Contact
Martinez shifts language on education, Medicaid cuts
Susana Martinez
Faced with a dramatically larger budget deficit than previously predicted, Gov.-elect Susana Martinez appears to be shifting her language about cuts to education and health care.
Martinez said repeatedly on the campaign trail that she opposed any cuts to education and Medicaid. But at a news conference on Friday, she instead talked about protecting “classroom spending” and “basic health care for those most in need.”
“Closing what we learned yesterday to be a half-billion dollar deficit is going to be a challenge,” Martinez said at the news conference. “During the campaign, we had deficit estimates that started around $80 million. Suddenly, we’re now at half a billion.”
“…In tackling that challenge, we must protect critical government services, such as classroom spending and basic health care for those most in need,” she said.
The budget deficit estimate for fiscal year 2012 has gotten dramatically worse. It has grown from $80 million in July to $260 million two weeks before the election to $450 million last Thursday.
In addition to opposing education and Medicaid cuts, Martinez said during the campaign that she opposed tax increases and taking money from the permanent funds to deal with the state’s fiscal crisis. That left cuts to the other 40 percent of state government as Martinez’s plan to balance the budget.
Martinez said during the campaign that she feared the Richardson administration wasn’t being honest and that the fiscal situation was worse than budget estimates indicated. But she made the pledge to balance the budget without cuts to education and Medicaid anyway.
Last week she said the $450 million estimate was “far worse” than even she expected.
Realistic and practical
Some lawmakers have said Martinez’s campaign pledges were not realistic and they expected her to shift gears. If that’s what’s happening now, it is a move many will view as realistic and practical. Even House Minority Whip Keith Gardner, R-Roswell – the first lawmaker to support Martinez’s run for governor – hasn’t said Martinez could balance the budget and keep her campaign pledge.
Gardner has said he believes it’s possible to balance the budget without raising taxes and without cutting anything but waste from education and Medicaid programs. But that’s different than Martinez’s pledge to balance the budget without any cuts to the education and Medicaid budgets.
Still, a shift away from her campaign pledge could be politically risky for Martinez. Democrats would be likely to hammer her in four years for breaking a promise to protect education and Medicaid.
But Senate Finance Committee Chairman John Arthur Smith, D-Deming, has told NMPolitics.net that he expected Martinez to shift gears. “Once you get the campaign people away from her,” Smith said, “…I think she’s going to look at it in a different light and recognize that we’re in a serious situation.”
Martinez’s new language about education and health care came during her introduction on Friday of Richard May to be her administration’s finance secretary. May, a former Republican staff director for the U.S. House of Representatives Committee on the Budget, said Martinez is “a serious person who expects results.”
Martinez indicated that she is willing to work across the political aisle to get things done.
“I will work in a bipartisan fashion, with Republicans and Democrats, to permanently solve this crisis and put our financial house in order,” she said.
11 comments so far. Scroll down to submit your own comment.
Leave a response
You must be logged in to post a comment.
We could certainly could use some administrative cuts, especially in some of the smaller school districts. The Cloudcroft school district serves a large area (Mayhill to Pinon to Timberon), but only graduates about 40 high school students a year. It does not seem to need a $70k superintendent.
Please read this site’s comments policy:
http://www.nmpolitics.net/index/policies/
Most important, comments must be factual. If you can include links to back up your claims, that’s helpful.
Thanks!
New Mexican, my comment was blocked as well. Heath often does this. Keep trying.
Thanx for not posting my response. Showes how balanced the weblog is
As a UNM student and feeling the pinch of 3yrs of increased tuition and not seeing the increase of money being invested in the class room i would welcome and ADMINISTRATION ONLY education cut. We have 5 of Uncle Bill’s cronies making over 250k a year. UNM does not need a “Government Relations” department with one of bill’s former chief of staff and deputy chief of staff.
In my first two years of college i never had a class with a tenured professor. They were all graduate students and all being paid around 2k per class per semester. So my education was built on inexperienced teachers that are only a couple years older than i am.
