County approves jail roof repair pact with state

QCS Staff

The Quay County Commission on Friday approved an agreement with the state that will allow the county to proceed with $186,000 in repairs to the Quay County Detention Center’s roof.

State capital outlay funds for the project were approved by the state legislature in its 2014 session. The roofing project was the highest item on the county’s list of capital projects that is submitted every year.

The commission also authorized Donald Adams, the county’s fire marshal, to proceed with requests for:

• $40,000 from the state’s Emergency Medical Services fund to purchase a rapid response vehicle that can transport equipment to emergency scenes in difficult terrain.

• About $100,000 in state Fire Protection Grants to purchase fire trucks for the Forrest and Rural I fire departments.

The commission also decided to support legislation in the next session of the New Mexico Legislature that the New Mexico Association of Counties will back. The legislation includes bills that would:

• Remove counties’ responsibility to fund Medicaid and the Safety Net Care Pool and consider the consolidation of some existing county local option gross receipts tax increments. The Safety Net Care Pool is a state-operated fund that replaced locally managed funding of care for the poor. The care pool has resulted in reduced funding for many rural county hospitals, including Dan C. Trigg Memorial Hospital in Tucumcari.

• Keep the Southwest Chief Amtrak Service running and find reasonable alternative funding sources for the passenger rail line.

• Authorize county treasurers to make changes in tax schedules and clarify the authority and reasons for tax schedule changes to correct obvious errors.

• Authorize county treasurers to receive all payments of property taxes, including those turned over to the Property Tax Division of the state Taxation and Revenue Department.

• Allow counties to expand the list of economic development projects eligible for industrial revenue bonds and removing the complaint process for certain industrial revenue bond projects.

• Create a task force to evaluate state and county dependence on federal revenue, conduct an inventory of federal land ownership within the state and study the legal, economic and practical impact of a potential transfer of certain public lands to the state.

• Study housing options and service delivery for detention inmates with special medical and mental health needs.