{"id":1351,"date":"2007-03-05T15:45:00","date_gmt":"2007-03-05T21:45:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.nmpolitics.net\/index\/2007\/03\/lujan-moves-to-kill-affordable-housing-overhaul-bill\/"},"modified":"2007-03-05T15:45:00","modified_gmt":"2007-03-05T21:45:00","slug":"lujan-moves-to-kill-affordable-housing-overhaul-bill","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/2007\/03\/lujan-moves-to-kill-affordable-housing-overhaul-bill\/","title":{"rendered":"Lujan moves to kill affordable housing overhaul bill"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a>In a move that can only be interpreted as an attempt to kill it, Speaker of the House Ben Lujan<\/a>, D-Namb\u00e9, has taken a bill that would remake the state\u2019s troubled affordable housing system off the calendar in one committee and moved it to another committee that killed a similar bill on Sunday. <\/p>\n

<\/o:p><\/p>\n

Senate Bill 519<\/a>, sponsored by Sen. Mary Kay Papen<\/a>, D-Las Cruces, had been assigned to the House Judiciary Committee. Lujan moved the bill today from judiciary to the Business and Industry Committee.<\/p>\n

<\/o:p><\/p>\n

That\u2019s the committee that on Sunday tabled, on a vote of 6-5, House Bill 997<\/a>, sponsored by Rep. Janice Arnold-Jones<\/a>, R-Albuquerque, which was a mirror of Papen\u2019s bill. Arnold-Jones\u2019 bill was tabled after Lujan spoke with at least two members of the committee privately during the public hearing.<\/p>\n

<\/o:p><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>Those pushing for the housing authority overhaul suspected all along that Lujan would attempt to kill the proposal. Michael Henningsen, spokesman for Lt. Gov. Diane Denish<\/a>, said that appears to be exactly what\u2019s happening.<\/p>\n

<\/o:p><\/p>\n

\u201cThe overall impression we\u2019re getting is that this bill is following in the footsteps of Rep. Arnold-Jones\u2019 bill,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

<\/o:p><\/p>\n

Lujan, who has sole control over bills\u2019 committee assignments in the House, couldn\u2019t be reached for comment. The office of Gov. Bill Richardson<\/a>, who has endorsed the bill, had no immediate comment.<\/p>\n

\n

Papen had no comment today, but on Sunday said she was \u201cterribly disappointed\u201d that Arnold-Jones\u2019 bill was tabled.<\/p>\n

<\/o:p><\/p>\n

Papen\u2019s bill would, over a period of several months, shut down the state\u2019s scandal-plagued regional housing authorities and replace them with a system overseen by the New Mexico Mortgage Finance Authority. Denish, as a member of the MFA board, has been a champion of the bill.<\/p>\n

<\/o:p><\/p>\n

The bill 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 Albuquerque<\/st1:city><\/st1:place>, defaulted on $5 million in bonds it owed to the state.<\/p>\n

<\/o:p><\/p>\n

Williams decried today the move by Lujan, noting that much of the state currently has no affordable housing program because some of the regional housing authorities have shut down.<\/p>\n

<\/o:p><\/p>\n

\u201cI think this is absolutely shameful,\u201d she said. \u201cIt smacks of some sort of collusion. How could you not want to pass a bill that would provide housing for low- and moderate-income people?\u201d<\/p>\n

<\/o:p><\/p>\n

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 \u201cSmiley\u201d Gallegos. Gallegos is a former legislator and current lobbyist who, in past sessions, has spent a lot of time in the speaker\u2019s office.<\/p>\n

<\/o:p><\/p>\n

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<\/a>, the aide paid back rent. She continues to live in the home.<\/p>\n

<\/o:p><\/p>\n

Lujan has said he didn\u2019t know about the situation until a reporter told him about it.<\/p>\n

<\/o:p><\/p>\n

The attorney general\u2019s office is conducting a widespread investigation of the housing authority scandal. Some suspect Lujan is opposed to Papen\u2019s bill because of the funding it would provide for audits.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

In a move that can only be interpreted as an attempt to kill it, Speaker of the House Ben Lujan, D-Namb\u00e9, has taken a bill that would remake the state\u2019s troubled affordable housing system off the calendar in one committee and moved it to another committee that killed a similar bill on Sunday. Senate Bill […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1351","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1351","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1351"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1351\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1351"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1351"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1351"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}