance Program, Walker said).

But it’s tough. “My kids don’t have

Marjorie Childress/New Mexico In Depth

Cree Walker and her four children live in one room with two beds at an Albuquerque hotel that allows longterm stay. room to run. They’re constantly arguing, always on each other’s nerves, none of us gets a break,” she said. “It’s really hard on us this way.”

Most landlords won’t take her Section 8 voucher, Walker said. And those who do require much higher rent than she can afford and at least a $100 application fee. “…they’re all out of my price range,” she said. The closest she is finding are three bed-

room homes “and they’re all above $2,000. And my voucher only goes to 1,675 with all utilities included.”

Just looking for an apartment can stretch her resources. Because of high gas prices, she rations how much she drives. She’ll arrange to meet a prospective landlord and they won’t show up. And sometimes fees can push promising rentals out of reach. One apartment tried to

charge her $150, nonrefundable, before putting a rental application in, so she passed. She couldn’t afford it. Everybody else she knows didn’t have to pay that fee, she said.

The struggle to find housing causes her anxiety, she said, but she continues the search.

Walker’s challenges mirror a stateContinued on 15 ➤

New Mexico In Depth • 2022 Legislative special edition

wide problem. In New Mexico, it’s not illegal to “overtly discriminate” against a prospective renter based upon how they pay their rent, according to Attorney Maria Griego, the economic equity director at the New Mexico Center on Law and Poverty.

“One of the biggest issues that we’re facing is that even when we have a housing voucher in hand, it is hard to find a rental unit that can accommodate a family,” said Rachel Biggs, chief strategy officer at Albuquerque Health Care for the Homeless. A lack of available housing stock combined with landlords not accepting vouchers — they are not required to — has made finding a rental with three bedrooms increasingly difficult. “Even when we do have a housing voucher in hand, it’s taking longer and longer for that family to find housing, which you can imagine is very troubling,” she said. “Once you had gone through the process of being able to secure that housing subsidy, you would hope that we’d be able to move a family in right away. And that’s just not the case right now.”

To tackle the housing problem, lawmakers in the coming legislative session hope to make evicting renters harder and to increase dollars for housing programs.

The problem is big, and growing

Homelessness has leaped dramatically in New Mexico, although exact numbers are hard to come by. The common measure of how many people live unsheltered depends on a “point in time” count on one night in the winter. But to anyone who’s lived in the state’s largest metropolitan area in the past year, the increase is evident, with tents pitched in parks, under overpasses, or tucked away in doorways.

The U.S. Department of Housing

“

When somebody is homeless, it’s not easy for them to come out of homelessness, sometimes they need much more than just finding an apartment or shelter.

“

Continued from 14 ➤

— Isidoro Hernandez, executive director and chief executive officer, New Mexico Mortgage Finance Authority

and Urban Development (HUD) estimated in 2020 there were a total of 3,333 people living in the state who were experiencing both sheltered and unsheltered homelessness. Of those, nearly a quarter — 23% — were families with children and 8% were veterans. New Mexico’s rural counties had one of the highest percentages of homeless veterans living unsheltered. HUD also reported that New Mexico had the highest rate of people struggling with chronic homelessness.

There are many more people hanging on to shelter by a thread.

According to the National Low Income Housing Coalition, there are 63,823 renter households in New Mexico that are extremely low income, but there’s a shortage of 30,154 rental homes that are both affordable and available to these same renters.

Of extremely low-income renters in the state, 82% spend more than 30% of their income on housing costs and utilities.

And a person working at the state minimum wage of $10.50 an hour has to work 54 hours each week to afford a modest one bedroom rental home at fair market rent.

“The discrepancy between the average salary in New Mexico and the average housing costs in New Mexico is getting wider every year,” said Sen. Jerry Ortiz y Pino, D-Albuquerque.

There isn’t enough affordable

housing for renters or would-be first-time homeowners in New Mexico, said Rebecca Velarde, senior director of policy and planning for the New Mexico Mortgage Finance Authority. There’s a shortage of about 32,000 rental units now statewide for renters who have incomes that fall below 30% of the area median income (AMI), she said, while “homeownership is becoming further and further away” for low to moderate income families because of skyrocketing prices. The numbers for the rental unit shortage come from a research brief by Root Policy Research, a firm hired to help the Mortgage Finance Authority formulate a statewide housing strategy, Velarde said.

That so many New Mexicans spend way too much toward their housing costs is one of the biggest drivers of homelessness, said Biggs of Albuquerque Health Care for the Homeless.

“That combined with lack of access to health care and lack of access to a living wage, a housing wage that actually allows people to afford their housing are our … biggest issues in the state in terms of homelessness,” she said.

New Mexico has long pumped money into a housing fund administered by the New Mexico Mortgage Finance Authority. The public agency uses it to beef up programs around the state that help people get into housing and to create more af-

15 fordable housing.

The New Mexico Housing Trust Fund is a crucial piece of a puzzle, with those dollars leveraging money from other sources to support programs for homeless people, to pay for low-income home rehab and weatherization, assist first-time homebuyers, and help with down payment assistance, or rental assistance.

Lawmakers have allocated $22 million to the fund since 2005, excluding 2021 Session appropriations, and interest has grown it to over $34 million. To date, there’s been a 32 to 1 return on the state money, for a total of $698 million since 2005, according to the New Mexico Mortgage Finance Authority.

“This is a perfect year to do something meaningful that is transformational for people in New Mexico,” said Sen. Nancy Rodriguez, a Santa Fe Democrat and the vice chair of both the Senate Finance and Mortgage Finance Authority Act Oversight committees. Eyeing the enormous amount of revenue lawmakers have to allocate this year, Rodriguez will push to add $70 million to the fund this year, she said.

In addition to lobbying for that, Rodriguez wants the state to invest money year over year into the New Mexico Housing Trust Fund. The senator is currently drafting a bill which would earmark two and a half percent of the state’s severance tax bonding capacity on an annual basis for a recurring, sustainable and permanent amount of funding to go into the New Mexico Housing Trust Fund for affordable housing.

In fiscal year 2023, which begins this July 1, this would generate $27.7 million from the state. The New Mexico Mortgage Finance Authority would then leverage this money for a 30 to 1 return on investment, according to the senator, potentially bringing in $831 million for affordable housing.