Even if she breaks a campaign promise to “not cut education” She will have my vote if she cuts ADMINISTRATION only. But that will be hard to do. and if there is one penny of cuts to teachers or class rooms, I nor any one at UNM can justify voting for her when there is already a plan to raise our tuition.
Between last summer and this fall, the projected budget deficit grew from roughly “$80 million in July to $260 million two weeks before the election to $450 million last Thursday.” Anyone who knows the first thing about deficit projections knows that they are understated before elections and grow over time up to and especially after the election. Neither candidate was honest about the anticipated problems posed by deficits; only Martinez will have to deal with them. Once we get passed pointing out her backtracking, we shall have to push her in the right direction: not to make up the deficit by demanding more of the middle and lower classes, on the elderly or infirm.
The budget isn’t quite as bad as it’s made out to be. The difference between the two numbers is in part due to the assumtpion that austerity measures will be continued, which they probably will. That’s half the difference. The other half is the big question mark around Medicaid. The problem is bad, but it didn’t double the it’s made out to have done. My question is what was the Guv’s strategy in makiing such an announcement the way he did? Remember, the $260 million of a month ago came from his people working with LFC, and there’s been little or no new news since.
As for the comments from the unecessarily partisan drumbeaters, the elections over folks – out of state corporations don’t scare anyone anymore… at least not as much as corrupt policians and wasteful spending practices do. When our budget was what it was a few years back, plenty went to tax cuts (which, in addition to making our income tax structure in lign with our surounding and competing states, also went to things like rebates for all BUT the upper middle class and above, working families credits, huge film credits,other business incentive credits, really huge credits for doctors when they’re not paid and for food and medical deductions where we have to compensate the local governments for their cost as well, countless narrow tax breaks for FOB’s, and the list goes on…), Still,the majority of the excess went to additional spending (good and bad). And don’t forget, we raised income taxes on the better off last year, in addition to raising the gross receipts tax (to record highs).
While we can’t afford the bloaded number of Richardson exempts or UNM VP’s, and they should be eliminated,but that won’t balance our budget. The broader the cuts the less the pain, although prioritization should take place in the legislatiure just like it does in the household when times get leaner. I care about kids too, but I’m concerned that as the budgets grow, graduation rates and other performance indicators fall. Are we accelerating the problem, or is shovelling our money into the blast furnace faster really the answer? Since the latter isn’t much of an option, I suggest effort be made towards effectiveness and efficiency in all areas of government. I don’t mean that in the right wing rhetorical way, but seriously. Then, if we have to raise money, do it in a fair and equitable manner. The “don’t tax me, tax the guy behind the tree” stuff is gutless. Man up or shut up. Tough times, unfortunately, means we’ll all get to feel a little pain.
I’m sure these aren’t the only things that Martinez will be changing her tune on. Cutting public education is really no big surprise coming from a Republican….their doctrine seems to be that only the wealthy people ‘deserve’ education anyway.
In fact, I fully expect that most of Martinez’s cuts will be at the expense of poor and middle-class New Mexican citizens and to the benefit of corporations and the top wealthiest 1-2% of New Mexicans…or Texans…or whoever she owes after receiving millions of out-of-state and corporate money.
Gov-Elect Martinez will have to make some tough decisions on the state budget given the mess Richardson is leaving behind. She should hack away at the salaries of UNM administration and high level state officials. Like Obama, what a hell of a time to take office!
It would take courage to put the tax rates back where Governor Johnson had them. The Richardson tax cuts were fine when there was more revenue from oil and gas coming into the state. Martinez ,Republicans and Democrats alike should have the courage to put taxes back where they were eight years ago and not just balance the budget on the poor and sick.
The education budget needs to be built from the bottom up.
include only essentials. Insist that it be lean and clean
and transparently accountable to the people.
It ends where it ends.
And then you look at the second most critical problem to solve.
And then you tax people if you must. That being the penalty
for our not paying closer attention to the spending of our power
and our resources.