New Mexico Watchdog - Many of New Mexico’s cities and counties give union officers paid leave to do union work. In Albuquerque, a union president’s entire salary is picked up by taxpayers when he reports to the union office each day instead of a the Solid Waste Department where his job is supposed to be driving a garbage truck. Santa Fe permits the officers of its firefighters union to participate in political activities while on the city’s clock. Across the state taxpayers pick up the bill for union activities regardless of whether they are in the public’s interest.
The City of Albuquerque is alone among New Mexico local governments trying to shake off a practice where unions’ overhead costs are subsidized by taxpayers. Albuquerque so far is having a difficult time with New Mexico judges who have relied on unproved presumptions to uphold the subsidies. Across the border in Arizona, a free-market think tank has been having better success in removing union bosses from the taxpayers’ dime. Read full story here:
News New Mexico
Union Time on Taxpayer's Dime
New Mexico Business Weekly - New Mexico companies will no longer have to pay a $100 annual fee to do business with state government. Gov. Susana Martinez said Monday that the state’s vendor registration fee, in place since 1994, was eliminated because technology has allowed the state and vendors to do business online, making the process of registering with the state less expensive. “Elimination of a vendor registration fee is a small but important way in which we can make it easier for small businesses to operate in New Mexico and do business with the state,” Martinez said in a news release. Martinez said her action was retroactive to July 1, and any vendor that has paid the fee since then will get a refund. The fee generated $158,000 in FY12, Martinez added. Last month, the state’s Construction Industries Division announced a plan to go paperless. Previously, all construction plans that required review by division officials had to be mailed to its offices in Albuquerque, Santa Fe or Las Cruces. CID officials marked up the plans manually and then mailed them back to contractors, who had to mail revisions back to one of the offices. Read More News New Mexico
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