Continued on 16 ➤

16

New Mexico In Depth • 2022 Legislative special edition

Marjorie Childress/New Mexico In Depth

Homelessness has escalated in Albuquerque, where signs of children and families living unsheltered have become more common.

Continued from 15 ➤ Such a cash infusion would add stability to money earmarked for housing needs, which currently is vulnerable to the state’s economic swings and the whims of lawmakers.

“We go to the state legislature every year. And we ask for funding, sometimes we get nothing, sometimes we get a good chunk, but it’s never certain,” said Velarde.

Isidoro Hernandez, executive director and chief executive officer of the New Mexico Mortgage Finance Authority, said an important piece of the MFA’s work is helping people experiencing homelessness qualify for services that help them access permanent housing.

“When somebody is homeless, it’s not easy for them to come out of homelessness, sometimes they need much more than just finding an apartment or shelter,” he said. The MFA has supported projects that

combine housing assistance and various services onsite that address the needs of people struggling to remain housed.

Supportive housing programs are critical, housing advocates said.

Biggs is urging a greater investment in the state’s Linkages Permanent Supportive Housing Program, which serves people with mental disabilities, and a doubling of available housing vouchers for those clients from 318 to 636.

“We’ve had great success with that program,” she said. Because it’s state rather than federal money, there’s more flexibility in how it can be used. “We’re able to house a wider range of people,” she said.

Tenant rights

While there’s a critical need for greater investment in housing stock and access, advocates also hope lawmakers will support greater safeguards to slow evictions of those

who are renting.

“Right now, under New Mexico’s law, we have…some of the strictest timeframes in the country for tenants who get behind on rent,” said Griego of the New Mexico Center on Law and Poverty.

If a tenant doesn’t pay rent when it’s due, their landlord can give them a three day notice of nonpayment, Griego said. That means a tenant has three days to pay the amount or a landlord can file an eviction case against them in court.

“Once a court case is filed, the hearing happens very quickly, within seven to 10 days. It’s supposed to happen that quickly,” Griego said.

Legislation being introduced, again, this year, would extend those time frames so tenants have time to find a lawyer, and take the time off work to prepare for the hearing. “So that they’re not just faced with the… choice of, go to work or go to this hearing and, you know, defend my

case because if you don’t go, then you lose by default,” said Griego.

Rep. Angelica Rubio, D-Doña Ana, one of the co-sponsors of the legislation, said she’s a renter and sometimes the culture around renting is looked down upon.

“It’s just really a culture that has been built up over decades around, like, who deserves what…,” Rubio said. “Housing is sort of that intersectional piece that doesn’t necessarily equate to equitable access for a lot of people.”

Her co-sponsor, Rep. Andrea Romero, D-Santa Fe, said the hope is that tenants burdened by a lack of resources can come to an agreement with their landlords, to “basically find more time to…be able to pay back anything that’s owed.”

Biggs said the tenant protection bill is her organization’s number one priority, because there’s an eviction crisis that’s been exacerbated by the pandemic.

17

New Mexico In Depth • 2022 Legislative special edition

prescription for the system

By Bryant Furlow New Mexico In Depth

The COVID-19 pandemic has laid bare the limits of New Mexico’s understaffed and highly centralized public health system.

Unlike most other states, New Mexico does not have county-based health boards. Instead, public health services like vaccination have traditionally fallen to the chronically understaffed state health department, which has struggled to contain the pandemic’s spread.

“The big lesson is that we’ve underfunded public health,” said Sen. Jerry Ortiz y Pino, D-Albuquerque.

“Our infrastructure was woefully inadequate and now we’re paying the price.”

That includes funding for the state’s 42 county and tribal comprehensive community health planning councils that, in the absence of local health boards, fill an important role identifying local public health gaps and needs. Many of the health coun-

Little-known councils are key to public health but chronically underfunded.

Advocates hope to change that in 2022

cils have gone beyond their statutory mandates, in recent months, to pitch in with local COVID response efforts – helping to coordinate local testing and vaccination efforts, get word out to local residents about where they can get booster shots, and at times serving as an important channel of communication between state health officials and local governments.

But the health councils are woefully underfunded, despite legislation passed in 2019 that expanded their mandates and directed the health department to provide them more funding. In 2022, with the state’s coffers busting at the seams, advocates and their allies in the Legislature want to see the state ensure councils’ long-term sustainability.

Boots on the ground

Health councils have been epicenters of local public health planning for more than 20 years, conducting local health needs assessments and advising local governments on solutions. (Health councils assess local health issues and help plan health care responses, but until recently, they did not deliver health care services.)

They are invaluable sources of insight about local issues in the state’s often-neglected rural areas, said Rep. Gail Armstrong, R-Magdalena.

“They are the boots on the ground in our communities,” Armstrong said. “They know what the needs are. But a lot of people don’t even know they exist or what they’re for.”

Lawmakers depend on health

councils as a reliable and objective source of information about local public health challenges, Ortiz y Pino agreed.

The Rio Arriba County Health Council, for instance, was spotlighted last year by reporter Ted Alcorn in the Washington Post for its work with the Española Police Department to train officers in naloxone administration to reverse opioid overdoses. Rio Arriba County has long been an epicenter of opioid overdose deaths.

“Rio Arriba was able to quickly refocus the infrastructure we’d created for addressing one epidemic, Substance Use Disorder, to combat the new pandemic, COVID-19,” Lauren Reichelt, of the Rio Arriba County Health Council, said in an interview. “We organized volunteers to make and distribute 10,000 masks, 800 gowns and hundreds of face shields throughout northern New Mexico early in the pandemic.”

The health council also created Continued on 18 ➤

Continued from 17 ➤ new COVID testing sites, coordinated testing clinics, and are coordinating school-based vaccine clinics throughout the county, Reichelt told New Mexico In Depth.

“As a result, we are among the most vaccinated counties in the U.S.,” she said.

The health councils were not originally created to help respond to fast-moving emergencies like infectious disease pandemics. They evolved from local maternal and child health councils in the 1990s into comprehensive health planning groups tasked with identifying and informing policymakers about local chronic health problems and needs.

“We know that only 20% of health outcomes are the result of health care,” Sharon Finarelli, executive director of the New Mexico Alliance of Health Councils, said. “Consequently, health councils’ focus on the social determinants of health, to work on the 80% that is responsible for community health outcomes in our COVID vaccine equity work.”

