SENATE JOINT MEMORIAL 2

56th legislature - STATE OF NEW MEXICO - first session, 2023

INTRODUCED BY

George K. Muñoz

 

 

 

 

 

A JOINT MEMORIAL

REQUESTING THE LEGISLATIVE, EXECUTIVE AND JUDICIAL BRANCHES OF THE STATE TO CONVENE A JOINT TASK FORCE TO STUDY EMPLOYEE CLASSIFICATION AND COMPENSATION SYSTEMS AND BENEFITS PRACTICES ACROSS ALL BRANCHES OF STATE GOVERNMENT.

 

     WHEREAS, the ability of the state to hire and retain a stable, quality workforce is key to ensuring that government can deliver services and benefits that keep New Mexicans safe, healthy and able to thrive; and

     WHEREAS, cumbersome processes and uneven pay raises have exacerbated personnel struggles across the three branches of state government and have resulted in an alarming lack of parity between and within the branches; and

     WHEREAS, the state is now competing to fill vacancies from a shrinking labor pool; and

     WHEREAS, the three branches of government would benefit from competitive pay structures, longevity pay for employee retention and a reduction of the employee probationary period; and

     WHEREAS, cost-of-living adjustments and improved working conditions, including annual and sick leave, health and safety and work-life balance considerations, are critical to employee retention; and

     WHEREAS, the state government should develop a more equitable way to distribute future legislated pay increases based on merit and filling critical, hard-to-staff positions; and

     WHEREAS, agencies across the state government should use national and evidence-based benchmarks to determine staffing levels as the basis of full-time-equivalent budget requests as opposed to only relying on vacancies; and

     WHEREAS, the legislative, executive and judicial branches should consider following best practices set by the government finance officers association and using the United States bureau of labor statistics' employment cost index to build cost-of-labor increases into salary budget requests; and

     WHEREAS, pay bands should be reworked into wider widths to ensure the equitable potential for in-pay-band increases and ensure that the pay bands include employees with salaries currently above their authorized pay bands; and

     WHEREAS, job classifications have resulted in an inflated system of more than one thousand two hundred different positions that are inflexible to the needs of government; and

     WHEREAS, the branches should develop an action plan for reviewing all classifications annually in accordance with guidelines from the society for human resource management, deauthorize unused classifications and adjust pay bands where necessary to eliminate the use of alternative pay bands; and

     WHEREAS, human resources transaction times have caused delays in hiring and resulted in unnecessary bureaucracy across the three branches; and

     WHEREAS, mandatory systemwide teleworking policies have a direct impact on state employee recruitment and retention and should be marketed as a benefit when and where appropriate;

     NOW, THEREFORE, BE IT RESOLVED BY THE LEGISLATURE OF THE STATE OF NEW MEXICO that the legislative council service be requested to commission a governmentwide study of employee classification and compensation systems and benefits practices across all branches of state government; and

     BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED that the legislative council service be requested to appoint a joint task force to include representatives from all three branches of government that will support and monitor the progress of the governmentwide study; and

     BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED that the task force shall report its findings and recommendations to the legislative, executive and judicial branches by December 1, 2024, including a mechanism requiring the regular updating of the classification and compensation system; and

     BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED that the legislative, executive and judicial branches commit to act on the recommendations of the joint task force; and

     BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED that copies of this memorial be transmitted to the director of the legislative council service, the governor, the chief justice of the supreme court, the director of the state personnel office, the secretary of general services, the executive director of the public employees retirement association, the attorney general, the director of the administrative office of the courts and the director of the administrative office of the district attorneys.

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