Thursday, February 21, 2008

New Mexico's 2008 legislative session saw a number of accomplishments for drug policy reform, despite talk in the state about legislative gridlock. In the short 30-day session, DPA moved forward with a public health approach to drug policy by helping to pass good legislation, block bad legislation, and lay the groundwork for even more reform in 2009.
 
Several important task forces were established this year. One, a Housing First task force (SM 2), includes a focus on supportive housing for people with addictions or people coming out of prison or jail. Another (HM 3) will examine and improve conditions for women in New Mexico's correctional facilities. A third (HB 109) will assess the collateral consequences of criminal arrest, conviction and extended periods of incarceration, and make recommendations on how to neutralize or eliminate those consequences.
 
DPA New Mexico also helped to secure funding for an ongoing statewide bias-based policing study (HB 270), and helped to pass a memorial (HM 39) directing state agencies to follow a previously passed law intended to protect the public by helping formerly incarcerated people find jobs. The law says someone who has been released from incarceration for at least three years must be considered rehabilitated for the purposes of employment.
 
DPA also made sure four negative proposals that would have advanced punitive drug policies failed to pass, with three of these bills failing to even receive a committee hearing. 
 
Two positive and important pieces of legislation failed to pass in New Mexico this session, but DPA did lay important groundwork on these bills, and will bring them forward again in 2009.
 
HB 224 stopped one step short of passage when it failed to get heard on the Senate Floor. This bill would have established a much needed, evidence-based treatment program for female inmates with heroin addictions using the state-of-the-art medication, buprenorphine.
 
HB 488 was tabled in the House Appropriations and Finance Committee. The bill would have established treatment instead of incarceration for drug possession offenders and drug-related probation and parole violations. The good news for this bill is that the committee members focused on whether there was enough funding to do it right, rather than on whether it should be done at all.  DPA was invited to present this bill to the Legislative Finance Committee over the summer, and several legislators publicly pledged to help pass the bill next year. 

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