Susan Morée speaks with MaryEllen Garcia, executive director of the New Mexico Coalition Against Domestic Violence, about what's next after the New Mexico Legislature chose not to provide the coalition with any additional funding. Here's a transcript of their conversation:
Susan Morée:
So MaryEllen, you talked to me about a month or so ago about asking the legislature for $5 million. And you said at the time that, really, to stabilize core services and bring salaries up to where they really needed to be in domestic violence shelters around New Mexico, that you really needed something more like $12 to $15 million. Can you tell me what happened when you went to the legislature in January and asked for $5 million?
MaryEllen Garcia:
You know, we'd like to honor and say that here in New Mexico, we did lean into our values this legislative session by strengthening some of the protections for immigrant survivors, which many of our domestic violence survivors are. And that was a moral and a practical victory for our state. But at the same time, many, many truths can be true. So, we're entering six years of domestic violence providers across New Mexico, which is 32 locations across New Mexico who provide services, have not received a meaningful recurring increase in state funding. But as we talked about over a month ago, in those six years, costs have risen dramatically. The cost of housing, the cost of insurance, the cost of staffing and utilities have all increased. The complexity of survivors reaching out for services has increased, but funding has not. And I know that a few communities received that one-time GROappropriation. And we're all grateful for every dollar that supports survivors. But one-time funding has proven to be incredibly difficult because it does not stabilize the workforce. It does not sustain shelter beds. It does not sustain the crisis hotlines or the crisis response. And really, when we're talking about safety in our communities, providers cannot build long-term safety with temporary one-time funding. And so right now our domestic violence providers are continuing to operate with uncertainty.
Susan Morée:
Just to be clear for listeners who are not familiar with the technical language of the legislature, GROfunding is money that individual legislators put towards projects in their own districts that they want to support. You've said before that there's increased need, more people coming to shelters in New Mexico needing help and resources. Can you talk about that a little bit more now? And what does the future look like for you all with this increased need and no additional funding?
MaryEllen Garcia:
So, we know from the reports that our providers are submitting to the Children, Youth and Families Department, who is the funding agency for the state of New Mexico, that they're seeing an increased need for services. Between 2021 and 2024, crisis calls increased by 53%, shelter nights increased by nearly 45%, children who are exposed to intimate partner violence increased by 74%. Yet the service providers, again, have not seen a meaningful increase in over six years. And we know, particularly over the last few weeks and several months, the deep and rippling impacts of domestic violence across our state. We know that domestic violence does not discriminate. It's impacting our rural and our frontier, our Indigenous, BIPOC communities, our LGBTQIA two-spirit communities. And when it happens, when domestic violence is happening, it's not just affecting one particular family. It's impacting our workplaces, our schools, and our hospitals. The rippling impacts are profound and intergenerational. But I do want to highlight, if we can, that we did have a powerful win through state Senator Angel Charlie with the Senate Memorial to help us spend the next few months really looking at what it would mean for the state to meaningfully fund domestic violence.
Susan Morée:
Okay. Was that a memorial?
MaryEllen Garcia:
Yes, it was a memorial state Senator Charlie was able to champion. And, you know, at its root, it's about the state of New Mexico saying, we believe in the safety of survivors. We believe that public safety, that domestic violence is a public safety and a public health crisis. And that survivors in New Mexico deservefunding to address the complexity and the needs of survivors. And so the memorial is going to ask that the Legislative Finance Commission take some time to meaningfully look at how the funding is being allocated and spent in New Mexico, both at the state and federal level through the Children, Youth and Families Department, and to look at those dwindling, flat and reduced funding that our providers have been experiencing and to make a recommendation as to what it would look like to adequately fund providers across the state. It was a really clear way to say that as a state, we value survivor safety and it's important that we look at what that would look like. It's unfortunate that we left the legislative session without additional funding, but we do take this as a win.
