New Mexico governor gives senior staff raises during coronavirus pandemic

(The Center Square) – At least eight members of New Mexico Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham’s staff received pay raises ranging from $7,500 to $18,000 during the ongoing coronavirus pandemic.

The information comes from the state’s sunshine portal.

“I feel like it was poor judgement, poor timing – these could have waited until we had our feet underneath us,” state Sen. Greg Baca, a Republican, told local media.

The biggest raise, $18,000, went to Tripp Stelnicki, the governor’s communications director. Six other staffers received pay hikes of $10,000 and one received a $7,500 raise.

Nora Sackett, a spokesperson for Lujan Grisham, told media that two of the staffers had been promoted and received pay adjustments.

Larry Behrens, western states director for Power the Future, a trade group for the oil and natural gas industry, called the raises “out of touch.”

“It’s beyond pathetic that just as President Joe Biden launches an all-out assault on New Mexico’s energy workers, apparently our governor feels her personal staff deserves a raise funded by those same workers,” Behrens told The Center Square. “I can’t think of anything more insulting than a governor doling out massive raises to her staff while leading New Mexico to one of the highest unemployment rates in the country.”

New Mexico’s unemployment rate stands at 8.2%, tied with New York for fifth highest in the nation. The national average is 6.7%.

Raises for public school employees in New Mexico were recently cut from 4 percent to 1 percent due to a dip in state revenues because of the ongoing pandemic.

Last September, a coalition of nonprofit pro-business groups called on Lujan Grisham to forego her taxpayer-funded paycheck as the state grappled with one of the highest unemployment rates in the country due to coronavirus.

The governor makes $174,000 annually, yet at the time New Mexico’s unemployment rate was 11.3 percent, which at that point was sixth highest in the nation.

“While thousands of New Mexican families are suffering without jobs and many without incomes, the elected leader of our state hasn’t missed a payday,” New Mexico Business Coalition President Carla Sontag said in a statement at the time. “If Gov. Lujan Grisham wants to put any sense of credibility to her words, ‘we’re all in this together,’ she would stop her income until such time as all New Mexicans are able to work and get paid.”

Last fall, the New Mexico Department of Workforce Solutions said it had paid out more than $2 billion in unemployment benefits over the previous six months, depleting the entire fund and forcing the state to borrow money from the federal government to continue paying claims.

Disclaimer: This content is distributed by The Center Square