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.
Gov. Bill Richardson reiterated Tuesday that he isn’t interested in scaling back his 2003 state income tax cuts or the state tax incentive program for films that his administration vigorously defended over the years.
But the state’s looming budget gap has the state’s chief executive indicating that he’s open to looking at closing some tax credits and tax incentives.
“We need to take a look at them, to look to see if some may have outlived their usefulness,” Richardson said in a brief interview with the Independent.
Richardson didn’t specifically name any tax credits or incentives that he’d be open to closing. But he and legislative leaders have agreed to a special legislative session in October to help close what has been estimated as a more than $400 million budget shortfall for this fiscal year, which ends next June 30.
Overall, the state’s revenues likely will drop by $700 million over two years from previous projections, enough to wipe out the state’s cash reserves.
That kind of fiscal hole has a way of focusing people’s attention, and already there’s a give and take between those who are advocating a strategy of closing the shortfall by trimming costs and those who say the state should focus on the tax side of the equation.
Richardson said Tuesday that while nothing is set in stone he is leery of changing his 2003 income tax cuts or the film tax incentives. He also said he did not want to cut education.
Richardson said he had named his budget chief, Katherine Miller, state Taxation and Revenue Department Secretary Rick Homans and Paul Ritzma from his staff as his negotiating team. Richardson said he’d get involved in the negotiations, too.
“The Legislature will name its group. We’ll start meeting right away,” Richardson said..
