May 21, 1999

SENATE EXECUTIVE MESSAGE NO. 7

The Honorable Manny M. Aragon and

Members of the Senate

Executive-Legislative Building

Santa Fe, New Mexico 87503

Honorable President and Members of the Senate:

I have this day VETOED and am returning SENATE BILL 18, as amended, without emergency clause, enacted by the Forty-Fourth Legislature, First Special Session, 1999.

A similar version of this legislation was vetoed during the regular legislative session. This legislation would have transferred the State Parks Division from the Energy, Minerals and Natural Resources Department to the Tourism Department. This would have been an ill-advised reorganization serving no consolidation purposes, achieving no efficiencies and working at odds with the core missions of the two agencies. The Tourism Department is a relatively small department that does not have the administrative capability to effectively support the Parks Division. Furthermore, under the jurisdiction of the EMNRD our state park infrastructure, staffing and management are the best they have been in over a decade. EMNRD is the proper home for our state parks.

Sincerely,

Gary E. Johnson

Governor