{"id":2936,"date":"2008-03-03T09:04:00","date_gmt":"2008-03-03T15:04:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.nmpolitics.net\/index\/2008\/03\/education-health-care-took-back-seat-in-state-budget\/"},"modified":"2008-03-03T09:04:00","modified_gmt":"2008-03-03T15:04:00","slug":"education-health-care-took-back-seat-in-state-budget","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/2008\/03\/education-health-care-took-back-seat-in-state-budget\/","title":{"rendered":"Education, health care took back seat in state budget"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a>By Sens. Dede Feldman and Cynthia Nava<\/span> <\/p>\n

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

Voters hear a lot about the importance of education and health care during every election season, but the true test of our elected officials\u2019 priorities can be found in the state\u2019s recently approved budget.<\/p>\n

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

\"\"<\/a>Ordinary citizens have been making extraordinary efforts to improve New Mexico<\/st1:state><\/st1:place> this year by participating in town halls, task forces and the like. Yet, in spite of the Herculean efforts of hundreds of citizens who have come together to grapple with tough issues such as the state school funding formula, the inability of small employers to afford health coverage for their employees and the growing number of uninsured people in New Mexico, this year\u2019s budget stops short of making the investments we need to assure a healthy, well-educated New Mexico, now and into the next decade.<\/p>\n

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

\"\"<\/a>As chairs of the Senate Education<\/a> and Public Affairs<\/a> committees, which deal with two areas that are often played off against one another \u2013 schools and health care \u2013 we are very disappointed.<\/p>\n

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

In this year\u2019s session of health-care reform, so dominated by proposals for universal health care and coverage, we underfunded Medicaid, the state-federal insurance program that now covers almost 190,000 low-income children, by $11 million. That\u2019s the amount the administration told legislative budget-makers was needed to keep the program whole. It did not include the additional $9 million to enroll 9,000 more low-income children, the first logical step toward broader coverage for all.<\/p>\n

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

That\u2019s distressing since there is a fairly broad consensus that, with three federal dollars for every state dollar devoted to the program, Medicaid is a great financial investment. Also, an ounce of prevention for babies \u2013 in terms of immunization, treatment for developmental delays and regular checkups \u2013 is worth a pound of cure, especially when those cures \u2013 in the form of special education or juvenile incarceration \u2013 are expensive.<\/p>\n

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

Healthier children are also better learners who can take advantage of some of the opportunities we are beginning to create for them in pre-kindergarten and early childhood education, two other areas where there is overwhelming evidence that the investment pays off handsomely.<\/p>\n

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

But it was in the field of education that the recent session was perhaps the most disappointing for child advocates.<\/p>\n

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

During the last two years, policymakers and citizens have been examining the public-school funding formula at a cost of $1 million for a task force and other research. An independent, out-of-state consultant has told us that we are under-funding our K-12 schools by $350 million, and a lawsuit looms if we do not remedy the situation.<\/p>\n

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

But what happened in the recent legislative session? The Senate Finance Committee<\/a> did not even schedule hearings on the issue, and in spite of all the work and the warnings, the issue died without a plan to go forward.<\/p>\n

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

Perhaps it\u2019s not so unusual for existing programs and new initiatives to go unfunded in tough budget years. But if we can find funds for a myriad of programs, not to mention tax breaks for a vast array of industries, surely we can find the money to enable sick kids to go to the doctor and support our schools, which are still the best avenues to opportunity and success.<\/p>\n

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

For us, it\u2019s a matter of priorities \u2013 and values.<\/p>\n

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

<\/a><\/p>\n

Nava<\/a>, D-Las Cruces, chairs the Senate Education Committee. Feldman<\/a>, D-Albuquerque, chairs the Senate Public Affairs Committee.<\/p>\n

\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

By Sens. Dede Feldman and Cynthia Nava Voters hear a lot about the importance of education and health care during every election season, but the true test of our elected officials\u2019 priorities can be found in the state\u2019s recently approved budget. Ordinary citizens have been making extraordinary efforts to improve New Mexico this year by […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[16],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2936","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-guest-columns"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2936","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=2936"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2936\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2936"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2936"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2936"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}