NM governor rejects call from mental health care providers, advocates to cancel special session

Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham delivers the 2023 State of the State before lawmakers in Santa Fe on Tuesday, Jan. 17, 2023. (Photo by Shaun Griswold / Source NM)

A coalition of 41 different organizations, mental health providers and other individuals from across New Mexico signed a letter to Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham Tuesday urging her to halt the legislative special session she called for July 18.

With only weeks before the session’s scheduled start, the groups wrote that there is “an obvious lack of consensus between lawmakers” on the governor’s plans, adding that “there is simply no way to achieve the solutions New Mexicans deserve.”

But on Tuesday afternoon, a spokesperson for the governor said she is moving forward with the special session, and characterized the groups’ letter as calling for “doing nothing.”

The groups want to find solutions to problems in the state, they write, even committing to work with Lujan Grisham’s office and lawmakers so that she, “may return with a comprehensive plan for the 60-day session.”

Michael Coleman, the governor’s communications director, emphasized the urgency his boss has taken to push through her special session call since she brought it up at the end of the 30-day legislative session in January.

“Every day that the root causes of crime and other public safety challenges go unaddressed is another day that New Mexicans are placed at risk,” Coleman said in response to the letter.

The letter is signed by groups that are stakeholders in public safety issues across various sectors in New Mexico. Some in the group support and have benefited from the Lujan Grisham administration.

Yet, they are still not convinced that state lawmakers need to meet up and pass the governor’s goals not achieved at the Roundhouse in January.

In the letter, the coalition criticizes three of the five draft bills which the governor has presented to lawmakers this summer by arguing they wouldn’t address the underlying causes of the problems she’s trying to solve, and would actually lead to more harm to unhoused people and people with psychiatric diagnoses.

Coleman said Lujan Grisham’s plans would “provide accountability and treatment for those who become entangled in the criminal justice system because of underlying mental health challenges, while improving the safety of New Mexico’s communities.”

For years, experts have said New Mexico’s entire health care system, including mental health treatment, is plagued by provider shortages. Lujan Grisham originally hinted in January she would pursue forced treatment as part of her public safety agenda, and over the summer rewrote her pitch to lawmakers.

The coalition wrote that Lujan Grisham’s draft bill related to civil commitment does nothing to tackle the underlying issue of critical shortages in voluntary mental health care while threatening people’s constitutional rights. The letter states that her draft bill related to competency undermines the careful consideration of people’s unique situations, potentially leading to unjust outcomes and causing further harm.

NM governor’s office continues forced treatment pitch to lawmakers, could return in full in 2025

They wrote that her draft bill related to median safety would saddle unhoused people with unpayable fines and jail time, which would do nothing to meaningfully address pedestrian safety while making it harder for people to qualify for housing.

Coleman said the median safety bill “is not an attack on the homeless, it’s a common-sense strategy to reduce New Mexico’s first-in-the-nation status for pedestrian fatalities.”

“We strongly believe the legislative proposals put forth will have a detrimental impact on New Mexicans, rather than achieving the aims you seek,” the letter states. “Your office has rightly recognized that system-wide solutions are too complex for a short special session. But with that acknowledgement, you have elected to instead pursue approaches that, while well-intentioned, threaten to exacerbate the very issues they aim to fix.”

The coalition wrote they share the governor’s “urgent desire” to bring forward solutions to get New Mexicans mental health care, addiction treatment, and affordable housing. Her call for a special session “ignited a much-needed conversation about mental health and public safety that has generated rich and creative ideas for addressing the complex conditions underlying the crises our communities now face,” they wrote.

“Moreover, a special session that will conclude in a matter of days with little to no opportunities for community feedback is not conducive to passing true and lasting safety solutions,” the letter states.

Coleman said the governor and her staff have been engaged in meetings with lawmakers and “other stakeholders” on these issues for months.

“Enough is enough and this can’t wait,” he said.

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LISTEN: Advocacy organizations ask NM governor to stop special legislative session

By Jeanette DeDios, KUNM News

Read the full letter below.

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