HM 7

                                1  HOUSE MEMORIAL 7
                                2      57TH LEGISLATURE - STATE OF NEW MEXICO - SECOND SESSION, 2026
                                3  INTRODUCED BY
                                4  Patricia Roybal Caballero
                                5
                                6
                                7
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                                9
                                10  A MEMORIAL
                                11   REQUESTING A STUDY AND REPORT ON THE USE OF EMPLOYMENT
                                12   CLASSIFICATIONS THAT RESULT IN LONG-TERM WORK WITHOUT BENEFITS
                                13   OR EMPLOYEE PROTECTIONS IN NEW MEXICO STATE GOVERNMENT.
                                14
                                15  WHEREAS, New Mexico's ability to recruit and retain a
                                16   stable, skilled public workforce depends on total compensation,
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                                17   including wages and benefits, and the legislative finance
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                                18   committee has noted that benefits are a material share of
                                19   overall compensation; and
                                20  WHEREAS, Deloitte's work for the legislative finance
                                21   committee identified compensation, flexibility to work remotely
                                22   and work environment as leading drivers of state employee
                                23   attrition and identified high vacancy rates and reduced
                                24   capacity tied to compensation and agency budget constraints;
                                25   and
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                                1  WHEREAS, New Mexico law uses the term "regular
                                2    nonprobationary employee" as a key threshold for who counts as
                                3    a public employee for collective bargaining purposes, which
                                4    threshold can create strong incentives to classify work in ways
                                5    that avoid "regular" status and related protections; and
                                6  WHEREAS, the Personnel Act exempts "employees of a
                                7    professional or scientific nature which are temporary in
                                8    nature", yet certain state agencies and the state personnel
                                9    office are using this language to deny employees who are of
                                10   neither a professional nor scientific nature access to the
                                11   rights afforded to all other employees in the classified
                                12   service; and
                                13        WHEREAS, the personnel board rules define a temporary
                                14   appointment as the employment of a candidate in a position
                                15   created for a duration of less than one year, in which the
                                16   employee does not have to complete a probationary period and is
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                                17   subject to termination without appeal, but should be afforded
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                                18   all other benefits outlined in personnel board rule, other than
                                19   military leave, although some public employees are not being
                                20   afforded equitable pay increases, sick or annual leave,
                                21   insurance coverage or other benefits afforded under personnel
                                22   board rule; and
                                23        WHEREAS, concerns persist that some public workers are
                                24   repeatedly separated and rehired, sometimes with a break as
                                25   short as one work day, in ways that may functionally evade job
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                                1    protections, their right to organize and long-term workforce
                                2    stability; and
                                3  WHEREAS, these practices can cause predictable harms,
                                4    including disruption of health coverage, loss of leave accrual
                                5    continuity, suppressed wages, reduced retirement readiness and
                                6    destabilized household finances, with disproportionate impacts
                                7    on lower wage workers and workers in public-facing service
                                8    roles, which raises environmental justice and humanitarian
                                9    concerns when the same communities already carry heavier
                                10   burdens;
                                11        NOW, THEREFORE, BE IT RESOLVED BY THE HOUSE OF
                                12   REPRESENTATIVES OF THE STATE OF NEW MEXICO that the legislative
                                13   council service, in coordination with the state personnel
                                14   office, the department of finance and administration and the
                                15   general services department, be requested to contract for a
                                16   study and report on the use of employment classifications and
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                                17   appointment practices in executive branch agencies that result
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                                18   in long-term work without access to standard benefits or
                                19   employee protections, including any patterns of repeated
                                20   separations and rehires that prevent workers from reaching
                                21   eligibility thresholds for benefits or regular status; and
                                22        BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED that the report include, at
                                23   minimum:
                                24  A.   a statewide count, by agency and job family, of
                                25   workers in temporary, term, seasonal, casual, on-call or other
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                                1    nonregular categories, including average tenure, cumulative
                                2    years worked and frequency and length of breaks in service;
                                3  B.   an estimate of the fiscal impact of extending
                                4    benefit eligibility to workers who meet objective work
                                5    thresholds, including health insurance, leave and retirement-
                                6    related costs, alongside administrative costs and expected
                                7    savings from improved retention and reduced turnover;
                                8  C.   identification of the statutory, rule, statewide
                                9    human resources accounting reporting system coding or policy
                                10   gaps that allow repeated nonregular employment over multiple
                                11   years, and proposed options to close those gaps, including
                                12   enforcement mechanisms and audit triggers; and
                                13  D.   an equity impact section describing which
                                14   workers are most affected by category and geography, including
                                15   impacts on rural service delivery and high-need communities;
                                16   and
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                                17  BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED that the legislative council
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                                18   service be requested to submit the report to the legislative
                                19   finance committee and the appropriate interim legislative
                                20   committees no later than November 1, 2026; and
                                21  BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED that copies of this memorial be
                                22   transmitted to the director of the legislative council service,
                                23   the director of the state personnel office, the secretary of
                                24   finance and administration and the secretary of general
                                25   services.
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