By Daniel J. Chacón
The Santa Fe New Mexican
Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham’s much-hyped initiative to offer taxpayer-funded childcare to every family in New Mexico, regardless of income, is closer to becoming reality.
The chair of the powerful Senate Finance Committee, Sen. George Muñoz, D-Gallup, is championing a bill that would allow the Legislature to spend an additional $1 billion from the Early Childhood Education and Care Fund over the next five fiscal years to shore up the initiative — without requiring any copays.
“We’re investing in people in New Mexico, and we’re really investing in our families in New Mexico,” Muñoz said in an interview after the committee passed Senate Bill 241 on a 7-3 party-line vote Tuesday, with Republicans voting in opposition.
Muñoz emphasized the bill contains “guardrails.”
“The protections are there,” he said.
The measure, for example, would prohibit the Legislature from making an appropriation that would drop the total balance of the trust fund below $10 billion.
Supporters of the measure say it would provide stability to New Mexico’s childcare assistance program for the next five years and also give the state time to figure out the true cost of universal childcare using a blend of general fund dollars and money from the trust fund.
“It gives you all the flexibility, and it also relieves the stress from the general fund,” Adrian Avila, the committee’s chief of staff, told lawmakers.
Avila said a fiscal analysis showed the fund will remain stable even if money is appropriated for childcare.
“If you were to hypothetically pull the entire billion right now, it’s still going to start growing again and reach past the $11 billion starting in calendar year 2031, so you’re not destabilizing the corpus,” he said. “This does not mean you’re going to pull the full billion. This is just, you know, giving you the worst-case scenario.”
Elizabeth Groginsky, secretary of the New Mexico Early Childhood Education and Care Department, said after the committee vote Tuesday the bill provides long-term certainty that allows the sector to grow and gives families confidence to trust that both the governor and lawmakers are invested in free universal childcare.
“Senate Bill 241 strikes a very important balance around funding, around guardrails, but very importantly that it makes sure that all families in New Mexico who are eligible have access to good quality childcare,” she said.
The department estimated it would cost an additional $160 million to expand the state’s childcare assistance program to make it universally accessible. Members of the House Appropriations and Finance Committee narrowed the funding gap in the state’s spending plan but still required copays, which the governor didn’t support. Her office said the state government has enough money to fund the initiative this year.
Asked how much the Legislature is expected to withdraw from the trust fund to pay for the initiative in the upcoming fiscal year, Avila offered only a range: as high as the “full $160 million” or as low as $50 million.
While the measure would fully fund the governor’s initiative, it includes several provisions that would trigger copays, including a recession, if oil prices drop below $50 per barrel, if inflation outpaces state revenues or if growth of the program far exceeds projections.
Lawmakers have been considering copayments for families above 600% of the federal poverty level, a move that would reduce the cost by about $12 million.
Sen. Pat Woods, R-Broadview, said the initiative costs more than the state can afford.
“We can’t just keep increasing our social programs with the unreliability of oil and gas,” he said.
“I know we’ve got a big trust fund here, and I know that you did a lot of work to make this deal work,” Woods told Muñoz, “but I just can’t get my hands around it.”
Sen. Steve Lanier, R-Aztec, said he met with representatives from the Governor’s Office on Monday, and the “big pushback” is the insistence to offer no-cost childcare to every family in New Mexico, no matter their income level.
“That’s fine, but how does somebody that makes so much money not have to pay more in a copay than what we’re asking here,” he said, adding his constituents are asking a similar question.
“It’s not from the wealthy ones,” he said. “It’s actually from those ones that really need this service, and they’re the ones that can’t understand how come that guy gets to get what I’m getting when he’s making $600,000, $800,000 a year.”
Muñoz told Lanier he’s talked to “guys who make a million dollars.”
“You know what they said? ‘I feel like I already paid for it. I pay for it in my taxes, and why am I not eligible? Why am I excluded?’ ” Muñoz recalled.
He argued all families should be treated the same.
“Why am I going to treat two different classes of people unequal in a system where we have the availability in New Mexico to do this?” he said.
Lanier pushed back and asked Muñoz why the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, formerly known as food stamps, was available to everyone.
“The argument you’re making is exactly that: Let’s treat everybody exactly the same,” Lanier said. “So, we need to make all the tax brackets the same. Let’s make all your SNAP funding the same. Everything should be across the board and then what do we call that? New York?”
Groginsky told Lanier the state is building “a cradle to career educational system” and doesn’t ask for income for prekindergarten programs, K-12 education or the Opportunity Scholarship for college.
“Madam Secretary, you understand this is the public’s money. They’re the ones that are paying for this,” Lanier said, adding he still doesn’t know how the funding plan is sustainable.
Lanier warned funding for the initiative could run dry.
“if we have any downturn or recession or any downturn at all, you’re going to have to dip into that fund,” he said. “When that runs out, are you going to go back and tell these folks, ‘Hey, sorry, you’re gonna start paying for childcare again.’ “