The chart below is directly from the Voices for Children website. New Mexico’s overall performance has been remarkably consistent over the past decade with NM bouncing from an overall ranking of 49th and 50th. In 2020 New Mexico remained stuck at 50th and in 2021 “rallied” to 49th. 

Here’s the thing. In 2019 during the last year of the Martinez Administration James Jimenez of Voices said, “Fundamentally, the story the data tells is there was a real failure by the Martinez administration to invest in youth, children and families in a way that made much of a difference in terms of these kinds of rankings.”

In 2021 as the State moved up a single spot (but with Gov. Lujan Grisham in charge), Emily Wildau of Voices wrote, “Pre-pandemic improvement in child well-being a glimpse at what investments can do.”

Clearly, New Mexico’s actual performance on Kids Count is quite poor (and the Gov.’s pandemic policies will likely have significant negative impacts on our children). That transcends who is in the Governor’s office. As the Rio Grande Foundation has noted the Legislature is the body that actually makes the laws. Perhaps more attention should be focused on THEM when New Mexico’s poor results are considered.

In a recent post at Errors of Enchantment Paul notes that several data and recent polling highlight and explain New Mexico’s poor governance.

NM is among states w/ largest outflow from gov’t schools/to home school. Other states are racing ahead on school reform which NM generally stands pat.

SCOTUS rules on donor privacy. 

Can ABQ be a job leader?

NM/federal stimulus funding both sides of the jobs equation.

Donald Rumsfeld was a statesman with a wide and varied career and he was a supporter of the Foundation. Paul acknowledges his passing in Taos, NM.

Paul interviews Doug Messier of the blog Parabolic Arc (which tracks the private space industry) about Richard Branson’s plans to head to “space” out of Spaceport New Mexico on July 11th.

It is well-known that a Republican governed states have by and large canceled the $300 “bonus” unemployment benefit being offered by the Biden Administration. Better still for those states, data shows that they are seeing workers return faster than those “blue” states like New Mexico which have kept the $300 payments in place and thus are incentivizing workers to stay home.

Now, Gov. Lujan Grisham has announced a NEW program using federal “stimulus” funds to incentivize people (to the tune of $1,000) to get back into the workforce. It’s a classic example of inherently conflicting policies, both of which are being funded by your taxes and/or debt.

It all reminds me of my reading of the New Deal. Historian and prior RGF speaker Amity Shlaes has pointed out in her writing how FDR’s (often conflicting) policies prolonged the Great Depression.  

The Rio Grande Foundation takes donor privacy VERY seriously. We fought tooth and nail against Secretary of State Maggie Toulouse Oliver’s push to publicize donations to 501c3 organizations like RGF open to the public. We also litigated against the City of Santa Fe over donor privacy issues regarding work we did to defeat the soda tax a few years ago.

And, we filed an ‘amicus’ or friend of the court brief in support of donor privacy(read it here) in the Americans for Prosperity v. California case just decided by the Supreme Court. The 6-3 decision strikes a blow for privacy and free speech for the Rio Grande Foundation, our supporters, and millions of Americans.

The following chart recently ran in the Albuquerque Journal. Click to read the article. The article detailed Albuquerque Economic Development (AED)’s latest plans to improve the local economy. At the Rio Grande Foundation, we have been at it for 15 years and say with experience that New Mexico’s political leadership and that of many in the State (elected and unelected) towards economic growth are going to be serious obstacles.

Here’s our “hot takes.”:

1. Locally, crime MUST be addressed head-on. This is primarily the job of the Mayor. The current Mayor is failing.
2. Albuquerque (like the rest of the State) needs a Legislature that is willing to embrace a pro-business, pro-economic freedom mindset. We can’t wait for the next check from Washington. Until change happens in Santa Fe, there is not much the City or AED can do (outside of reducing crime) to change the City’s trajectory.
3. The group is definitely right to focus on education reform and the Rio Grande Foundation has done this recently. But, more money isn’t the solution. And, again, Santa Fe MUST be part of the solution.

On this week’s episode, Paul discusses Mississippi’s recent educational successes with Dr. Jameson Taylor of the Mississippi Center for Public Policy, a free-market think tank based there.

