Virgin Galactic, the anchor tenant at the Spaceport, has made veiled threats of pulling up stakes if the New Mexico Legislature does not pass liability safeguards for the company as well as manufacturers in the suborbital launches scheduled to take place at the facility located outside Truth or Consequences.
But on Tuesday afternoon, assembled Democrats from both chambers of the Legislature announced that compromise had been reached that the New Mexico Trial Lawyers Association – which spearheaded efforts against previous attempts at liability exemptions — could live with.
“It was difficult,” Senate Majority Leader Michael Sanchez (D-Belen), a trial lawyer himself, said. “There was nothing easy about” the negotiations that had been going on between the two sides since last summer “but it worked out for the best interests of New Mexico.”
Democrats said Senate Pro Tem Mary Kay Papen (D-Las Cruces) would introduce the compromise bill in the Senate and Republican state Rep. Jim White of Albuquerque would introduce the House version of the bill that was described on Tuesday as a measure that would align New Mexico with liability agreements in place in Florida and Colorado.
The bill’s particulars are expected to come out Wednesday morning but are reported to contain $1 million in liability limits should an accident take place and extend the act through 2021.
“I think this should go through the Legislature pretty smoothly,” Sen. Sanchez said.
Gov. Susana Martinez has been calling for lawmakers to pass a limited liability bill as a way to protect the $209 million tab that taxpayers have already sunk into the project that has been billed asa boost to the state’s economy in general and southern New Mexico in particular. Read more
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