HOUSE JOINT MEMORIAL 39

49th legislature - STATE OF NEW MEXICO - second session, 2010

INTRODUCED BY

Eleanor Chavez

A JOINT MEMORIAL

REQUESTING THE PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES AND THE UNITED STATES CONGRESS TO ENACT A NEW, BROAD-BASED JOB CREATION PLAN, INCLUDING SIGNIFICANT ADDITIONAL FISCAL RELIEF TO STATES AND LOCAL GOVERNMENTS TO FOSTER ECONOMIC GROWTH AND CREATE AND MAINTAIN JOBS ACROSS THE NATION.

     WHEREAS, New Mexico lost twenty-five thousand four hundred jobs in 2009; and

     WHEREAS, in late 2009, the unemployment rate in New Mexico reached a twenty-one-year high, with seventy-two thousand six hundred fifty people out of work, an increase of over three percent from the previous year; and

     WHEREAS, New Mexico has the second-highest uninsured rate in the nation at twenty-three percent; and

     WHEREAS, approximately twenty-eight thousand three hundred New Mexicans lost health insurance in 2009 due to the rise in unemployment; and

     WHEREAS, currently there are approximately nine thousand homeless children in New Mexico, and the number of homeless people in New Mexico is growing; and

     WHEREAS, the safety net of services for New Mexico's most vulnerable citizens who are hungry, homeless, ill or at-risk is imperiled by funding cuts and a reduced charitable-giving base; and

     WHEREAS, New Mexico is facing a one-hundred-fifty- million-dollar ($150,000,000) budget gap before being able to maintain a five percent reserve at the midpoint of fiscal year 2010; and

     WHEREAS, a two-hundred-million-dollar ($200,000,000) deficit is projected for New Mexico in fiscal year 2011; and

     WHEREAS, New Mexico's revenues dropped twenty percent from 2008 to 2010; and

     WHEREAS, since the 2009 special legislative session, nearly five hundred million dollars ($500,000,000) has already been cut from New Mexico's budget; and

     WHEREAS, further budget cuts will only deter consumer demand, discourage private industry activity, lead to higher unemployment and hamper overall economic growth; and

     WHEREAS, New Mexico miners, construction workers, retailers and many other workers across the state face the dire prospect of job loss during a time of economic uncertainty; and

     WHEREAS, New Mexico families will have to deal with the following effects of budget cuts: larger class sizes, an inferior educational system, reduced health care and safety services and generally diminished quality of vital public programs;

     NOW, THEREFORE, BE IT RESOLVED BY THE LEGISLATURE OF THE STATE OF NEW MEXICO that the president of the United States and the United States congress be requested to take proactive steps to create jobs and enact fiscal relief for state and local governments to foster growth, avoid further budget catastrophe, ensure that states perform the core functions that all American families deserve and deliver jobs to Americans on main street; and

     BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED that any job creation and state fiscal relief plan include extending the federal medical assistance payments or "federal match" increases for medicaid, provide additional support for education, boost funding for infrastructure projects and public transportation investments, support the long-term unemployed to sustain them until they reenter the workforce and provide direct financial assistance to state and local governments so that they may provide the vital services needed to maintain growth in local communities across the nation; and

     BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED that copies of this memorial be transmitted to the president of the United States, the president pro tempore of the United States senate, the speaker of the United States house of representatives and the members of the New Mexico congressional delegation.

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