Report: NM's free school meals initiative boosting participation rates — with hefty bill - Dan Boyd, Albuquerque Journal
New Mexico’s push to provide free school meals for all K-12 public school students statewide is still being fully digested two years after being approved.
A legislative report released Thursday found the 2023 law has boosted school meals participation rates around the state as intended, but at a rapidly growing cost.
Meanwhile, complying with a new Public Education Department rule that 50% of school breakfasts and lunches are made from scratch has proven challenging for many districts, due primarily to staffing and infrastructure issues, the Legislative Finance Committee report found.
But some lawmakers said the free school meals program is trending in the right direction, despite the logistical challenges.
“I don’t care how long it takes them to get this done, I just want it done right,” Senate Majority Whip Michael Padilla, D-Albuquerque, said in an interview after a Thursday legislative hearing in Las Cruces.
He also said implementing the initiative will be different in rural school districts than it will be in larger ones like Albuquerque Public Schools, which has a centralized kitchen.
The free school meals law was unanimously passed by lawmakers in 2023 to address one of the nation’s highest food insecurity rates.
It specifically requires K-12 public schools to establish programs to offer “high-quality meals” — both breakfast and lunch — to all students at no charge. But schools were given a two-year period to prepare for the healthy meals provision.
Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham claimed when signing the bill it could boost academic outcomes in New Mexico, saying, “Kids learn better when their stomachs are full and they’re not worried about their next meal.”
Since the free school meals legislation was signed in 2023, the percentage of students eating school breakfasts and lunches has increased in all 10 of New Mexico’s largest school districts, the LFC report found. That includes a 9.7% increase in APS and a 14.7% jump in Rio Rancho Public Schools.
However, the school meals participation increases have been greatest among students from higher-income families who would not have qualified for free or reduced-price meals under the previous eligibility rules, the report found.
The free school meals are paid for with a mix of state and federal funds, with the federal government primarily picking up the tab for children whose families fall under a federal poverty threshold.
The overall cost has increased in recent years — jumping from $206 million in the 2022-23 school year to $248 million in the following school year, according to the LFC report. In addition, total spending on food per student has gone from $486 in 2018 to $830 in 2024.
“The state’s investment is leading to increased participation, but we’re also seeing increased expenditures,” LFC program evaluator Ryan Tolman said during Thursday’s hearing.
Greg Frostad, the Public Education Department’s assistant secretary of policy and technology, said looming federal changes to the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, formerly known as food stamps, could leave the state on the hook for an increased share of the school meals program.
But he said the PED has identified other federal funding streams that could alleviate the state’s financial burden.
Meanwhile, Laura Henry-Hand, the deputy director of PED’s Student Success and Wellness Bureau, said trainings on the health meals guidelines have been provided for school districts around New Mexico. She also said many districts have entered into contracts to buy locally sourced food.
Specifically, she cited the Roswell Independent Schools’ use of local beef, Bernalillo Public Schools’ decision to rely on dry beans and Farmington Municipal Schools using 10% of its allocated food budget to purchase local products.
Padilla, who was one of the sponsors of the 2023 legislation, said many school kitchens will have to be expanded or rebuilt to allow for more on-site meal preparation.
“We knew there was going to be a cost to make this program work,” Padilla told the Journal.
At least some lawmakers said they’re hopeful the program will eventually provide cost savings — along with healthier meals.
“Dry beans are cheaper than a can of beans, I know that,” Rep. Jackie Chatfield, R-Mosquero, said during Thursday’s hearing.
NM Gov declines GOP’s invite to visit ICE detention center - Patrick Lohmann, Source New Mexico
Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham’s “busy schedule” Monday means she won’t join Republican lawmakers on a tour of New Mexico’s biggest immigration detention center, a spokesperson for the governor told Source New Mexico on Thursday.
New Mexico Republicans shared a letter on social media Wednesday announcing some members would be touring the Otero County Processing Center on Monday, and they invited the governor to come along. The detention center in Chaparral currently houses most of the Immigration and Customs Enforcement detainees in the state, and its population has increased since President Donald Trump’s immigration crackdown began this year.
The governor’s chief lawyer told an interim legislative committee in July that the governor was considering adding a measure to the agenda at an upcoming special session that would ban immigration detention facilities in New Mexico.
“Before we take any action with such far-reaching implications (for example, putting New Mexicans out of work and risking millions of federal funding), it is essential that we have a clear first-hand understanding of the conditions within these facilities and the operations that take place there,” Republican lawmakers Rep. Andrea Reeb and Sen. Crystal Brantley wrote in the letter.
The letter went on to invite the governor to tag along for the visit at 8 a.m. Monday.
“We believe your participation would be instrumental in ensuring that any decisions made are fully informed and in the best interests of the people of New Mexico,” the Republicans wrote.
In an email Thursday afternoon, Michael Coleman, the spokesperson for the governor, told Source that the governor won’t join the tour and also hasn’t decided yet whether she’ll add an ICE detention facility agenda to the special session call.
“The governor has a busy schedule on Monday and won’t be joining in the tour,” Coleman said. “We’re still working to determine a special session agenda, and no final decision has been made on this particular issue.”