Mississippi and New Mexico so often struggle at the very bottom of the “good” lists and rise to the top of the bad lists, but as Paul noted recently, Mississippi has seen some recent improvements in the area of 4th grade reading on the “gold standard” NAEP test.

So, what did Mississippi do to improve educational outcomes? Ironically, for many New Mexicans, this will be a case of “Back to the Future” as Mississippi’s playbook looks a lot like that of former Gov. Susana Martinez.   

You don’t want to miss this conversation!

We at the Rio Grande Foundation are saddened to learn of the passing of American statesman Donald Rumsfeld. On June 30, 2021, we lost a dedicated patriot. He was surrounded by family in his beloved Taos, New Mexico.

We are deeply saddened by his loss. A lifelong patriotic American statesman and our fellow New Mexican, Mr. Rumsfeld embodied the characteristics of liberty that we live by every day. He was an avid supporter of the Foundation and our friend.

Said Rio Grande Foundation President Paul Gessing. “We mourn his loss but let us also celebrate his many gifts and continue to build on them. We will continue his mission for freedom so that every person has the best chance to thrive in life.”

He will be missed.

According to a report from McKinsey & Company between school closures and reduced instructional time, the average U.S. child has lost the equivalent of five to nine months of learning during the pandemic. New Mexico students have lost more than most.

With government school systems in SO MANY states failing their students over the past year, legislatures and other elected officials are rushing to offer choices and opportunities to students in their jurisdictions.

You can see a full list from EdChoice here. Jason Bedrick of EdChoice writes, “In total, 14 states have enacted 18 new or expanded educational choice policies so far this year. In addition to the above, we are expecting further new or expanded choice policies in at least six states.” You can see which states are enacting reforms below.

Unfortunately, New Mexico’s union-beholden political leadership has NOT enacted any reforms.

Some of the most exciting reforms are in the following five states which have enacted brand new education choice programs:

• Arkansas (SB 680): New tax-credit scholarship for students from low-income families (up to 200 percent of the federal poverty line) who are switching out of public school or entering kindergarten or first grade.
• Indiana (HEA 1001): New ESA for students with special needs from families earning up to 555 percent of the federal poverty line.
• Kentucky (HB 563): New tax-credit ESA for students from low- and middle-income families (up to about 324 percent of the federal poverty line).
• Missouri (HB 349): New tax-credit ESA for students from low- and middle-income families (up to about 370 percent of the federal poverty line) who are switching out of public school or entering kindergarten or first grade. (Note: this bill passed both legislative chambers but is still pending the governor’s signature.)
• West Virginia (HB 2013): New ESA for all students switching out of public school or entering kindergarten or first grade.

On this week’s podcast conversation, Paul and Wally discuss reports that the government schools saw a big drop in enrollment due to homeschooling during the pandemic. 

The annual KIDS COUNT report from Annie E. Casey/Voices for Children has been released. NM goes from 50th to 49th. MLG is happy about this but this is 2019 data. We’ll truly see the impact of COVID 19 (possibly) next year.

It was a big week for NM’s subsidized film industry as new taxpayer-funded facilities NBC Universal in Albuquerque AND Totah Theater in Farmington opened. The theater, which was acquired by San Juan County last year and underwent a $1 million renovation over the past several months. The facility will be used for film screenings and live entertainment events, but its upper floors will be available to film and TV industry representatives to rent for office space.

At the NBC Universal grand opening, fully vaccinated Gov. MLG wore a mask outdoors. At a Mora County Democrat fundraising event (posted on her Twitter account) the Gov. was the ONLY one wearing a mask at yet another outdoor event.

Paul notes that criticizing the vaccinated Gov. for wearing a mask at public events REALLY drives the Twitter liberals crazy. He suggests following both his personal and the RGF Twitter accounts.

NM’s awful unemployment rate is the 2nd-highest in the country.

Paul and Wally discuss Santa Fe’s fake “Universal Basic Income” experiment.

NM’s Department of Information Technology doesn’t have a record retention policy.

US Census data offer clues on redistricting.

Bank of America forecasts $100/barrel oil during 2022. 

