Record number of housing bills introduced this session, but little to show for it, advocate says

Yahoo

28-03-2025

Workers paint a new apartment complex near Old Town Albuquerque in December 2022. The most housing-related legislation in years was introduced in the recent 60-day session, but there is little to show for it, according to an advocate who paid close attention. (Photo by Patrick Lohmann / Source NM)
At the beginning of the 60-day legislative session, housing advocate Winter Torres remembers feeling like the issue of housing affordability and homelessness had reached such a crescendo that lawmakers were jumping over each other to introduce bills.
By the session's midpoint, housing advocates watching the session closely said they were tracking more than 60 bills, a huge increase over previous years. Lawmakers introduced nearly 200 bills mentioning the word 'housing' this session. That's the most since at least 2005.
'There's never been bills like this,' said Torres, who runs an eviction diversion program in Santa Fe and also tracks housing-related legislation on her website during the session. 'People just came out of the woodwork with them.'
But now that the session is over, Torres said she can't help but feel like the Legislature missed a chance to catch up to other states' efforts to reform housing policies and address the crisis here before it gets worse.
The state lacks more than 32,000 housing units, homelessness is on the rise and federal cuts threaten to deprive housing aid to thousands of New Mexicans.
'I feel disappointed,' she said. 'Some of the other advocates may have a different view, but I feel like, you know, we had our shot.'
Legislative leaders have touted this year's session as building on recent record investments in making housing more affordable and building more of it. Lawmakers last year appropriated nearly $200 million for various housing projects and programs.
This year, lawmakers have earmarked at least $140 million for housing programs, including up to $80 million of that for Albuquerque and Bernalillo County.
Outside of the budget, both chambers of the Legislature also passed 21 bills mentioning 'housing,' including Senate Bill 267, which caps late and application fees for renters, and House Bill 571, which creates incentives for municipalities that reform their zoning codes in ways that expands the construction of affordable housing.
Another bill creates a new governing subdivision to oversee the New Mexico State Fair grounds and empowers it to study the feasibility of building new housing there.
Torres said she doesn't want to minimize those significant bills, but the way other bills were moving early on in the session made their eventual deaths more frustrating. For example, a House bill that would have prohibited landlords from turning away tenants who carry Section 8 vouchers failed early in committees in at least the last two previous sessions, but this year made it all the way to its final Senate committee, Senate Judiciary, where it never received a hearing.
Other House bills she tracked also died in Senate Judiciary, their final hurdle before the Senate floor, including ones that would have expunged old eviction records or given mobile home park tenants a chance to buy their park if it goes up for sale.
New Mexico governor once again tries to create Office of Housing
'Fundamentally, I think the way we do sessions is an extremely irresponsible way to make law, when we are so far behind the rest of the nation on so many things, and the rest of the world just keeps speeding up,' she said. 'We'll never catch up.'
Rep. Kathleen Cates (D-Rio Rancho) sponsored several housing bills and joined a working group with other lawmakers to discuss and propose housing-related legislation. She said the Legislature was abuzz with housing-related energy at the beginning and is proud to have supported another year of significant investments in housing and homelessness.
Still, Cates also said significant legislation she supported languished without hearings, primarily in Senate Judiciary
'That's where everything dies, Senate Judiciary,' she said. 'It's ridiculous.'
Sen. Joseph Cervantes, who chairs the Senate Judiciary Committee, did not respond to a request for comment on Friday afternoon from Source New Mexico.
Other prominent housing-related bills that died this session include one that would have created a new Office of Housing, Planning and Production in the executive branch. Advocates say the office is necessary to collect better data and coordinate various government agencies into a unified statewide strategy. That bill also made it to its final committee hurdle, Senate Finance, without being heard.
'Our priority bill SB205…had amazing support, compelling testimony, and endorsements from diverse organizations around the state. We won bipartisan support in four committee hearings and passed the House 49-17,' Daniel Werwath, housing policy adviser to Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham, wrote in an email to supporters on the last day of the session. 'Sadly, in the last few days of the session, the Senate Finance Committee chose not to hear our bill and denied us a vote on the Senate floor.'
Werwath declined an interview request with Source New Mexico until after the governor decides which bills to sign, but his same email pointed to the money in the budget for housing and also HB571 as reason to call the session a success.
'While we failed to win statutory authority for the Office, this doesn't change our work,' Werwath wrote. 'With record funding and mandates to work on statewide housing regulatory frameworks through HB571 …we will continue to work to ensure that state investments in housing are delivered quickly, efficiently and with a focus on innovation and outcomes.'