Many experts point to poverty and one’s race and ethnicity as key factors in a community’s struggles with poor health outcomes.

For most health councils, tackling an immediate crisis like the pandemic is new, Finarelli acknowledged.

“We’re moving so fast it’s like we’re putting down the railroad ties as the engine’s coming over them,” said Anne Hays Egan, a public health consultant, about some health councils’ new, direct participation in local pandemic responses.

That work has been challenging at times. The state was slow to share detailed COVID infection and vaccination rate data with local governments and health councils for targeted community-based interventions. Originally, in 2020, the state health department disclosed only county-level data. In early December 2021, they agreed to pro-

New Mexico In Depth • 2022 Legislative special edition

“

The big lesson (from the pandemic) is that we’ve underfunded public health. Our infrastructure was woefully inadequate and now we’re paying the price.”

— Sen. Jerry Ortiz y Pino, D-Albuquerque

vide Zip-code level data to the N.M. Community Data Collaborative (NMCDC) and health department analyses of that data (but not the data itself) to health councils. But it was not clear how Zip code-level data could be used to identify individual neighborhoods or census tracts that might be falling between the cracks.

The NMCDC is using the health department data to create data dashboards for county and tribal health councils.

But even as health councils’ responsibilities grow, sustainable funding remains in doubt. Since the Great Recession, they have struggled.

Underfunded

In 1991, the New Mexico Legislature mandated the creation of county maternal and child health planning councils, funded through the state health department. In 2007, lawmakers amended the Maternal and Child Health Plan Act to include tribal health councils.

“By 2010, the health council system as a whole was receiving $2.8 million annually in state funding,” said Ron Hale of the New Mexico Alliance of Health Councils, which was created that year.

But then came the Great Recession. The state suspended funding for the councils between 2010 and 2014, forcing some to curtail or cease their work. Rural health coun-

“

18

cils were hardest hit.

“They just got wiped out,” Ortiz y Pino said.

Health council funding hasn’t neared 2010 levels since.

“Amounts of annual appropriations have varied widely, up to a maximum of $395,000” for all councils combined, Hale said.

In 2019, the Legislature passed the County and Tribal Health Care Act (HB 137), tasking health councils with identifying local health needs, resources, and priorities.

The law directed the state health department to administer funding for health council staff and training, and to develop guidance and benchmarks for measuring health councils’ success and “mechanisms to ensure the long-term viability of health councils.”

Nearly three years later, however, the state has yet to make good on those mandates. Finarelli and health department officials are still in talks to create a committee to develop the HB 137-mandated benchmarks and guidance.

And even when combined with temporary pandemic-related nonprofit grants, the current state funding is enough for no more than one full-time staff member at each council, Finarelli noted. (State general fund support comes to just under $9,500 for each health council.

That plus funding from the W. K. Kellogg Foundation and U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention means funding for each health

council is “just shy of $60,000,” she explained.)

That funding supports staffing but not support for equipment, supplies, rental fees, and other expenses, Finarelli noted. “We estimate that it would take about $100,000 per county or tribe to fully fund a health council.”

Fully funding all health councils statewide and the Alliance would come to $5 million a year, she said.

As of December, 37 health councils were receiving health department-administered Kellogg and CDC vaccine equity and community health rebuilding grants. (Two additional tribal health clinics might join them this month.) Those grants are worth $50,000 each year but will run out in June 2023. The Robert Wood Johnson Foundation and Con Alma also awarded modest grants to health councils and the Alliance.

That grant money is crucial for rebuilding health council capacity, noted Susan Wilger, of the Center for Health Innovation. But it is not enough to make health councils sustainable over the long haul, she, lawmakers, and health council officials agreed.

“A grant is a grant: after two years, it goes away,” Armstrong said.

“That’s the problem. They’re on a rollercoaster.”

As of early December, the state health department had not drafted any legislative requests for health council funding for this session but a spokesperson said in an email that “it is possible there may be one coming, as the department works through the implementation of HB 137.”

Armstrong, who serves on the House appropriations and legislative finance committees, has requested appropriation this legislative session of an additional $75,000 in health council funding through the health department. But Continued on 19 ➤

New Mexico In Depth • 2022 Legislative special edition

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Continued from 18 ➤ that money would have to be split among all health councils, statewide, she acknowledged.

“I think there will be an effort made to expand the funding available for all of them through the DOH budget,” said Ortiz y Pino.

The only other realistic mechanism for health council funding this session will be lawmakers’ individually assigning funds under their control, called “junior money” appropriations, Ortiz y Pino said.

“They could try to introduce a separate bill, but if it’s not in House Bill 2 [the general appropriations bill], the odds of it getting approved go down to practically zero,” he said.

Tribal Health Councils

Tribal health councils – and coordination between county and tribal health councils – will be key to building a stronger public health system in New Mexico, proponents believe. The Navajo Nation and several Indian Pueblo communities were among those hardest hit by the COVID pandemic.

Nine tribes currently have active health councils: the Cañoncito Navajo Band in To’hajiilee and eight Indian Pueblo tribes: Acoma, Cochiti, Nambe, San Ildefonso, Santa Clara, Santo Domingo, Picuris, and Tesuque. The pueblos of Nambe, Picuris, and Santo Domingo established health councils in 2021 and the Santa Clara Indian Pueblo is in the early stages of rebuilding its health council, said Tribal Liaison Gerilyn Antonio, who is Diné. She joined the New Mexico Alliance of Health Councils in June.

The Alliance hopes to help establish two new tribal health councils each year, Finarelli said. But that will depend on state funding, she cautioned. Many tribal communities have chosen not to participate yet in establishing or reestablishing health councils because of uncertain

funding.

Public health in Native communities is even more complex than elsewhere, with important roles for information sharing between the tribes, counties, state agencies and federal Indian Health Service.

Trust is another factor.

“I do see some tribal communities maybe who do not want to accept state funding,” Antonio said. “I think that is part of navigating historical trauma that’s happened and working with outsiders. We need to try to build better relationships.”

The tribes are also anxious to protect their health data sovereignty, Antonio noted. The New Mexico Community Data Collaborative is in discussions with tribal health clinics to determine exactly who will have access to their individual data dashboards.

