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.
The state Health Department and Department of Finance and Administration (DFA) have agreed to jointly administer the Health Policy Commission (HPC), according to a memorandum of understanding released by the Health Department.
The Commission was the only independent source of health policy data and analysis for state legislators.
The Health Department, an Executive Branch agency, will now house the Commission and help provide the Commission’s “administrative, human resources and fiscal activities,” the memo states.
“I don’t think legislators and the public realize what this means in terms of having an independent group do work for them,” said Santa Fe County Commissioner and former Health Policy Commission Director Liz Stefanics. “Some of the work for legislators was one-on-one and helped them develop legislation. I think that’s going to be a loss.”
During the 2009 Regular Session, legislators passed HB 613, which would have allowed the Commission to seek independent funding from federal and private grants.
But Gov. Bill Richardson pocket vetoed the bill.
State senators on the Budget Committee then delivered the coup de grace, slashing the Commission’s budget in the subsequent 2009 special session from $811,000 to $155,600 for the coming fiscal year, which begins July 1.
The new budget will allow for a Commission staff of only two, down from 14, and will curtail the Commission’s data collection and analysis efforts, a staffer told The Independent.
“The budget reductions make it extremely difficult for the HPC to exist without the Department of Health’s support,” Health Department Spokeswoman Deborah Busemeyer said Friday.
Most staffers have begun looking for other jobs.
The Commission produces health policy studies for legislators, and publishes annual reports on hospitalization trends, regional variation in New Mexicans’ access to medical care, and county funding of health care throughout the state.
“In the face of this drastic a cut to HPC’s budget, I’m very appreciative of the Department of Health’s willingness to support the remaining staff and mission of the HPC,” Commission Director Sam Howarth, himself also a division director at the Health Department, said Friday. “I’m hopeful that the HPC can continue to provide guidance on health policy to the Executive (and) Legislative (branches) and citizens of New Mexico.”
The Commission was created by the legislature in 1991 to provide state lawmakers with independent research, data and recommendations on health policy issues, and to track health care trends in the state.
