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More mental health support may be coming to schools across the state

Tug of war statue at Roundhouse
New Mexico In Depth
Legislators in Santa Fe last week advanced a bill that would put aside more than $2 million in funds to establish mental health rooms in 14 schools across the state.

Legislation that would appropriate more than $2 million to expand mental health access in schools made it past its first hurdle last week with strong bipartisan support.

The House Health and Human Services Committee unanimously approved House Bill 58. 

Rep. Pamelya Herndon, D-Albuquerque, said the bill will provide $1.75 million to establish 14 new mental health rooms in schools around the state, doubling the 14 rooms that have already been established in the last couple of years.

Herndon, who sponsored the bill along with Rep Yanira Gurrola, D-Albuquerque, has been working on getting these rooms into schools since 2022, and has seen the benefits they can provide.

“I was able to visit the last one…and watch those students as they talked about and thrived in terms of how they were growing and evolving with their behavioral health,” she said. “It was quite impressive.”

The bill would also provide another $300,000 to train school staff, students, and community members in culturally appropriate suicide prevention and trauma-informed care.

Not a single person voiced opposition to the bill, but many did voice loud support for it, including David Burke, director of the Serenity Mesa Youth Recovery Center, which houses the state’s only detox for people under 18.

“We speak to far too many families who have had somebody that's been lost to suicide or struggles with mental health,” he said. “A lot of the kids that come to Serenity Mesa could use these services, or could have used these services.”

Strong bipartisan support was on display as well. Rep. Nicole Chavez, R-Albuquerque, made her gratitude clear.

“Teenagers already have overwhelming hormone changes and emotions,” she said. “And I just think that this is amazing. And I wanted to thank you for bringing this because it is needed.”

The bill now heads to the House Appropriations and Finance Committee for approval.

Support for this coverage comes from the W.K. Kellogg Foundation.

Daniel Montaño is a reporter with KUNM's Public Health, Poverty and Equity project. He is also an occasional host of Morning Edition, All Things Considered, and Let's Talk New Mexico since 2021, is a born and bred Burqueño who first started with KUNM about two decades ago, as a production assistant while he was in high school. During the intervening years, he studied journalism at UNM, lived abroad, fell in and out of love, conquered here and there, failed here and there, and developed a taste for advocating for human rights.
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