During the 2020 session, CWA fought hard to get all its members 4% to 5% pay raises, which were clawed back due to budget cuts. These same budget cuts affected the agencies our state employees work in, with cuts of 3% to 6% to their operating budgets, making it even more difficult to deliver the services so desperately needed to the citizens of the state of New Mexico during this difficult time.
Yesterday KOB reported that the Governor gave her staff big raises last year, while asking state employees and teachers to take a cut in their hard-earned pay raise. She provided tens of thousands of dollars in raises to her executive staff during the budget crisis and pandemic, while causing state employees and her own divisions take take the hit.
CWA is asking the Governor and Legislature to give back to all public employees and teachers the raise that was promised with a cost-of-living adjustment and to finally give a living wage to our lowest-paid employees.
President Biden has pledged to raise the minimum wage to a living wage and CWA believes that should start with our public employees, thousands of whom earn what the President rightly calls poverty wages. CWA stands with President Biden and Vice-President Harris and we trust that Governor Lujan Grisham and the leadership in the legislature will too.
[Home page: photo courtesy KOB TV · Above: President Joe Biden and Vice-President Kamala Harris / courtesy WhiteHouse.gov]