He also said the governor hasn’t yet decided on a date for the special session, which her lawyer said she anticipated would happen later this month or in September to address federal funding cuts Congress recently enacted in the “Big Beautiful Bill” act. Other crime-related measures could also be on the governor’s call.
Senate GOP spokesperson Brandon Harris told Source New Mexico earlier Thursday that delays around background checks likely mean reporters won’t be able to join the lawmakers during their tour, but they intend to hold a news conference or otherwise provide an update to the public about the tour.
That could be on social media or at a previously scheduled meeting of the interim Courts, Corrections and Justice Committee also occurring Monday in Las Cruces. But the governor, who hadn’t responded to the GOP’s invite as of 1:30 p.m. Monday, would be able to join if she wanted, he said.
“If anyone could probably get expedited [approval],” it’s the governor, Harris said. “If she wanted to, she probably could.”
The GOP’s letter said the CCJ committee canceled a long-promised tour of the facility, citing concerns about background checks.
As of Aug. 4, the average daily inmate population at Otero County Detention Center is 863, an increase of about 60 inmates, on average, since December last year, according to the Transactional Records Access Clearinghouse. The other two New Mexico facilities in Torrance and Cibola counties have average daily populations of 444 and 223 ICE detainees, respectively, according to TRAC.
Health Department contractor distributes $1.5M to violence prevention nonprofits - Austin Fisher, Source New Mexico
Community organizations from across New Mexico received a boost of public funding this week that they will use over the next year to prevent violence.
The nonprofit New Mexico Coalition of Sexual Assault Programs distributed $1.5 million in one-time state grant funding to 18 different nonprofit organizations practicing evidence-based solutions to violence, according to a news release on Wednesday. The recipients received between $30,000 to $200,000 each, according to the release.
Coalition of Sexual Assault Programs Executive Director Alexandria Taylor told Source NM on Thursday that the grant recipients use public health approaches to preventing people’s harmful behavior in the first place rather than policing it after the fact.
“It’s investing in longer hours at a community center, people who are holding dance lessons for young people, or giving young people and their peers something to be proud of in their communities and in their daily lives,” Taylor said in an interview. “The antidote to violence is joy and connection.”
Director of Prevention Jess Clark told Source the grant recipients are trying to address the root causes of sexual, intimate partner and gun violence; and they already have deep trusted relationships in their communities.
“These are the programs that our communities who are most impacted by violence are already turning to,” he said in an interview. “One incredible thing about doing prevention work that’s rooted in a public health framework is that when you’re focusing on one area, you end up impacting many other areas of violence. So it ends up being money that is very, very well spent.”
Organizations applied for the grants in July, Taylor said. Recipients had to be nonprofits and were chosen based on their proven histories of culturally reflective violence prevention programming and their abilities to complete the work within the next year, Clark said.
For example, Casa Fortaleza offers prevention presentations and educational workshops for survivors of sexual violence in Spanish-speaking communities. The funding will allow them to expand their services, Director of Education and Community Engagement Marian Méndez-Cera said in a statement.
“We focus on proactive solutions rooted in prevention — educating communities, challenging harmful norms, and fostering a culture of respect and consent,” Méndez-Cera said. “As a trauma-informed agency, we provide strength-based, community-driven, linguistically specific services that honor survivors’ dignity and draw from the values, traditions, and collective strength of the communities we serve.”
More than half of all New Mexicans have been sexually assaulted or raped at some point in their life, and 40% have been the victim of some kind of sexual violence while in New Mexico in the previous year, according to a report the coalition commissioned earlier this year.
Unlock Civics New Mexico received another grant for its work empowering young people impacted by incarceration, poverty and trauma to become civic leaders through project-based learning, peer mentorship and advocacy for systemic change.
“Guided by the truth that our liberation is bound together, we are weaving networks of safety and belonging that resist disposability and affirm life,” Unlock Civics NM Program Director Justin Allen said in a statement. “Together, we are building the conditions for safer, more connected communities, not only for today, but as an inheritance of justice and possibility for generations to come.”
Other grant recipients include the Albuquerque-based Keshet Dance Company, Arise Sexual Assault Services in Portales, Tewa Women United in Española and the Chavez County CASA Program in Roswell.
The money comes from the Violence Intervention Program Fund created in 2022 by the New Mexico Legislature and overseen by the New Mexico Department of Health, which hired the Coalition of Sexual Assault Programs to distribute the funds, Taylor said.
The coalition itself received $200,000 to pay for training the grant recipients and evaluating their work based on Centers for Disease Control and Prevention standards, she said.
“We are excited to have this opportunity to expand support for community organizations working on holistic public health approaches to violence intervention,” DOH Office of Injury and Violence Prevention Manager Kathleen Maese told Source on Thursday. “These organizations implement evidence-based, community-centered, and culturally appropriate programs covering upstream prevention and intervention to address violence.”
The New Mexico Sexual Assault Helpline is available for anyone to call to talk about their experience. For anyone in need of support, please call, text or chat the New Mexico Sexual Assault Helpline at 1-844-667-2457 or nmsahelp.org. The Helpline is available 24/7 and is 100% confidential and free.