Several tribes and tribal health councils are currently focused on delivering pediatric COVID immunizations and ensuring access to booster doses for adult tribal members, Antonio said. “We see a lot of high vaccination rates in some of the pueblos I work with,” she said.

“Some ranging over 85%, which is

really great. With so many tribal mos. community members vaccinated, “There was no analysis of epidetheir focus has shifted to pediatrics miologic data” for the outbreak, Skolnik said. “There was no comand boosters.” munication with the public about the sources of spread or how our ‘All Public Health is Local’ Health councils’ emerging role personal and community response to the outbreak should be adjusted.” in helping develop locally tailored Health councils can play a role pandemic responses is a welcome in bridging gaps in pandemic remove away from the state’s highly sponses, but that will require pocentralized system of public health, litical will and sustainable funding according to several local experts mechanisms, said Skolnik, a former who spoke with New Mexico In global health lecturer at Yale UniDepth. versity, director of George Washing“New Mexico is a large state with ton University’s Center for Global a small and dispersed population,” Health, and a retired World Bank said Richard Skolnik, a member of director for health and education in Los Alamos County’s recently re- South Asia. constituted health council. “I unHealth councils “need resourcderstand why there is a unified state es to fulfill their mission,” he said. health system. Figuring out how Skolnik spoke to New Mexico In best to handle public health, struc- Depth in his personal capacity, not turally, in New Mexico is a real chal- as a representative of the county lenge.” health council.

But the pandemic has exposed “All public health is local and, “structural flaws that need to be therefore, data and communication overcome quickly,” Skolnik said. He must be localized,” Skolnik said. noted as one example “gaps in communication” between state and local Editor’s note: the W.K. Kellogg public health officials during a recent Foundation funds New Mexico In cluster of COVID cases in Los Ala- Depth.

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New Mexico In Depth • 2022 Legislative special edition

Commentary

Diversify New Mexico’s economy using oil/gas surplus

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After many years of failed ecently, it was attempts and with a big announced that surplus available, it is despite repeattime to really reform the ed attacks by the Biden GRT. administration, New Currently, the City Mexico’s oil and gas industry had a record

By Paul J. Gessing of Las Cruces GRT is 8.3125%, Albuquerque is year. It generated 35% of at 7.875%, while Sanall general-fund revenue ta Fe is 8.44%. Rates for the state budget in FY 2021 (which ended in June) – a across the state of New Mexico are charged at similar rates but up to share exceeded only once in the 9 percent. For a variety of reasons most recent eight-year period. rates across the state have risen In raw numbers, the industry dramatically over the last 10-15 generated almost $5.3 billion in revenue for state and local govern- years. But high and rising tax rates are only part of the problem. ments in the 2021 fiscal year. In The real problem with the GRT other words, the industry that New is it’s unfair treatment of small Mexico has long (over) relied on businesses. Accountants, bookand the “progressive” wing of the keepers, even medical profesDemocratic Party, in particular, sionals, and attorneys (and many would like to eliminate entirely, others) all must charge this tax on continues to prop up the State top of the cost of their services. economy and budget.

Alternatively, service providers loIronically, the massive cated in other states do not have to oil-and-gas-generated budget surplus available to legislators this charge the GRT. This makes New Mexico especially unattractive as a January is also the ticket to the diversified economy that everyone of location for small businesses. And it is those small businesses that both political parties realizes New grow into tomorrow’s big busiMexico must have. nesses which can employ hundreds And, while we support ANY effort to lower tax burdens on New or even thousands of workers and boost state and local economies.

Mexicans, Gov. Lujan Grisham’s plan for a small .25 percentage With the Legislature convening point reduction in the State’s Gross with a massive surplus generated Receipts Tax (GRT) is inadequate. primarily from oil and gas, now is

the time to focus on fundamental reform. According to the governor, her proposed GRT cut will reduce revenues by $145 million annually.

That’s a tiny fraction of the surplus.

At a bare minimum proper GRT reform needs to eliminate the taxation of these business services. It will be easier to make the change when there is plenty of revenue available.

The GRT and much-needed reforms to it are not a partisan issue. Republican Jason Harper has introduced reform legislation in recent years with former Senate Finance Committee chair, Democrat John Arthur Smith. More recently, powerful House Appropriations Committee Chair Democrat Rep. Patty Lundstrom told attendees of the New Mexico Oil and Gas Association (NMOGA) conference in October that “tax pyramiding” needed to be addressed by the Legislature in the upcoming session.

While taxing services is the fundamental problem with the GRT, there are others. Specifically, while the tax was originally conceived as being applied at VERY low rates and broadly, the political process has led to the current, sorry state of high rate, exemption-filled tax structure.

Special interests line up in Santa Fe to lobby for exemptions and deductions for their business or in-

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dustry and the Legislature is more than happy to offer those exemptions. And, whether you support taxing groceries or not, the process of eliminating that tax has directly contributed to the massive rise in GRT rates in recent years.

In addition to addressing taxes on business inputs and services, the Legislature needs to put a stop to the special exemptions while also constraining the future ability of local governments to raise rates.

If New Mexico Democrats are serious about “diversifying” New Mexico’s economy away from over-dependence on oil and gas, using that revenue as a proverbial “backstop” to transition the GRT into something less anti-business and more resembling a sales tax, this is the time.

Paul Gessing is president of New Mexico’s Rio Grande Foundation.

The Rio Grande Foundation is an independent, nonpartisan, tax-exempt research and educational organization dedicated to promoting prosperity for New Mexico based on principles of limited government, economic freedom and individual responsibility. The views in this column are the author’s alone and do not reflect the views or opinions of New Mexico In Depth.

