{"id":389945,"date":"2017-07-17T09:53:38","date_gmt":"2017-07-17T15:53:38","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/?p=389945"},"modified":"2017-07-17T09:57:34","modified_gmt":"2017-07-17T15:57:34","slug":"what-if-we-invest-in-new-mexico","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/2017\/07\/what-if-we-invest-in-new-mexico\/","title":{"rendered":"What If We Invest in New Mexico?"},"content":{"rendered":"

COMMENTARY:<\/strong> Recently my sons asked, \u201cDaddy, when you\u2019re governor can you stop our friends from leaving?\u201d<\/p>\n

\"Jeff

Courtesy photo<\/p>

Jeff Apodaca<\/p><\/div>\n

They\u2019ve watched too many friends from our neighborhood and school leave with their families in search of better opportunities.<\/p>\n

It hurts to think that even at a young age, they are fully aware that something is wrong.<\/p>\n

My sons, Asher and Gage, are my motivation and my daily reminder of the importance of the work ahead for our state.<\/p>\n

Yes, we are struggling. But we don\u2019t need more studies or statistics.<\/p>\n

What we need is leadership.<\/p>\n

That\u2019s why I am running for governor. To turn New Mexico around.<\/p>\n

For too long, we have had a governor content to make decisions for the next political cycle, not the next generation. It’s time that we have leaders with imagination, creativity, and the will\u00a0to make serious, game-changing investments into our state.<\/p>\n

So I ask, what if we did things a better way? Here\u2019s an example:<\/p>\n

New Mexico is the 2nd sunniest state, yet 48th when it comes to renewable energy production.<\/p>\n

That\u2019s crazy.<\/p>\n

If we invest into a strength, our beautiful sunshine, we have the capability to generate enough clean energy to power other states while fueling job creation at home.<\/p>\n

We will turn New Mexico around by investing in ourselves.<\/p>\n

Did you know New Mexico has state investment funds the size of Canada, Australia, Brazil and Mexico combined?<\/p>\n

So let\u2019s put our $21.6 billion to work for us.<\/p>\n

Instead of arguing over pennies in Santa Fe, what if we invested 5 percent of these funds back into New Mexico? That still leaves us with $20.5 billion in New Mexico\u2019s investment funds \u2013 and that doesn\u2019t even account for future performance of the funds.<\/p>\n

Let\u2019s put New Mexicans to work repairing schools, bridges, arroyos and acequias. Let\u2019s invest in new startups that are leaving to grow elsewhere, and into new technologies.<\/p>\n

Where we don\u2019t invest, others do. That\u2019s why we\u2019re losing homegrown companies in expanding fields like cyber security, robotics and 3D imaging.<\/p>\n

We must invest into 95 percent of our economy — local small businesses — to help New Mexico grow.<\/p>\n

We\u2019re short hundreds of doctors and nurses. Let\u2019s invest in higher education, in teaching, in medical, nursing and dental schools, and then follow that up with a promise to our young people: If you\u2019re willing to fill a need in our schools or hospitals and give back where we need you most, then we\u2019ve got your back with low-interest loans, tuition credits and tools to ensure that we\u2019re building communities, not only companies.<\/p>\n

And we\u2019ll invest in skilled trades at every level, restore lost trade classes to our middle and high schools, and work with local labor unions to strengthen and expand successful apprenticeship programs.<\/p>\n

There\u2019s no reason that tens of thousands of jobs need go to out-of-state workers because we don\u2019t have the skilled workforce necessary to do the jobs. We\u2019re going to fix that.<\/p>\n

So, what does all of this add up to?<\/p>\n

When we invest in New Mexico we know we can create 225,000 new jobs \u2013 a job for every New Mexican who needs one.<\/p>\n

But we cannot leave anyone behind.<\/p>\n

That\u2019s why we\u2019re going to support drivers of our economy — women, the middle-class and millennials — with equal pay, a living wage, earned sick leave, child care, and investments in the sharing economy that allow thousands of New Mexicans to earn extra income.<\/p>\n

But to do all of this, we must make another massive investment in our future.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s time for our generation to step up and guarantee year-round early childhood education and early family development resources for every child in New Mexico.<\/p>\n

So what if we find a better way than what we’re doing right now?<\/p>\n

When we invest into our state, together, we will\u00a0turn New Mexico around.<\/p>\n

Jeff Apodaca<\/a>, a Democrat, is running for New Mexico governor.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Did you know New Mexico has state investment funds the size of Canada, Australia, Brazil and Mexico combined? So let\u2019s put our $21.6 billion to work for us.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":389948,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1192,16],"tags":[2238,3587,107],"class_list":["post-389945","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-commentary","category-guest-columns","tag-2018-election","tag-jeff-apodaca","tag-roundhouse"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/389945","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=389945"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/389945\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/389948"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=389945"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=389945"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=389945"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}