This post will be somewhat different insofar as it connects various data points, including polling data, to make conclusions about the challenges facing New Mexico:

1. According to Wallethub New Mexico is the “worst state to live in” in the entire country. Disagree with their metrics if you will (we think they are reasonable), but notably the liberal “Voices for Children’s” annual Kids Count report arrives at a similar conclusion as do many other national reports which more closely align with Rio Grande Foundation’s outlook.
2. According to a poll from KOB TV Channel 4, 49% of New Mexican’s believe that Gov. MLG’s COVID policies were “just right” and another 16% said the restrictions were “too lenient.” RGF recently addressed the Gov.’s COVID response.
3. COVID responses have been highly partisan as a separate national poll finds that 57% of Republicans and just 4% of Democrats “believe the pandemic is over.”
4. New Mexico has the 2nd-highest unemployment rate in the nation and Gov. MLG has stated that she will NOT turn down Biden’s $300 “supplemental” unemployment payments. A new report shows that states that HAVE foregone those benefits have seen faster declines in unemployment than those that have kept them. Notably, as the unemployment data show, those states with Republican governors already had lower unemployment rates than New Mexico and other Democrat-governed states.

It would seem (not shocking to many) that New Mexico’s fundamental problem is that it’s elected leaders make bad policy decisions and that voters’ ignorance only reinforces those views. Wallethub’s map is below:

Recent reports have noted that New Mexico’s already-falling government school student population fell even more quickly thanks to the uptick in home schooling during the pandemic. The author’s own family chose this option and were clearly not alone.

As the map below shows, New Mexico is among the states with the largest outflow of students from government schools. You can read the full article from The 74 here This isn’t surprising given New Mexico’s relative large loss of classroom learning, but the uptick in home-schooling doesn’t necessarily correlate with most locked down states. It IS certainly noteworthy that some of the least locked down states like South Dakota and Utah saw the least uptick in home schooling.

Of course, Albuquerque Public Schools is concerned about losing as much as $53 million because of the decline in enrollment. What is left unsaid is that even as enrollment declines, already high APS’s per-pupil spending figure will likely skyrocket in the next few years.

This article appeared in the Las Cruces Sun-News on June 27, 2021. With COVID and the Gov.’s COVID policies at last receding, the race is on to determine how effective or ineffective our Gov.’s lockdown policies really were. Our analysis is below:

This was a “big” week for New Mexico’s heavily subsidized (money-losing, see image from LFC at bottom of post) film industry. The industry which already receives up to 35% of its costs for doing business saw the opening of the new (also heavily-subsidized studio) NBC/Universal studio.

The facility will receive $10.7 million in LEDA subsidies from state and local governments in addition to benefiting from State subsidies.

As if that weren’t enough, in Farmington the ribbon was cut on the refurbished Totah Theater. Previously privately owned, the historic facility was purchased by San Juan County and has received state grants in order to become a “place for productions, screenings and have dedicated office space for production companies to work out of.” The facility is eligible to receive New Mexico’s “most generous” film subsidy rate of 35%.

Naturally, Gov. Lujan Grisham crowed about the film industry having “its biggest year ever” Of course, if film were such a boon for our State it wouldn’t be raising red flags at the LFC over the cost of subsidies and perhaps New Mexico’s unemployment rate wouldn’t be 2nd-highest in the US.

Big news: despite the pandemic, New Mexico’s film and television industry had its biggest year EVER.

We’ve made New Mexico the place to be for film and TV – and we’re not done yet.https://t.co/DBDdY16xyd

— Michelle Lujan Grisham (@GovMLG) June 25, 2021

Dangerous oversight or intentionally vague?

The open government rabbit hole is getting pretty deep.

By their own admission, the New Mexico Department of Information Technology (DoIT) does not maintain a records retention policy separate from the “regulations”  provided in the New Mexico Administrative Code (NMAC).

NMAC vaguely addresses broad terms like “transitory” and “non-record” but does not specify any length of time that records ought to be accessible.

As an example, hospitals are legally obligated to maintain specific policies that explicitly identify the relative importance of certain documents, the corresponding periods of time that those documents have to exist, and the process by which the documents are disposed of after the time of the retention period has elapsed. And HIPAA is pretty clear that there are fines associated with improperly retained documents.

Without good policies in place, employees are left without direction and chaos ensues. Well, Michelle Lujan Grisham’s administration has cried havoc and let slip the dogs of perplexity.