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Commentary

A fair and equitable recovery starts with supporting women of color

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But the COVID recesall of our children and their mothew Mexicans share a belief sion went way beyond ers have access to the same opporthat all of us – no wage differences. In New tunities. matter where we live, Mexico, women comprise Fortunately, policymakers pushed how we look, or what we 47% of the workforce through some big wins for families believe – deserve access and 64% of the frontline during the 2021 legislative session, to the same opportunities workers. But, across the in part by increasing and expandBy Amber Wallin that help us achieve our nation, women’s rate ing two tax credits for those earnunique potential. These of participation in the ing low incomes. The federal inopportunities – receiving workforce is the lowest it crease in the Child Tax Credit was a quality education, and having has been since 1988. In September another life line for many families. access to affordable health care, 2021, men gained 220,000 jobs but And the state’s expansion of child jobs that pay family-sustaining women lost 26,000 jobs. care assistance for working parents wages, and safe and affordable Being a mother has increased helped rebuild infrastructure that housing – are often referred to as this inequity. More mothers than is as critical to our economy as to social determinants of health and fathers have lost wages, decreased our parents. But there is more to be they impact everything from the their work hours, and exited the done. conditions surrounding our births labor force entirely. Mothers with In the upcoming legislative to the length of our lives. young children have reduced their session, New Mexico Voices for The COVID-19 pandemic made work hours four to five times more Children will be asking lawmakers it apparent that these opportunities than fathers have. to put families with children first in are not universally available and That women of color have been policymaking. High on the list of their lack has led to lower-qualhurt the most by the recession policies that will help ensure a just ity social determinants of health should be of great concern in a recovery and equitable opportunifor some communities. Clearly, state where 75% of our kids are ties for all families are enacting a communities of color and those children of color. If we want them state-level CTC, with families facearning low incomes were hardest to succeed, we need to ensure that ing the biggest economic challenghit by the pandemic as well as the economic aftermath. But another aspect that hasn’t gotten as much Equality of opportunity is not something notice is how the pandemic and recession have hurt women more that just happens. It is a product of policies than men, with women of color and programs that work together to create being hurt the most.

This should not be surprising, a foundation so all of New Mexico’s kids, since women still earn lower families, and communities have an equal incomes than do men in the same chance to strive for success. professions, and that the gap is even greater for women of color.

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es seeing the biggest benefits. We will also be pushing for the state to make the changes in child care assistance permanent. Other policies to improve family economic security include providing cash assistance to families left out of federal relief and giving one-time economic assistance to frontline essential workers. Both of these groups will spend that relief quickly and locally, hastening our state’s economic recovery as well. Ending predatory lending, which can trap families in an endless cycle of debt, would also ensure families have better opportunities to thrive.

Equality of opportunity is not something that just happens. It is a product of policies and programs that work together to create a foundation so all of New Mexico’s kids, families, and communities have an equal chance to strive for success.

Listening to women, families, and communities of color, and enacting bold, systemic policy change that prioritizes those who have too long been left behind – that’s how we build back better and cement a just future for all.

Amber Wallin, MPA, is the executive director of New Mexico Voices for Children. The views in this column are the author’s alone and do not reflect the views or opinions of New Mexico In Depth.

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New Mexico In Depth • 2022 Legislative special edition

Commentary

Common Cause New Mexico goes back to basics for 2022 session

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commission is asking for the web for all to see. Yet often the 021 has been a long a total of $1.27 million for reports are inconsistent, incomplete year. Starting with FY 22-23 and we strongly or inaccessible, making enforcethe Jan. 6 insurrecsupport it. The comtion at the U.S. Capitol, it ment difficult. We support fundextended through attempts mission suffered a cut in ing for an additional FTE to audit made by several state leglast year’s budget, which reports more regularly and report reduced its staff to five, in discrepancies. The SOS is requestislatures to erect barriers

By Mario Jimenez spite of statutorily reto voting and take back ing $66,500 for this purpose. Seems the authority to determine quired additional respon- like a modest proposal. We hope election results themselves the budget will accommodate that sibilities. This year—in rather than basing it on the tabula- cooperation with the Legislative request.

This year we are also supporting tions of election officials—and votes Council Service—it selected three a constitutional amendment to cast by citizens. Here in New Mex- members of the Citizen Redistrictamend Article 7, Section 5 of the ico we are fortunate to have robust ing Commission and staffed its constitution to allow local governelection administration at the state meetings, which were praised for and local levels, with secure, accupublic outreach and participation. ments to modify their own election Transparency is the first line of processes. This year marked the rate and accessible elections open to defense against conflict of interfirst election under the consolidatall qualified voters.

But that does not mean we need est and the violation of state laws. ed local elections plan passed by to rest on our laurels. This session, Nowhere is this truer than in the the Legislature in 2018. As hoped, Common Cause will focus on area of lobbying and campaign turnout in smaller elections for strengthening some of the basic finance. We have worked hard to water conservation districts, school safeguards to democracy at the require public officials, candidates boards and other lesser known local local and state level. Our priorities and lobbyists to file regular reports authorities increased dramatically. may not elicit much razzle dazwith the Secretary of State’s office, However, there were some unexwhich must, by law, be posted on zle, but we believe in adequately pected consequences. Without a funding some of the protections we already have established in the new Ethics Commission and in the Secretary of State’s Office. We are Here in New Mexico we are fortunate to have robust also supporting a constitutional amendment that will protect local election administration at the state and local levels, elections from capture by small with secure, accurate and accessible elections open to minorities.

With no shortage of corruption all qualified voters. But that does not mean we need to in New Mexico, we need to give the state Ethics Commission the rest on our laurels. This session, Common Cause will resources to hire two more lawyers focus on strengthening some of the basic safeguards to and support staff to investigate and adjudicate claims, handle civil democracy at the local and state level. litigation and special projects. The

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provision for run-off elections in school board races, for example, many candidates in multi-candidate fields won with far less than a majority of the vote.

Albuquerque and other municipalities rectified this problem with run-offs years ago. In Las Cruces and Santa Fe, these run-offs occur automatically on election night, thus sparing the taxpayers another election. Local governments should have the ability to set their own election terms, but a constitutional amendment is needed for this common-sense reform.

We expect this short session of the Legislature to be crowded with the budget issues made urgent

by COVID. Important decisions must be made on how to spend the surplus. That’s why this year we’re sticking to the basics—for the sake of democracy.

Mario Jimenez is Campaign Director for Common Cause New Mexico.

Common Cause is a non-partisan grassroots organization dedicated to upholding the core values of American democracy. It works to create an open, honest and accountable government that serves the public interest; to promote equal rights, opportunity, and representation for all; and to empower all people to make their voices heard as equals in the political process. The views in this column are the author’s alone and do not reflect the views or opinions of New Mexico In Depth.

