Santa Fe, NM – Just like leaves turn color every autumn, it is becoming an annual occurrence every Legislative Session that officials from the state Department of Finance and Administration (DFA) tell us in the Legislative Finance Committee (LFC) and the Senate Finance Committee (SFC) that they really can’t provide accurate balances of the state’s finances.
The problem of Legislators not knowing the bottom line has stretched back as far as eight years and into the previous administration, which instituted a cumbersome accounting system called SHARE. This system has caused accounting problems for state employees ever since it was implemented.
We as Legislators, and more specifically those of us who serve on the Legislative Finance Committee and the Senate Finance Committee, have a vital fiduciary responsibility to know exactly what shape our state’s finances are in before we can prudently approve budgets for each upcoming fiscal year. When we cannot trust the accuracy of the state’s own financial reports — there is a major problem! It can be compared with a driver taking off on a cross-country drive with a broken gas gauge and never really knowing how much gas is in the tank — a prime recipe for disaster.
The voters of my district sent me to Santa Fe to watch over every dollar that you and your families contribute to the state. Responsible managers of financial matters would be remiss in their duties if they did not demand an exact accounting of the public finances they steward. New Mexico is the only state in the union that does not have a clear balance on its checkbook, which is an embarrassment to us as a state.
According to the Chicago-based watchdog group, Truth in Accounting, last year New Mexico was last in the nation to release its Comprehensive Financial Report and is on course to repeat that dubious feat once again. Obviously, when we cannot predict what new monies we will have because of the current phenomena of fluctuating oil and gas prices, the need to know the state’s exact checkbook balance becomes that much more critical.
Therefore, I have introduced an amendment to the State Constitution that would require by law that officials keeping track of state finances be required to reconcile state transactions on a daily basis. Senate Joint Resolution 11 (SJR11), “Modernize State Accounting & Reporting, CA”, would amend Article 5 of the Constitution by repealing the current Section 9 and replacing it with, “The state treasurer and the executive financial control agency shall reconcile all of the state’s cash accounts each day and shall provide periodic reports as provided by law to the governor and the legislature on the condition of the state budget.”
It is long overdue that we stop driving this used car without knowing how much gas is in the tank. We must stop blaming the previous owner for problems we should have corrected years ago. New Mexicans deserve better!