In an official Inspection of Public Records Act (IPRA) request to DoIT, I specifically sent a copy of the Document Retention Guidance currently being disseminated by the legal department of Governor Michelle Lujan Grisham’s administration. I asked if DoIT has their own policy related to document retention. They provided the link to the NMAC section that addresses records management requirements for electronic messaging.

When asked specifically for the policy that dictates the retention of records, they responded that “DoIT does not currently have a records retention policy”.

A behavioral pattern is developing. Over a dozen state agencies are using Microsoft Teams and those same agencies employ the executive branch policy of automatic deletion after a peculiarly and exceptionally short retention period, previously reported as 24 hours.

The absence of an official retention policy maintained by DoIT contradicted by the existence of legal guidance that “You may delete any text message that is a routine communication and is not ‘required to control, support or to document the operations of government’” is antithetical to the principles of open government. When in doubt, it seems that New Mexico agencies err on the side of deletion rather than retention.

If this sounds confusing, that’s because it is. But with actions like this, it is becoming increasingly clear that New Mexico government is obfuscating the obvious and trivializing the importance of open and transparent government.

According to the Albuquerque Journal, The City of Santa Fe is among about 25 U.S. cities that will be experimenting with universal basic income as part of a pilot program funded through the Mayors for a Guaranteed Income project.

The concept of a “Universal Basic Income” (UBI) that replaces traditional, top-down welfare programs with a government-provided “basic income” has been around for decades and even received support from free market adherents like Milton Friedman and Charles Murray.

Of course, while there are “UBI” supporters on the political right, the idea is to REPLACE other government welfare programs with a “basic” income. Santa Fe’s plan fails right away on that point. In fact, the COVID pandemic has been a bit of an experiment with “real world” UBI. As millions of Americans lost work, government stepped in with “stimuli” and supplemental unemployment payments that have gotten many people used to the idea of government cutting you a check regardless of whether you work or not.

A second big flaw in this “experiment” is that the money will come from voluntary sources, not taxpayers. Funding will come from Twitter co-founder Jack Dorsey, a group called Mayors for a Guaranteed Income project, and the Santa Fe Community Foundation. Having “free” money pay for a new welfare program may SEEM like what the government is doing now, but we are seeing the cost via inflation. Donor-driven UBI as in Santa Fe is just a nice gesture by donors.

Finally, the third major inherent issue is that the money is being targeted to help 100 people under age 30 who have children and are attending Santa Fe Community College.

Targeting certain groups to receive $400-$500 a month is a nice idea, but it’s obviously NOT “universal.”

The problem with UBI is that when it gets through the political process, it will not resemble the theory supported by Friedman and Murray. Among other problems will wind up supplementing, not a replacing other welfare programs.

The new unemployment figures are out and states (like New Mexico) with Democratic Governors dominate the list of worst unemployment rates (state with Republican governors dominate the lowest unemployment states).

This is no surprise to us at the Rio Grande Foundation has Gov. Lujan Grisham has enacted economic policies with little concern to actual economic growth. You can find the May data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics here. We have presented the data in different ways below.

Notably, in December of 2018, the month before Lujan Grisham took office, New Mexico’s unemployment rate was 4.7%. Utah’s was higher than it is now (3.2%). New Mexico’s unemployment rate has jumped by 70% under MLG.

The Albuquerque Journal’s John Trever, of course, had it right from the beginning in this 2020 cartoon.

Despite Gov. MLG having claimed that “New Mexico will be totally open July 1” the reality is that New Mexico remains one of the strictest states in the nation in terms forcing masks on children. Predictably, as it stands now, when kids go back to school in early August they will be forced to wear masks (as will students in other “blue” states).

The following data are from Burbio which has done invaluable work tracking various COVID-related rules. Not surprisingly, all of New Mexico’s neighbors DO NOT have mask mandates while a majority actually ban locally-imposed mandates. With the Biden Administration pushing 12 year olds to be “vaccine ambassadors” to their fellow 12 year olds, there seems to be little question that the Gov. will keep masking our kids until she is told not to by the Biden Administration or CDC (despite the absurdly-low virus death rate among healthy children).

NM didn’t quite get to its 60% vaccination rate, but the Gov. says NM will be “totally reopened” on July 1. This is welcome news, but it’s also not really true (not for our children, yet).

Now that COVID IS receding as an issue, the debate will be over Gov. MLG’s performance during the pandemic. Paul cites a national report to show why he believes she did a poor job.