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Commentary

Ethics reform efforts hampered by constitutional restrictions, politics

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year, 30-day sessions: 1. veryone who works While the budget requests are budget matters; 2. bills around the Legisguaranteed a hearing in this 30pursuant to special mesday session, the forward-thinking lature – legislator, lobbyist, analyst, advocate, sages of the governor; and Disclosure Act is not. The only way reporter, etc. — knows 3. bills of the last previous that will happen is if the governor puts that on her call…and ethics that it can take time for regular session vetoed by reform has not been announced legislation to “ripen”. That the governor.

By Kathleen Sabo In public meetings of as a priority by the governor. That sometimes moving in a means that necessary ethics reform new direction from what the State Ethics Comwill most likely have to wait to even is currently in statute or mission and the Ethics be considered until the 2023 legislawhat is commonplace can take Reform Working Group (www. years of lead time and advocating nmethicsreform.org), both the com- tive session. for a change or for reform.

So, here we land, with a huge mission and the Secretary of State’s And sometimes there are issues corruption scandal whetting the Office have discussed submitted that arrive with such exigency that budget requests for new positions to public’s appetite for reform, but they are embraced with apparent probably no way to make that strengthen their capabilities under immediacy and acknowledgment of various ethics laws. Honoring these reform happen during the 2022 the necessity for action. legislative session. necessary budget increase requests This year saw the indictment of What’s the solution? Increasing will serve New Mexicans well. a powerful state representative on At its December 3rd meeting, the the number of persuasive lobbymultiple corruption charges. What commission, charged with recomists in the ethics-reform arena to a time for reform, right? With the convince both the governor and mending reforms to ethics-related public’s outcry over what may seem laws, voted to move forward with legislative leadership that the public to be unending opportunities for the proposed “Disclosure Act,” that (and legislators) will best be served graft (sometimes seized), and the would repeal the existing Financial by endorsing and entertaining chance for lawmakers to strengthen Disclosure Act, and expand upon ethics-reform legislation during the rules and laws governing disthe 2022 legislative session? Maybe. what public servants are required to disclose in the name of transpar- That’s certainly a political solution. closure and transparency, auditing But what of an institutional soluand reporting, and weak penalties ency. (See Appendix 1 in the comfor misconduct, that could make mission’s public materials at https:// tion? a bad actor at least think twice www.sec.state.nm.us/wp-content/ Calls for reform/modernization/ about committing wrong, unlawful, uploads/2021/11/Public-Mateprofessionalization of the Legisself-enriching acts! rials-for-2021-12-3-Commislature have been on the increase.

And yet…here we are approach- sion-Meeting-Updated-11-24.pdf.) Everything from session length, saling and in a timely legislative session, with little hope for meaningful enactment and reform of ethics-reCalls for reform of the Legislature have been on the lated laws. Why? Because this is a increase. But there’s no appetite on the part of legislative 30-day budget session. Our State Constitution (Article IV, Section leadership to back a constitutional amendment orchestrating 5) limits legislators to considering only the following during evenreform when that issue could become political.

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aries, and increased, regular staffing have been suggested. Much of this will take a constitutional amendment. But there’s no appetite on the part of legislative leadership to back a constitutional amendment orchestrating reform of the institution of the Legislature when that issue could become political, and there’s an election in 2022!

So, here we are in a catch-22 situation: the need for ethics reform is urgent, apparent and desired…but will most likely not be considered in a 30-day, budget matters session…so let’s have a constitutional amendment that permits both budget and substantive matters to be introduced in every session…but there’s no support for that effort because 2022 is an election year…so we’ll have to wait for an odd-year, 60-day session for legislators to introduce substantive, ethics reform legislation!

In the meantime, years and opportunities for meaningful ethics reform pass by. The potential price?

Loss of public trust in the Legislature. If I were a legislator, that would be a price I would be unwilling to pay. How about you?

Kathleen Sabo is executive director of New Mexico Ethics Watch, a non-partisan organization dedicated to promoting ethics and accountability in government and public life in New Mexico. The views in this column are the author’s alone and do not reflect the view or opinions of New Mexico In Depth.

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New Mexico In Depth • 2022 Legislative special edition

Commentary

State must adopt tribal remedy framework for public education

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hen recent high signed to erase differences school graduate and impose the presumed Chaslyn Tafoya supremacy of Western of Taos Pueblo was asked culture, public schools in a public forum with embody the cumulative New Mexico’s education harm inflicted by syssecretary what she loved temic and institutional

By Regis Pecos racism. Countless public most about where she called home, she pointed investigations and judicial to her culture, her lanrulings have surfaced the guage, and her tribal community. trauma caused by “Indian EducaWhen asked what threatened what tion,” yet the assimilation paradigm she loved most, she replied, “public persists. education.”

Three years after the landmark Her response echoed the verYazzie/Martinez ruling, Native dict issued by New Mexico’s First students are still waiting for meanJudicial District Court in its 2018 ingful change. Meanwhile, the Yazzie/Martinez ruling: IndigeCovid-19 pandemic is exacerbatnous students “will be irreparably ing education inequities. Native harmed” if the State does not enact students have suffered dispropora comprehensive overhaul of public tionate learning loss as they lack education. The Court ordered the the technology infrastructure for State to implement the New Mexdistance learning. Even before the ico Indian Education Act of 2003, pandemic, Native students were a which requires the New Mexico third less likely than White students Public Education Department to to graduate on time. collaborate with Tribes in providing Disparate academic outcomes a culturally and linguistically releare routinely presented as a liability vant education to Native students. for New Mexico, indicative of the Public education has long posed clichéd “Indian problem.” Yet as the an existential threat to our Native Yazzie Court reminded, disparities children and to the cultural survival are the result of systemic failures, of Indigenous peoples. The recent maintained by an education policy discovery of mass graves at Indian steeped in the legacy of colonialism boarding schools exposes only the and racism. While Native students most egregious atrocities commitstruggle with racial bullying and biased curricula, they are rarely ted in the name of Western educasupported by teachers that share tion. After boarding schools came similar experiences. In the school the forced integration of Native district that serves almost exclusivechildren into public schools. De-

ly students from the Jicarilla Apache Nation, only 1 in 10 teachers are Native. There are over 1,000 teacher vacancies across the state; to close the diversity gap, each and every new hire would have to be Native.

The failures of our public education system are harming the minds and souls of Native children. Tragically, our Native youth are a third more likely than their peers to take their own lives. It reflects a sense of hopelessness.

