I am writing today to announce the closure of the New Mexico Independent. After three and a half years of operation in New Mexico, the board of the American Independent News Network, has decided to shift publication of its news…
While environmental activists played their part yesterday during demonstrations at the capitol building, going so far as to dress up as solar panels and to sing the tune of “You Are My Sunshine,” their counterparts, the anti-cap-and-trade contingency who has…
Roughly one quarter of University of New Mexico students are unimpressed with the state’s flagship public school, according to a survey that questioned college students about their higher education experiences.
There are those in Congress advocating for a federal economic stimulus bill that would help states pay for projects –- like, say, road construction or aid programs –- and also generate much-needed jobs during the economic downturn.
New Mexico’s top two executives –- Gov. Bill Richardson and Lt. Gov. Diane Denish -– shared some thoughts Thursday on what they’d like to see in a rescue bill for states.
“It shouldn’t be a handout,” Richardson said during a Thursday morning press conference in his cabinet room. “It should be targeted assistance in areas where the federal government has not responded in a positive way to states, like Medicaid, like transportation, like all kinds of infrastructure projects.”
Medicaid is the joint state-federal government health insurance program from low-income people.
New Mexico is suffering from a financial shortfall in its transportation projects. As a result, its roads have suffered.
But recently, state Transportation Secretary Rhonda Faught said New Mexico likely would get $150 million if federal money for roads and bridges in an economic stimulus bill equaled $18 billion. The state’s cut would be even larger if money earmarked for roads and bridges was more than $18 billion.
New Mexico’s transportation agency already has compiled a $1 billion priority list of projects for the American Association of State Highway and Transportation Officials, which advocates on the behalf of states before Congress. And it is now beginning to prioritize projects based on what the Land of Enchantment might receive if such legislation became a reality.
Denish said what she’d like to see is assistance that keeps “New Mexicans working.”
She hoped whatever federal aid came New Mexico’s way would make it “where we don’t have to cut critical services to the people who need the most.”
“As an incoming governor I will be talking very much to the commerce secretary and other governors about what kind of packages are going to be important to a state like New Mexico,” Denish said.