Speaking of COVID performance, NM’s Education Secretary Stewart recently took a “victory lap” on COVID 19. Again, the data don’t seem to back him up. 

The Biden Administration wants your kids (as young as 12) to push their friends and families to take the vaccine. 

One of the largest and most prominent hotels in New Mexico is totally shuttered. 

Did a federal judge just unleash a new era of energy-driven prosperity in New Mexico?

While the State of New Mexico and its citizens may benefit from oil and gas jobs, MLG wants to impose ethanol and other supposedly “green” fuels on drivers during the next legislative session.

The Kids Count Report co-released by the Annie E. Casey Foundation and Voices for Children has at least partially been released (we had trouble accessing the full report). The Albuquerque Journal had a story and the most relevant chart (below). New Mexico has moved up slightly to 49th overall from 50th in the previous report. Of course, Gov. Lujan Grisham proclaimed this a “success.”

As we’ve stated in the past, the report itself is reasonably sound, but as with most such reports, but interpretations vary based on the political inclinations of those looking at the data. It is no surprise that the Gov. and Voices embraced even a tiny uptick. And, with the COVID 19 pandemic looming in next year’s data and New Mexico students suffering massive educational losses, it will be interesting to see what happens with the report itself and especially New Mexico’s results.

Recently, RGF’s president was walking downtown and noticed the Hyatt Hotel downtown was completely closed to the public. Physical entry to the property was impossible and his phone calls were not returned.

Ultimately, it came to light thanks to an Albuquerque Journal article that the hotel was closed due to a lack of convention business AND that the City of Albuquerque had filed tax liens against several properties for lack of payment of lodgers taxes. The Rio Grande Foundation has expressed concerns in the recent past about lodgers taxes and agrees that reform is needed, BUT if the business is collecting the tax from its customers, they should be remitted.

Check out the story here and by clicking the image below:

It has been hot and mostly dry throughout New Mexico this June. After a pleasant and relatively cool (at least in Albuquerque) Memorial Day weekend, the heat has been on and the rain has been scarce. This is a longer-term (and more complex) issue for Elephant Butte Lake and agricultural users, but you can bet that environmentalists and many New Mexico policymakers will push for even faster government-driven efforts to address “global warming.”

But, as noted in several media articles including this one from the BBC, China’s CO2 emissions now exceed ALL other developed nations combined.

And, while the US has continued to reduce CO2 emissions, especially in the pandemic year of 2020, China continues to move in the opposite direction. Point being that the US (and certainly not New Mexico) can and should move to be more efficient (including the adoption of nuclear energy), but cannot reduce CO2 emissions without dramatic action by China.

Of course, most supposedly “green” politicians here in New Mexico would rather enact destructive economic policies here at home than push China to reduce CO2 emissions.

We at the Rio Grande Foundation try to stay on top of the numerous economic changes and issues taking place around both the Albuquerque metro and the State. Recently, on a walk through downtown Albuquerque, the Foundation’s president noticed that the Hyatt Hotel downtown was closed. No bellhop out front, no one at the reservations desks, no lights on, and the doors are closed. Check here for yourself. 

We also called them and attempted to contact Heritage Hotels which apparently manages the property now.

With downtown Albuquerque struggling mightily STILL post- COVID and post-riots, the future of this hotel is of great interest.

UPDATE: Per the Albuquerque Journal, the Hyatt downtown is one of several hotels that has a lien against it from the City of Albuquerque. It has been shut down due to the lack of convention traffic in downtown Albuquerque.

We have often disagreed with New Mexico’s “powers that be” regarding their handling of COVID, but this recent opinion piece by Education Secretary Ryan Stewart is particularly shocking.

The gist of the piece involves Stewart celebrating his Department’s “accomplishments” during the era of COVID 19. Whether it means “keeping people safe” or training staff in COVID-safe practices, Stewart’s article is basically one big pat on his own back.

Of course, New Mexico students lost more classroom time than students in all but 5 other states due to policies imposed by Gov. MLG and his Department. He doesn’t even mention educational outcomes or results, partially because the Administration has eliminated most testing.

Remember, according to the “progressive” New Mexico Voices for Children, New Mexico ranked 50th on education BEFORE the pandemic.