A series of resolutions were approved by the Las Cruces City Council Tuesday, including a police auditor contract and additional COVID aid.
The council is working to provide additional pandemic support—approving $977,000 of emergency assistance. The city has allocated over 3 million dollars since last spring to help offset burdens related to the pandemic, with money going to food initiatives, emergency shelter operations and other assistance programs. City Housing and Neighborhood Services Manager Natalie Green says that while COVID cases have gone down, there is still a need for continued funding.
“The services that are provided out of this funding are direct financial assistance, housing supportive services, food and nutrition services, PPE, utility assistance, and in the past some economic development initiatives,” Green said. “COVID continues to pose a threat to the health and safety and well-being of our residents and there remains to be a need for additional funding to expand those services.”
Councilor Tessa Abeyta-Stuve gave an update on the city’s COVID-19 Task Force, highlighting their goal to give 80% of Doña Ana County residents the opportunity to be vaccinated by the end of the year. At this time, the county has vaccinated over 28,000 people, about 11.9% of the total population.
“Everybody's been very concerned with equity in Southern New Mexico and in Doña Ana County, to make sure that we are given that equitable amount of the vaccine,” Abeyta-Stuve said. “And here at the task force, we are going to be solution-based, to make sure that we are providing the Department of Health any resources that they need so that we're able to accept every vaccine that they want to distribute here.”
City councilors also unanimously approved a resolution to enter into a contract with OIR Group for police auditor services. The city has been without an independent police auditor since the summer of 2019. While not legally required, the regular audits help to evaluate police operations. Internal Auditor Viola Perea outlined the first steps of action in the auditing process.
“The first process that they'll be completing is audits of the complaint investigation process,” Perea said. “This includes the completed investigations by the police department's Internal Affairs Division, and they'll be looking at these completed investigations to ensure that their investigations were complete, objective, thorough, fair and that the findings and actions taken in response to these investigations is appropriate. They'll also be conducting audits of police operations, which includes all of the related policies, procedures and training that tie back to the investigations that they're auditing.”
The findings will be presented to the Las Cruces City Council on a semi-annual basis. Councilor Gabe Vasquez says he’s hopeful the new audits will provide increased clarity.
“I think part of the issue I believe we had with our last auditor at several meetings, was a couple of times they didn't show up or a few times they were unprepared,” Vasquez said. “I think this is a good firm. It's got a good mix of folks from what it looks like on their website of both the civil rights lawyers and former law enforcement folks, and this is long overdue. And so, I'm glad that we finally have an auditor in place.”
A resolution to convert 22% of the city fleet to electric vehicles by 2030 was tabled for further language adjustment. Councilor Gill Sorg says he feels the city is already behind in comparison to other government efforts in New Mexico.
“In New Mexico alone, the New Mexico Energy, Minerals and Natural Resources Division, the governor, the state legislature, the New Mexico Environment Department are all working on ways to get the use of electric vehicles in the state, both in the public sector and private sector,” Sorg said. “And so, I get the feeling that we're kind of behind the ball here…this is something we can work in slowly and easily. We can start out with just a couple of cars next year, next fiscal year that is, and go from there.”
Many members of the city council seemed receptive to the resolution, indicating they would support further exploration of electric vehicles.
