Luis Sánchez Saturno/New Mexican
In this file photo, Rep. Kelly K. Fajardo sits at her desk in the House of Representatives.
SANTA FE, N.M. — There were both victories and setbacks for foster youth during the 2020 New Mexico Legislature in terms of bills that directly deal with improving conditions for youth in care.
But state officials and foster youth advocates say one must also look at other proposed legislative fixes: laws that contribute to the global system of foster care and child welfare in New Mexico, such as rebuilding the state’s behavioral health service network, punishing human traffickers on a more no-nonsense scale and addressing the state’s homeless crisis.
According to policymakers, foster care professionals and a state legislative director, these legislative proposals yielded assorted results during the session.
Help for Senior Caregivers, gun control bills
The establishment of the Kiki Saavedra Senior Dignity Fund aligns with the Children, Youth and Families Department’s emphatic push for kinship care, where foster youth are placed with relatives rather than in conventional foster homes. House Bill 225, which funds “high-priority services” for seniors, such as food and transportation assistance as well as physical and behavioral health concerns, will also assist grandparents who have been pressed into child care duties, said Denicia Cadena, director of legislative affairs for the CYFD.
“There are different complex reasons why parents aren’t able to raise their own children, from substance use to mental health issues, and we know the number of grandparents and elder relatives who are raising children has grown in the past decade,” Cadena said.
The fund, which will be administered by the New Mexico Aging and Long-Term Services Department, got an initial appropriation of $7.3 million from the state’s general appropriations budget, HB 2. Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham, who signed HB 225 into law on Feb. 25, had originally asked for $25 million.
CYFD supported SB 5, the controversial Extreme Risk Firearm Protection Order Act, or red flag gun control law, Cadena said. The new law gives law enforcement the authority to disarm individuals who possess a gun if it appears that they’re in danger of harming themselves or others.
The bill polarized lawmakers and ignited fervent public comments, ranging from county sheriffs to people who had lost a family member or friend to domestic violence or youth suicide. New Mexico is the 17th state to pass an extreme risk protection order.
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“Youth suicide is one part of a very complex puzzle [in child welfare],” Cadena said. “It’s really a public health crisis in New Mexico.” A Centers for Disease Control and Prevention report shows that New Mexico ranks first in the nation for suicide in youth aged 15 to 19 as of 2017.
The state shortage of behavioral health care, especially in rural areas, will get funds via the refreshed Behavioral Health Collaborative. The collective, a division of the New Mexico Human Services Department that partners with CYFD, the New Mexico Department of Health and Aging and Long-Term Services, will also get funds that can help provide wraparound services to CYFD’s most vulnerable youth in an attempt to divert them from juvenile incarceration, Cadena said.
Additionally, the appropriation — Cadena said lawmakers were still working out the final dollar amount as of press time — will establish reentry services for people who exit correctional systems via a partnership between Aging and Long-Term Services and the New Mexico Corrections Department. The new funding stream will allow the Department of Health to create the Alcohol Prevention Office, which Cadena says is imperative because New Mexico ranks first nationwide in alcohol-related death and disease.
“The work that was done around the [Human Services Department] and accessing behavioral health, and even the dollars that went to corrections to reduce recidivism, those are parents of children that are routed through our system,” said Republican Rep. Rebecca Dow. “Because families are the number one indicator of a child’s success, the dollars that are invested in mental health should reduce child abuse and neglect.”
Homelessness, Human Trafficking Bills didn’t pass
Several bills related to rectifying New Mexico’s homelessness predicament didn’t pass, including one sponsored by Democratic Rep. Dayan Hochman-Vigil that sought to direct $372,000 to The University of New Mexico in Albuquerque to study homelessness. A U.S. Administration for Children and Families report shows that 26% of youth who have aged out of care at 21 experienced homelessness within two years of leaving the system.
Seven lawmakers from both sides of the aisle co-sponsored the Human Trafficking and Sex Offender Changes Act, HB 237, which would have increased prison stays for human traffickers and increased the maximum age of child victims from 16 to 18.
“We’re a hub for human trafficking because of the major intersection of [Interstate 40 and Interstate 25],” said Republican Rep. Kelly Fajardo, one of the bill’s sponsors. Many victims of human sex trafficking are children, said CYFD Cabinet Secretary Brian Blalock in a recent interview.
HB 237 also aimed to require out-of-state sex offenders who own New Mexico property to register here as a sex offender. Jeffrey Epstein, the financier and convicted sex offender who committed suicide in a federal jail cell, didn’t register as a sex offender in New Mexico despite owning the lavish Zorro Ranch south of Santa Fe. That’s because state law didn’t — and still doesn’t — require it.
The Human Trafficking and Sex Offender Changes Act received unanimous approval in the House but didn’t make it to the Senate calendar, simply due to a lack of time in the home stretch to hear all the bills, Cadena said.
As a whole, only 88 bills passed during the session, the fewest in a 30-day assembly since 2012, according to the Albuquerque Journal. (The New Mexico Legislature meets for 30 days in even years and for 60 days in odd years.)
Lawmakers are expected to tackle New Mexico’s human and sex trafficking problem during the 2021 Legislature, which is scheduled to convene for 60 calendar days from Jan. 19 to March 20.
This story is part of a Youth Today project on foster care in New Mexico. It’s made possible in part by the May and Stanley Smith Charitable Trust. Youth Today is solely responsible for the content and maintains editorial independence.
