Welcome to the e-Voices MONDAY MINUTE, your weekly email newsletter from New Mexico Voices for Children. Please take a minute to add your voice to the pressing issues of the day. Also, tell us what issues you'd like to know more about so we can tailor the MONDAY MINUTE to your interests. Thanks!

January 22, 2007

Washington at Work
The U.S. House of Representatives finished the agenda Speaker Pelosi had laid out for their first 100 hours. And they did it in less than 50! If only all government agencies were so efficient. Of course, one of the issues we've been watching closely is raising the federal minimum wage - which the House voted to do. New Mexico Representatives Heather Wilson (CD 1) and Tom Udall (CD 3) supported the measure.

The Senate is expected to take up the issue this week - perhaps as early as today - so please consider contacting your senators and asking them to support the raise. You might want to mention that Congress has raised its own pay by $31,000 over the past ten years, while leaving the minimum wage at its dismal $5.15 an hour over the same time period.

What you can do:

  • Email Senator Jeff Bingaman at senator_bingaman@bingaman.senate.gov or Senator Pete Domenici via a form at http://www.domenici.senate.gov and ask them to vote in favor of raising the minimum wage.
  • Or call the Capitol Switchboard toll free at 1-800-459-1887 and ask to be connected to your senator.
  • Consider sending a thank-you-for-voting-to-raise-the-minimum-wage email to Reps. Wilson and/or Udall via the forms at their websites: http://www.wilson.house.gov and http://www.tomudall.house.gov.

Meanwhile, Back at the Roundhouse...
New Mexico's 2007 legislative session got underway last week. While the first week was taken up with the introduction of legislation, in the second week committees will start to meet to consider/rewrite/kill that legislation. One of the biggest and most important bills will be the annual budget. And one of our big priorities for that budget will be the funding of Medicaid. We have two objectives in that regard:

  • That the current level of benefits and eligibility be maintained - that means some $70 million just to prevent cutbacks.
  • That Medicaid eligibility be expanded to cover adults who live at or below 100% of the federal poverty level - that means another $16 million.

The grand total of $86 million is actually a miniscule portion of the $5.7 billion state budget. It's also one of the best investments we can make in the well being of our children, families and communities.

What you can do:

  • Please consider giving your state representatives a call and asking them to support the full funding of Medicaid.
  • Remind them that for every dollar New Mexico spends on Medicaid, we receive $3 from the federal government - and that's a great return on any investment!
  • You can find out who your state legislators are and how to contact them here: http://legis.state.nm.us/lcs/legislatorsearch.asp

Food for Thought on What We Could Have Bought
Whether you support America's involvement in Iraq or not, there's no denying that the war has cost far more than it was projected to. The National Priorities Project (NPP) calculates that so far the war has cost the U.S. $359 billion. That's to say nothing of the personal cost of putting American men and women in harm's way.

The folks at NPP have done some interesting calculations on the war costs. They've determined how much the war will cost each state, county and city. They've also given some thought to how we could have spent that money differently. Here are a few examples:

New Mexico will pay $1.2 billion-plus for the Iraq War. For that we could have done one of the following:

  • Purchased health care for 339,032 people;
  • Hired 24,579 new elementary school teachers;
  • Given scholarships to 293,673 college students;
  • Built 11,738 affordable housing units.

You can find out how the war bill will break down for your city or county and look at some of the other possible monetary tradeoffs here: http://database.nationalpriorities.org/tradeoff

Speak Up for Our Children
Here at NM Voices we have an elite group of communications warriors we call our Media Rapid Response Team. While their work is critical, it's not difficult or time consuming. And we need to recruit more members to our team.

Here's how it works: One of the great ways to shape public debate about an issue is by writing a letter to the editor of the local newspaper. Newspaper editors love the sorts of letters that succinctly make an original point, clarify an argument or criticize a decision. But they don't love getting dozens of letters from the same person or group. That's because the letters-to-the-editor section is a public forum and they want to allow as much of the public to participate as possible. So when there's an issue we'd like to weigh in on, we often ask our Media Rapid Response Team to carry our message on our behalf. To make it easy on our team members, we draft a version or two or three of a letter, which we email out to the group. If a letter strikes someone's fancy, they add their name to it (and make any changes they want), submit it to the editor whose contact information is supplied, and let the rest of the group know so that no one else submits the same letter.

If you'd like to join our elite team, please email our Communications Director Sharon Kayne at skayne@nmvoices.org and she'll add your email address to the group.

Call for Nominees
The deadline for nominations for our 2007 Amy Biehl Youth Spirit Award is drawing near. The award honors New Mexico youths (ages 13 through 26) who are making a difference in their communities through service work or outreach. This year we've split the award into two age groups - 13 to 18 and 19 to 26. One finalist and one winner will be selected from each of the age groups.

The deadline for nominations is 3pm, Friday, Feb. 9, 2007. If you'd like a nomination packet mailed to you call 505-244-9505, ext. 10. You can also download the forms here: www.nmvoices.org/abysa.htm. The awards ceremony will be Friday, April 20, 2007, in Albuquerque.

Your financial support is critical to our work. Please consider making a contribution today at http://www.nmvoices.org/donate.htm