A bill that would remake the state’s troubled affordable housing system was tabled by a House committee today, but a second bill that’s already been approved by the Senate remains alive.
House Bill 997, sponsored by Rep. Janice Arnold-Jones, R-Albuquerque, was tabled by the House Business and Industry Committee on a vote of 6-5 this afternoon. Six Democrats voted to table. Four Republicans and Rep. Dona Irwin, D-Deming, voted against the motion.
The bill’s demise came after Speaker of the House Ben Lujan, D-Nambé, entered the committee room during the hearing and spoke privately with the committee’s chair, Rep. Debbie Rodella, D-Ohkay Owingeh, and freshman Rep. Thomas Garcia, D-Ocate, sources tell me.
Garcia then made the motion to table the bill, which had previously been approved unanimously by members of the House Health and Governmental Affairs Committee.
Rodella and Garcia could not be reached for comment. Lujan doesn’t return my calls.
The bill is a companion to Senate Bill 519, sponsored by Sen. Mary Kay Papen, D-Las Cruces, which passed the Senate several weeks ago on a 36-1 vote. Her bill has also been approved by the House Health and Governmental Affairs Committee, and is awaiting a hearing in the House Judiciary Committee.
Papen and Arnold-Jones decried the tabling of the Arnold-Jones bill.
“I’m terribly disappointed,” Papen said, adding she was hoping that both bills would proceed through the House together.
The proposal, which has the endorsement of the governor, would, over a period of several months, shut down the state’s scandal-plagued regional housing authorities and replace them with a system overseen by the New Mexico Mortgage Finance Authority.
It would also provide for audits of each of the seven housing authority regions to determine the extent of the mismanagement first revealed last year when Frances Williams, a member of the Las Cruces-based Region VII board, complained about problems. Several weeks after she went public, the Region III authority, based in
The housing authority scandal has been a hot potato in the Legislature because of the relationship between Lujan and former Region III Housing Authority Director Vincent “Smiley” Gallegos. Gallegos is a former legislator and current lobbyist who, in past sessions, has spent a lot of time in the speaker’s office.
Among the scandals that have plagued the housing authority was the disclosure late last year that a top aide to Lujan, who may not qualify for low-income housing, had been living rent-free in a home owned by the Region III authority. After the situation was revealed by the Albuquerque Journal, the aide paid back rent. She continues to live in the home.
Lujan has repeatedly said he didn’t know about the situation until a reporter told him about it.
Lujan’s actions at today’s committee hearing didn’t surprise some of those I spoke with, who believe he is attempting to kill the proposal.