{"id":284008,"date":"2017-02-06T20:18:38","date_gmt":"2017-02-07T03:18:38","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/?p=284008"},"modified":"2017-02-07T08:56:05","modified_gmt":"2017-02-07T15:56:05","slug":"house-approves-emergency-funding-for-courts","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/2017\/02\/house-approves-emergency-funding-for-courts\/","title":{"rendered":"House approves emergency funding for courts"},"content":{"rendered":"<div id=\"attachment_56542\"  class=\"wp-caption module image alignnone\" style=\"max-width: 771px;\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-large wp-image-56542\" src=\"http:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/06\/Kids-at-Roundhouse-771x504.jpg\" alt=\"A statue outside the Roundhouse in Santa Fe.\" width=\"771\" height=\"504\" srcset=\"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/06\/Kids-at-Roundhouse-771x504.jpg 771w, https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/06\/Kids-at-Roundhouse-336x220.jpg 336w, https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/06\/Kids-at-Roundhouse-768x502.jpg 768w, https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/06\/Kids-at-Roundhouse-1170x764.jpg 1170w, https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/06\/Kids-at-Roundhouse.jpg 1500w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 771px) 100vw, 771px\" \/><p class=\"wp-media-credit\">Heath Haussamen \/ NMPolitics.net<\/p><p class=\"wp-caption-text\">A statue outside the Roundhouse in Santa Fe.<\/p><\/div>\n<p>The state House of Representatives rushed <span class=\"aBn\" data-term=\"goog_693173098\"><span class=\"aQJ\">Monday<\/span><\/span> evening to approve emergency funding so that New Mexico&#8217;s court system would have enough money to pay jurors and interpreters for at least the next two months.<\/p>\n<p>The 68-0 vote sends the funding bill to the Senate with the clock ticking on what Supreme Court Chief Justice Charles Daniels said could be a breakdown of New Mexico&#8217;s justice system. He said the state will be forced to end jury trials <span class=\"aBn\" data-term=\"goog_693173099\"><span class=\"aQJ\">March 1<\/span><\/span> for lack of money.<\/p>\n<p>House members approved the bill just days after Republican Gov. Susana Martinez vetoed emergency court funding when Democrats added it to a different bill.<\/p>\n<aside class=\"module align-left half type-aside\">\n<h3>About this article<\/h3>\n<p>This article comes from <a href=\"http:\/\/www.santafenewmexican.com\/\" target=\"_blank\">The Santa Fe New Mexican<\/a>. NMPolitics.net is paying for the rights to publish articles about the 2017\u00a0legislative session from the newspaper. Help us cover the cost by\u00a0<a href=\"http:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/donate\/\" target=\"_blank\">making a donation to NMPolitics.net<\/a>.<\/p>\n<\/aside>\n<p>Judges and court administrators aren&#8217;t the only ones feeling the pain of New Mexico&#8217;s cash shortage. Lawmakers began the 60-day session by taking up a series of bills to balance the budget for the fiscal year that ends in June. Legislators raided the savings accounts of school districts and fire departments lost their up-front funding for major purchases or other expenses.<\/p>\n<p>The bill approved <span class=\"aBn\" data-term=\"goog_693173100\"><span class=\"aQJ\">Monday<\/span><\/span> would provide $593,000 to pay jurors, interpreters and expenses for witnesses. That&#8217;s less than the $800,000 previously approved by the Legislature, but court administrators say it is enough to carry the justice system through mid-April.<\/p>\n<p>At that point, the courts could receive extra money that the Legislature includes in the state&#8217;s annual budget. Lawmakers hope to approve the budget within the month. And judges are counting on them providing even more money to fill a shortage in the court fund that they expect to total $1.6 million.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;Time will be tight but we can make it,&#8221; Daniels said of the stopgap measure. &#8220;This is not the complete solution.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>Sponsored by Reps. Nate Gentry, R-Albuquerque, and Zach Cook, R-Ruidoso, the bill also includes $83,000 to cover a shortfall for payroll at the Supreme Court. Without the money, the court would have to furlough its staff for about nine days before the end of the fiscal year on <span class=\"aBn\" data-term=\"goog_693173101\"><span class=\"aQJ\">June 30<\/span><\/span>, Daniels said.<\/p>\n<p>The House&#8217;s overwhelming vote <span class=\"aBn\" data-term=\"goog_693173102\"><span class=\"aQJ\">on Monday<\/span><\/span> was a stark contrast to the partisan clash that erupted last week when legislators authorized court funding as part of a bill to pay for the legislative session.<!--more--><\/p>\n<p>House Republicans said court funding should have been considered as separate legislation. Then Martinez killed the court funding in a line-item veto and denounced Democrats for packaging court funding with the bill to finance the session. In a message to lawmakers, Martinez also said she would schedule a meeting of the state Board of Finance to consider the courts&#8217; request for emergency funding and would &#8220;work with them to find recurring savings.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>The Board of Finance has called an emergency meeting for <span class=\"aBn\" data-term=\"goog_693173103\"><span class=\"aQJ\">Wednesday<\/span><\/span>. But it turned Daniels down when he requested money for the same fund during a meeting in December. Board members told him to ask the Legislature instead.<\/p>\n<p>Daniels said <span class=\"aBn\" data-term=\"goog_693173104\"><span class=\"aQJ\">Monday<\/span><\/span> he did not care which entity provided the funding, so long as the courts got it one way or another.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;I don&#8217;t care if they give it to me in a tin can,&#8221; he said.<\/p>\n<p>But the chief justice added that he believed it would be most appropriate for the Legislature to take on the issue at this point.<\/p>\n<p>Though the funding bill is sponsored by Republicans and its passage through the House comes with support from budget officials in Martinez&#8217;s administration, some Democrats still wondered whether the governor will sign it.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;What assurances do we have that this will actually get signed this time?&#8221; Rep. Christine Trujillo, D-Albuquerque, asked during the House Appropriations and Finance Committee.<\/p>\n<p>Gentry replied: &#8220;It&#8217;s my understanding this figure was acceptable.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p><em>Contact Andrew Oxford at (505) 986-3093 or <a href=\"mailto:aoxford@sfnewmexican.com\">aoxford@sfnewmexican.com<\/a>. Follow him on Twitter at <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/@andrewboxford\" target=\"_blank\">@andrewboxford<\/a>.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The 68-0 vote sends the funding bill to the Senate with the clock ticking on what Supreme Court Chief Justice Charles Daniels said could be a breakdown of New Mexico&#8217;s justice system.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":56542,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11],"tags":[3329,196,161,107],"class_list":["post-284008","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news-and-analysis","tag-2017-legislative-session","tag-budget","tag-judiciary","tag-roundhouse"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/284008","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=284008"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/284008\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/56542"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=284008"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=284008"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=284008"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}