by Susan Dunlap, NM Political Report April 21, 2024 New Mexico Voices for Children, an organization that focuses on tax policy and how it impacts children in poverty, has new leadership. Gabrielle Uballez replaces Amber Wallin as executive director of the nonprofit. Uballez began her new position last month. Uballez told NM Political Report that her interest in advocacy work was sparked when she was a child living in New Mexico. After school and during summer breaks, she participated in a program called Working Classroom, which provides art mentors to youth to build art skills focus ..read more

By Paige Knight, Santa Fe New Mexican April 13, 2024 This Tax Day, we all have much to be thankful for as we consider the bounty of public goods and services that are made possible with our tax dollars. These include a school system that offers a free education to every child, the roads and other transportation infrastructure that make it possible for us to move about our cities and state, the first responders who keep our communities safe, no- or low-cost health care coverage for a majority of New Mexicans, our plentiful parks, libraries, museums and so much more. This year, we have even mor ..read more

Diana Castillo, KOB TV April 4, 2024 ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. — The tax filing deadline is coming and if you’re a parent, you’ll want to know about a child tax credit you can claim in New Mexico. Qualifying families in New Mexico can claim a new state child tax credit. In 2022, our state joined other states in creating a credit like this. Last year, state officials increased the value of the credit through House Bill 547. That means this is the first tax season with the credit on the table. “A really great provision of the child tax credit is that it is fully refundable. What that means is that, if ..read more

Modeled after groundbreaking New Mexico initiative, CT fund would allow state to ‘actually do things’ in Blue Ribbon Panel plan by Erica E. Phillips, CT Mirror Mar. 28, 2024 A bipartisan group of Connecticut lawmakers wants to use state money to seed and sustain a trust fund designated solely to cover early childhood education.  The proposal, House Bill 5002, would direct an initial $50 million in bond funding and up to $50 million more from the state’s projected budget surplus this fiscal year into the Early Childhood Care and Education Fund. Private donations, local and federal gra ..read more

by Brandon Whiting, Connecticut Inside Investigator Mar. 28, 2024 While education and policy advocates took to today’s Finance, Revenue and Bonding Committee meeting in support of HB 5002, a wide-sweeping child care bill, Jeffrey Beckham, Secretary of the State’s Office of Policy and Management (OPM), took aim at the bill in his written testimony which vehemently opposed it. The bill would allot $50 million to the State’s recently created Early Childhood Education Fund, and authorize the State Bond Commission to issue state bonds of up to $50 million in support of the Fund. Proceeds made ..read more

By Bill Jordan, The Paper Mar. 26, 2024 New Mexico is a land with many valuable assets – from our rich cultural diversity to our stunning physical beauty, to our mineral wealth. These assets belong to us all and while it’s impossible to put a price on some of them – our culture and natural landscape, to be precise – we can and do put a price on our mineral wealth. And that price needs to be fair so that we are all receiving the benefit of the bounty beneath our feet. That’s why we support State Land Commissioner Stephanie Garcia Richard’s pause on certain leases on land in the Permian Basin ..read more

By Dr. Norty Kalishman and Fred Harris, Albuquerque Journal Mar. 24, 2024 The civil rights leader James Baldwin said, “Not everything that is faced can be changed, but nothing can be changed until it is faced.” In other words, we can’t solve a problem if we refuse to look at it. Looking helps us know the extent of the problem. The column “An optimist’s guide to depressing data” (Sunday Journal, March 17) takes the “New Mexico KIDS COUNT Data Book” to task for citing bad-news data about child well-being. We understand. We, too, find it demoralizing that New Mexico has the highest rate of child ..read more

Albuquerque Journal Mar. 18, 2024 Gabrielle Uballez has joined New Mexico Voices for Children as executive director. Uballez has more than a decade of experience in organizational leadership, partnership development, program design and racial equity. She most recently served as a program officer at Asset Funders Network. Prior to her work at Asset Funders, Uballez served as the co-director of the U.S. Department of Arts & Culture, executive director of Working Classroom, co-facilitator of the New Mexico Women of Color Nonprofit Leadership Initiative at the Santa Fe Community Foundation an ..read more

PRESS RELEASE March 14, 2024 FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE CONTACT: Sharon Kayne, Communications Director, NM Voices for Children, 505-361-1288 (direct) ALBUQUERQUE, NM—New Mexico Voices for Children is pleased to welcome Gabrielle Uballez as its new executive director. Uballez is a seasoned social sector leader with over a decade of experience in organizational leadership, partnership development, program design, and racial equity. She most recently served as a program officer at Asset Funders Network, where she played a key role in advancing national and regional initiatives focused on racial and e ..read more

By Susan Dunlap, NM Political Report Feb. 21 House Speaker Javier Martinez said that the Paid Family and Medical Leave will return to next year’s legislative session. SB 3, sponsored by state Rep. Christine Chandler, D-Los Alamos, appeared to have the momentum to pass this year but like last year, it failed in the House process. Last year, the House Commerce and Economic Development Committee tabled the effort after it passed the Senate floor. This year, the bill bypassed that committee and made the House floor, but the chamber narrowly tabled it, as well, by a vote of 34 to 36. Martinez said ..read more