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 1-cent sales tax hike passed Tuesday by Arizona voters is expected to raise $918 million in its first year. But it’s nowhere near enough to pull Arizona out of its economic problems, reports the Associated Press.
That news just serves to reinforce the point that New Mexico’s next-door neighbor is confronting near catastrophic economic distress. Some have highlighted Arizona’s financial struggles relative to New Mexico as one of many factors in that state’s tough stance toward immigration.
Times are tough in New Mexico. But Arizona’s problems are of a different order of magnitude when compared to our state’s struggles.
Arizona voters approved the sales tax increase by a wide margin Tuesday after the Legislature already had trimmed $1 billion in state spending, including decisions to “slash state funding for kindergarten, reduce safety-net social programs, close some state parks and highway rest areas and freeze signups for a children’s health program. Also, thousands of state employees have been laid off and thousands more have been subjected to unpaid furloughs,” the AP story tells us.
In fact, the difference between Arizona’s ongoing spending and ongoing revenues is $2.2 billion even with the money expected to come in from the sales tax increase, which takes effect June 1. That’s because since the recession started Arizona has lost a third of its revenue, according to the AP story.
