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The Roundhouse in Santa Fe Thursday March 17, 2011. (Eddie Moore/Albuquerque Journal)
Here is a summary of some of the legislation that passed or failed during the 60-day session of the New Mexico Legislature. Gov. Susana Martinez has until April 5 to sign or veto bills passed during the final three days of the session, which ended Saturday.
Budget/Finances
Passed: $5.9 billion budget for 2013-14 that hikes spending 4.4 percent and includes a 1 percent pay raise for state workers and teachers and 4 percent for some law enforcement officers; public works and infrastructure projects totaling $274 million for all 33 counties, largely funded by severance tax bonds.
Failed: Change in investment rules for Land Grant Permanent Fund to lift cap on international investments; making permanent the current 5.5 percent Land Grant Permanent Fund distribution rate.
Confirmations
Passed: Senate confirmation of recently appointed members of the governor’s Cabinet: Retta Ward, Department of Health; Gino Rinaldi, Aging and Long-Term Services Department.
Failed: Senate never took up confirmation of Public Education Secretary-designate Hanna Skandera – despite two long Senate Rules Committee hearings – or confirmation of Transportation Commission Chairman Pete Rahn.
Crime
Passed: Amber Alerts for child abductions by relatives; requirement for real-time tracking to stop overbuying of pseudoephedrine; Silver Alert for endangered missing people 50 or older; advocacy services and legal remedies for victims of human trafficking; commission to review criminal justice system in Bernalillo County; protective vests for police dogs; background check requirement when state places children with relatives; criminal record expungement.
Failed: Reduced penalties for possessing less than 8 ounces of marijuana; removal of statute of limitations for prosecuting second-degree murder and some other felonies; prohibition against DWI interlock users buying alcohol; tougher penalties for repeat DWI; prohibition on texting while driving; new crime of homicide by boat; increased penalties for some copper wire thefts; stronger penalties for animal cruelty.
In this Oct. 17, 2011 file photo, guests stand outside the new Spaceport America hangar in Upham, N.M. With Spaceport nearly complete but still mostly empty, Branson and Virgin Galactic has hinted it may take its spacecraft and launch elsewhere. (AP Photo/Matt York, File)
Education
Passed: Public Education Commission as an independent entity authorized to review charter school appeals; lottery scholarship fund bolstered with one-year, $10 million fix from Tobacco Settlement Permanent Fund; teachers in low-income, poorly performing public schools eligible for educational loan payment program; expanded eligibility for K-3 Plus program; provision of school leave for teen parents.
Failed: Increased payouts from Land Grant Permanent Fund for early childhood programs; governor’s proposal to expand intervention for struggling readers and hold back third-graders who can’t read proficiently; proposals to shore up lottery scholarship fund by changing eligibility requirements or payouts; restructuring of UNM, NMSU boards of regents; change in the way regents are appointed.
Elections
Passed: A fix to the matching-funds provision of the public financing law to conform with a U.S. Supreme Court decision; constitutional amendment to allow school elections to be held in conjunction with other nonpartisan elections; campaign finance reporting requirements for some school district elections; campaign account holders allowed to conduct electronic transactions.
Failed: Photo identification requirement for voters; stronger penalties for fraudulent voting; reporting requirements for independent expenditure committees; doubling of contribution limits for four-year offices; some 17-year-olds to vote in primaries; straight party voting on ballots.
Employment
Passed: Raise in the minimum wage from $7.50 to $8.50 except for employers with fewer than 11 workers; prohibition for most employers from asking prospective employees for passwords to their social networking accounts; restrictions on when employer can take into consideration prospective employee’s credit history; workers allowed to sue in state court for pay discrimination based on gender; requirement that courts prioritize civil actions to collect unpaid or underpaid wages; formula change for calculating what employers pay into unemployment fund.
Failed: Minimum wage increase for tipped employees; bar on unemployment benefits for drug users.
Ethics
Passed: Registration and disclosure requirements for prospective contractors with state or local governments and ban on certain contributions during the procurement process; campaign reporting requirements for large school districts; 72-hour notice for public meetings.
Failed: Prohibition on double per diem payments for legislators; increased penalties for certain public corruption offenses; creation of state ethics commission.
Government
Passed: Qualifications for members of the Public Regulation Commission; removal of insurance superintendent from PRC to an independent office; shift of corporations unit from PRC to secretary of state; establishment of independent Public Defender Department; change in membership of State Investment Council; increased qualifications for New Mexico Finance Authority board; legislative rule change to limit the public release of records such as lawmaker emails under the Inspection of Public Records Act.Failed: Expanded ability of local governments to ban aerial fireworks during drought; creation of commission to do redistricting, instead of Legislature.
Guns
Failed: Requirement for background checks for private sales at gun shows and required reporting of mental health information; ban on assault weapons; prohibition on enforcement of federal gun laws.
Health
Passed: Creation of a health insurance exchange, an online shopping mart for health insurance plans under the federal Affordable Care Act, overseen by a 13-member board; a five-year Department of Health pilot project for “Community Engagement Teams” to link the mentally ill with services; coverage for autism services for children of public employees.
Immigration
Failed: Proposal to revoke driver’s licenses held by illegal immigrants; proposals to stop issuing driver’s licenses to illegal immigrants; governor-backed proposal for a two-tier system that would have precluded most illegal immigrants from being licensed; two-tier system that would have allowed for continued driving privileges for illegal immigrants.
Pensions
Passed: Shored-up retirement system for more than 86,000 government employees and retirees covered by the Public Employees Retirement System, including trimming benefits, enacting stricter retirement eligibility for future hires and increasing employee and employer contributions. A solvency fix for the retirement system for more than 97,000 educators and retirees, with increased contributions from employees and a new minimum retirement age of 55 and deferred cost-of-living adjustments for future hires. A solvency fix for the judicial retirement system, adjusting cost-of living-increases, employer and employee contribution rates, and benefits.
Failed: Change in method of calculating retirement benefits for government retirees.
Spaceport
Passed: Limitation on the liability of spacecraft manufacturers and suppliers, considered key to the development of a commercial space travel industry at Spaceport America in southern New Mexico, where Virgin Galactic is the tenant.
Taxes
Passed: Tax package with several components, including expansion of film tax credit for TV series, reductions in corporate income tax from 7.6 percent to 5.9 percent over five years, tighter rein on existing tax breaks, phaseout of certain payments to cities and counties, phase-in for manufacturers to base their taxes entirely on New Mexico sales, and change in the way out-of-state companies file corporate taxes.
Failed: Counties allowed to impose local liquor tax; fix to “tax lightning” problem of unequal taxation of residential property; tax credit for racetracks for live race days.
Miscellaneous
Passed: Liquor sales at 11 a.m. Sunday in bars and restaurants; change in traffic citation process so all citations go to courts; creation of a racehorse testing fund to finance drug testing of racehorses at laboratories that meet national standards; creation of a horse shelter rescue fund.
Failed: Ban on breed-specific legislation; prohibition on coyote-killing contests.
More on the 2013 Legislative session
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