Solutions to this unconscionable crisis are right before us. The Tribal Remedy Framework, developed by tribal communities and Indigenous education experts, has been endorsed by all of New Mexico’s Nations, Tribes, and Pueblos. It is a comprehensive plan for a balanced, culturally and linguistically relevant education that meets the needs of Native students. Three strategies undergird this plan: increasing the capacity of Tribes to share responsibility in public school governance, investing in tribal community-based education, education infrastructure and harnessing the expertise of Indigenous higher education faculty to train Native teachers and assist school districts and Tribes.

Native American state legislators, most notably Rep. Derrick Lente, have repeatedly introduced bills to implement these solutions. Legislative action is needed to make targeted investments in Native students and fully fund the New

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Mexico Indian Education Act. However, state officials have yet to act on the proposals contained in the Tribal Remedy Framework.

Recent piecemeal reforms failed to match the magnitude of the problem and across-the-board funding increases have bypassed Native students. The State’s failure to listen to Tribes is perpetuating the same institutional racism that lies at the root of this crisis.

Yet Indigenous peoples remain resilient and will persevere. We will not accept the slow death of our cultures, languages, and way of life.

Chaslyn Tafoya’s voice joins a growing chorus of Indigenous advocates who insist the time for change is now. Until tribal communities gain greater control over the education of their children, and until Indigenous cultures and languages are fully integrated into schools, and have access to the necessary education infrastructure, tribal youth, their families, and their communities will continue demanding an overhaul of public education.

Regis Pecos is a former governor of Cochiti Pueblo and co-director of the Leadership Institute at Santa Fe Indian School, which provides a forum to discuss the most critical policy issues that impact the Native tribes of New Mexico. The views in this column are the author’s alone and do not reflect the views or opinions of New Mexico In Depth.

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Commentary

New Mexico has an opportunity to learn what works best following two years of extraordinary innovation

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federal COVID relief funds. While decreased enrollment, he 2022 regular legexpanded child care access appears family and provider fears islative session will to be a priority of the governor, it is about COVID exposure, be the second unless clear whether legislators share and unpredictable cloder the persistent shadow this view. of COVID-19. For those sures and quarantines.

This is also the last regular sesof us who focus on child Yet this year has also seen and family well-being, the a dramatic expansion in sion before a scheduled public vote situation is simultaneously By Hailey Heinz eligibility for child care in fall of 2022 on whether New dire and hopeful. The dire: assistance. Child care Mexico should tap its Land Grant Families with children, esassistance helps lower-in- Permanent Fund to support addipecially those with lower incomes, come families afford care, and New tional funds for early childhood have been slammed by the simulta- Mexico has expanded the program and K-12 education. The vote will to include many middle class fambe the culmination of a decade-long neous impacts of school and child policy conversation, and comes at care closures, job losses, and the ilies, who have long struggled to anxiety and grief that have characafford the high cost of high-quality a historically unique moment. New Mexico is enjoying an abundance care. terized this time for many.

How long will this policy last? We of resources thanks to federal relief The hopeful: The sudden loss of will watch to see whether state lead- dollars and high state revenues, in-person schooling and child care has renewed public focus on the ers view this expansion as a tempo- as well as an avalanche of critical importance of these sectors. States rary recovery measure for workers, needs. The Legislature will not dehave received federal funding to or as a permanent move toward termine the outcome of the Permastabilize them from the impacts of more universal child care access. nent Fund vote, but we’ll watch to COVID, allowing new resources to This question is entwined with see whether the prospect of the vote flow into schools, child care, interthe ongoing issue of who governs factors into early childhood fundnet connectivity and other longstanding needs.

During the session and in the coming year, our team at the UniDuring the session and in the coming year, our team at versity of New Mexico Cradle to Career Policy Institute will watch the University of New Mexico Cradle to Career Policy to see what New Mexico decides to Institute will watch to see what New Mexico decides keep from the pandemic, and what the state casts aside. In our policy to keep from the pandemic, and what the state casts and personal lives, the pandemic has offered a complex mix of things aside. In our policy and personal lives, the pandemic we are eager to lose forever, alonghas offered a complex mix of things we are eager to lose side those we hope to maintain.

In the child care sector, forever, alongside those we hope to maintain.

COVID-19 has brought great instability for providers faced with

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ing and policy decisions.

Expanded child care assistance is just one COVID-era policy that leaders may decide to keep or adapt. Although distance learning in K-12 schools was challenging for many families, others enjoyed the flexibility and found new forms of family engagement. These families may benefit from increased online and hybrid options in the future.

Home visiting, a service for families with or expecting new babies, saw some families thrive through video visits who might have been hesitant to accept in-person services in their homes. Other families longed to welcome home visitors back into their living rooms.

The COVID-19 pandemic is far from over, with lawmakers setting policy under conditions of extreme uncertainty. As difficult as this is, the possibilities are also exciting: New Mexico’s leaders have a unique opportunity in 2022 to look back at two years of extraordinary innovation and decide which parts to fund and sustain.

Hailey Heinz is a research scientist at the University of New Mexico Cradle to Career Policy Institute, which produces research, evaluation, and analysis that supports thoughtful and informed policymaking for children and families. The views in this column are the authors’ alone and do not reflect the view or opinions of New Mexico In Depth.

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New Mexico In Depth • 2022 Legislative special edition

