Lawmakers gathering today for a special session of the Legislature seem to be on the same page when it comes to plugging a shortfall of as much as $2 billion for the budget year that starts July 1 so they will have time to consider other proposals sent to them by the Governor. Here are the highlights from her call and the blog take:

— Requiring police to wear cameras, banning chokeholds and making officers’ disciplinary history a matter of public record.

Blog take: The camera requirement is particularly important to Bernalillo County where Sheriff Manny Gonzales has refused to allow them. If the Legislature forces him to do so, it will actually help him by taking a thorny issue off the table for his planned run for ABQ Mayor in 2021. Sidebar: Smaller NM police departments have pleaded poverty when it comes to supporting the cameras, but federal money is available.

— Authorizing county clerks to mail ballots to registered voters without requiring the voter to fill out an application first during a public health emergency. Ballots would go only to voters with a current address.

Blot take: This might be biting off too much for a special session. R's are strongly opposed to mailing out absentee ballots without voter requests, although they did support the mailing of absentee ballot applications by county clerks in the primary election. That worked out pretty well. The Legislature should make technical changes so the clerks can better process the anticipated heavy load of absentees in this year's general election, but an already controversial presidential election is not the time to allow individual clerks to decide whether to mail every voter in their county an absentee. The special can make needed technical changes to speed the counting of the absentees and leave the rest to a regular session.

— Waiving penalties and interest for small businesses and individuals who are unable to pay their property and gross receipts taxes on time.

Blog take: That's not too complicated in the harrowing economic times brought about by the pandemic.

--Directing the state investment officer to use some of the Severance Tax Permanent Fund for loans to help small businesses and municipalities damaged by the pandemic.

Blog take: But keep the interest rates very low--not like a recent State Investment Council effort--and fully fund the loans--on the order of $500 million or more. This proposal is what deficit-plagued Santa Fe and other cities badly need to avoid widespread layoffs and/or furloughs which would only add to the economic misery and worsen the downturn.

The special session is expected to wrap up over the weekend.

DOROTHY RUNNELS

Dorothy Runnels, who died Monday morning at her Humble City, NM home (between Hobbs and Lovington), was at the center of one of most fascinating dramas in state political history. It began August 5, 1980 when her husband, southern Democratic Congressman Harold Runnels, was claimed by cancer at 56. The race was on for the seat in the upcoming Nov. election and Wikpedia picks up the story from there:

The attorney general, a Democrat, announced that the Democrats could replace Runnels on the ballot but that it was too late for the Republicans to do so. Republicans were outraged and rallied behind a write-in effort by Skeen, while the Democrats selected Governor Bruce King's nephew, David King, over Runnels' widow, Dorothy Runnels. To complicate matters for the Democrats, Dorothy Runnels was so angry at how the Democrats treated her in the primary that she elected to run her own write-in campaign. Furthermore, David King had only moved his voter registration into the district some ten days after Runnels died. Skeen was elected with 61,564 votes (38 percent) to King's 55,085 (34 percent), and Mrs. Runnels' 45,343 (28 percent). He was helped by the split among the Democrats, as well as Ronald Reagan carrying the district. Skeen was only the third person in U.S. history to be elected to Congress as a write-in candidate.

I was staffing Congressman Manuel Lujan, Jr. in Washington back then and ended up sharing space with Skeen in Lujan's office in the Longworth Building while his office was being prepared. He was constantly peppered with media calls about how he had pulled off the nearly unthinkable.

Dorothy Runnels continued on, running the family's successful oil business and encouraging her son Michael, who like his father took the political path and became lieutenant governor under Gov. Toney Anaya. Mike died at age 69 in 2015. Her other children are Matt, 64, Phillip, 33 and Eydie.

Dorothy Runnels gave it her all, but it would not be until 38 years later, in 2018, that a woman would finally represent the southern district when Xochitl Torres Small took the seat.

Dorothy Runnels was 97. She surely earned her chapter in the never ending book of La Politica.

HEAT ON THE HEAT

Lots of fallout over the police response to the Monday melee at the Oñate statue at the entrance to ABQ's Old Town where shots were fired and a main was critically injured. The event received worldwide attention, including in the NYT where one of the authors of their reports--Las Vegas, NM native Simon Romero--sounded a common complaint:

I've covered violent street protests in Caracas & Rio. Never felt as threatened as last night in Albuquerque. At one point an armed militia member taunted me for working at the NYT. No police were in sight. Why did authorities cede control of the scene to extremist gunmen?

Oh, my. What a week. Grab your facemasks, kids. We're Flyin' Down To Rio.

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(c)NM POLITICS WITH JOE MONAHAN 2020