Commentary

Hydrogen is a false solution for problem of climate change

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in New Mexico. ndigenous commuMexico, including hydroSome hydrogen (“green hydronities in New Mexico gen, and are calling on the have long dealt with Governor to stop sacrific- gen”) can be produced using water, the negative impacts of ing our lands, waters, and but with our state facing severe experimental energy drought and a dwindling water communities. projects promoted by state supply, there is nothing “green” Hydrogen is currently and federal governments. about using our precious water produced using methane This legislative session, By Mario Atencio gas - the “gas” in oil and sources to drive a process that will as the state faces a clionly fuel the climate crisis. gas. Converting methane Proponents of hydrogen, like Gov. to hydrogen promotes mate crisis that is already Lujan Grisham, suggest that these disproportionately impacting Indig- more fracking in our communities pitfalls can be addressed by producand releases carbon dioxide in the enous, low-income, and commuprocess. To boot, converting meth- ing hydrogen with renewable ennities of color, the stakes of energy policies are higher than ever. ane to hydrogen requires enormous ergy and by capturing and storing Why, then, is New Mexico Govamounts of energy, energy that carbon emissions released during today mainly comes from the burn- the process underground. ernor Michelle Lujan Grisham Here, hydrogen truly reveals itself touting the hydrogen fuel industry, ing of fossil fuels. Where will these as a false solution. which is nothing short of a scheme fossil fuels come from? From more On the carbon-capture front, we to subsidize oil and gas companies fracking in New Mexico. By proand keep the state dangerously reli- moting more fracking, this method know this technology is a failed fanof hydrogen production stands to ant on fossil fuels? tasy and has yet to achieve any level The governor’s proposed “Hydro- perpetuate environmental injustice of commercial viability. Critically, that our communities are already however, the energy required to gen Hub Act” promotes hydrogen experiencing in the Greater Chaco capture carbon emissions and peras a clean energy solution. But 96 region, cause further air and wapercent of hydrogen production in manently store them underground the U.S. requires fossil fuels, and is itself astronomical. More energy ter pollution, and further damage burning hydrogen is worse for the means more fossil fuel burning, sacred landscapes and public lands environment than burning coal.

Hydrogen development will only exacerbate the climate crisis the state is facing, while distracting As scientists the world over warn that a fast move state agencies from investing in away from coal, oil, and gas consumption and meaningful climate solutions and renewable energy projects, like production is needed to avoid the worst impacts solar and wind. of the climate crisis, it is clear that New Mexico As leaders in an Indigenous organization whose members and cannot afford to slow down a transition from fossil communities would be directly fuels. Yet, the governor’s hydrogen development impacted by hydrogen development, we have taken a stand against plans would do just that. all false climate solutions in New

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perpetuating the cycle of climate destruction.

Second, and crucially, any renewables used to produce hydrogen are renewables that can’t be used to replace coal, oil, and gas-fired power.

This means that the governor’s hydrogen plan will not only promote more fracking across New Mexico’s already overburdened landscapes: it will actively stand in the way of the just energy transition that our state needs.

As scientists the world over warn that a fast move away from coal, oil, and gas consumption and production is needed to avoid the worst impacts of the climate crisis, it is clear that New Mexico cannot afford to slow down a transition from fossil fuels. Yet, the governor’s hydrogen development plans would do just that. This legislative session, we urge our leaders to stand up for our communities and future generations by saying NO to false climate solutions like hydrogen, so that we can build a just transition together.

Mario Atencio is a board member of Diné CARE, an all-Navajo environmental organization based on the Navajo homeland. It strives to educate and advocate for traditional teachings and promotes alternative uses of natural resources that are consistent with the Diné philosophy of Beauty Way. The views in this column are the author’s alone and do not reflect the views or opinions of New Mexico In Depth.

New Mexico In Depth • 2022 Legislative special edition

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Commentary

To create opportunities tomorrow, NM must embrace strengths today

N

children, and opportuew Mexico’s oil the growing energy needs of peoand natural gas nities to improve lives all ple worldwide requires leveraging industry is growover our state. the resources and capabilities we ing again, which is welThis fiscal and economic already have at our disposal. Couleadership goes hand in pled with advancements in techcomed news to lawmakhand with environmental nology and innovations, the future ers, communities, and all stewardship and protectpromises to usher in a new era of people across the land of By Leland Gould ever-cleaner energy for all of us. As ing our natural resources. enchantment.

New Mexico seeks opportunities to Climate change can and Through challenges and grow other sectors of the economy should be addressed, and changing times over the producers around the state are con- alongside oil and gas, we should past two years, our dedication to take advantage of our existing stantly working to ensure that the New Mexico has been unwavering resources, technical knowledge, and oil and natural gas produced here and we’re committed to doing our infrastructure to drive growth. is cleaner, safer, and more envipart to help New Mexico succeed.

Low-carbon hydrogen produced ronmentally sound than anywhere New Mexico’s oil and gas industry with natural gas, known as “blue is proud to be the foundation of the else in the world. As global energy hydrogen,” has emerged as a promdemand is projected to grow 50% state’s economy, providing thouby 2050, energy priorities must be ising and viable pathway to help sands of jobs across our state and focused on meeting these increasmeet energy needs across several supporting the budget and public sectors of the economy, from heat ing energy needs more efficiently schools with billions in revenue. and power generation to long-haul Teachers, students, first responders, with lower emissions and lower and passenger transportation. carbon. and many others depend on our Combined with carbon capture, Economic growth in oil and industry for critical resources to utilization, and storage, low carbon natural gas and cleaner energy are support learning, develop the next blue hydrogen can build on New generation of leaders, and keep our not mutually exclusive. Meeting communities healthy and safe.

Our state’s role as an energy producer and leader was underscored New Mexico is home to abundant energy resources, earlier this year by our ascension to the second-largest oil producer and the energy sector is poised to continue growing in the United States while remaining the eighth-largest producer of across the board well into the future and building natural gas. This growth is creating the economy of tomorrow requires leveraging our unprecedented opportunities for the state of New Mexico with a strengths today. Oil and natural gas have delivered record $5.3 billion in state and local for New Mexico for decades and will continue to revenue attributed to the industry last fiscal year, ensuring that do so as we transition to the lower-emissions and New Mexico will have resources to low carbon vision we all share. recover, investments to make in our

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Mexico’s vast natural gas resources while minimizing emissions.

In recent weeks, New Mexicans and lawmakers have been subjected to a tired, recycled barrage of distortion and misinformation about natural gas and its role in hydrogen production as the Legislature considers proposals to deliver low-carbon blue hydrogen. Unfortunately, this has little to do with facts and more to do with a thinly-veiled effort to undermine any future role of oil or natural gas whatsoever in our state’s economy. Regardless of this rhetoric, the fact is that the best opportunities for hydrogen’s longterm viability emphasize accessibility, affordability, and reliability provided by natural gas.

New Mexico is home to abundant energy resources, and the energy sector is poised to continue growing across the board well into the future and building the economy of tomorrow requires leveraging our strengths today. Oil and natural gas have delivered for New Mexico for decades and will continue to do so as we transition to the lower-emissions and low carbon vision we all share.

Leland Gould is president and CEO of the New Mexico Oil and Gas Association. The views in this column are the author’s alone and do not reflect the views or opinions of New Mexico In Depth.

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New Mexico In Depth • 2022 Legislative special edition

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