Lujan Grisham mandates NM environment officials resume food, health inspections
New Mexico will resume health and food safety inspections after Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham intervened following a pause in enforcement.
State to restart food safety checks after inspections were halted
Danielle Prokop, Source New Mexico
This story was originally published by Source New Mexico.
New Mexico Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham on Wednesday ordered the state’s environment department to immediately resume health and food safety inspections, which had been paused since last Friday.
According to a news release, the department stopped inspections due to a $1.2 million budget shortfall stemming from the most recent legislative session. Lujan Grisham said her office is working with the Department of Finance and Administration and legislative staff to identify funds to transfer to the department to resume inspections.
“The Environment Department’s decision to halt inspections was premature,” Lujan Grisham said in a statement. “We will resolve the agency’s budget shortfall to ensure the crucial service of providing health and safety inspections is uninterrupted moving forward.”
The Environmental Health Bureau oversees inspections of food service establishments, including in schools, hospitals, nursing homes and detention centers, along with public pools and septic systems across the state. The bureau employs 35 inspectors, who conduct about 17,500 inspections per year.
According to NMED Director of Communications Drew Goretzka, the budget gap translated into approximately $800,000 in unmet payroll costs for the bureau along with a roughly $400,000 shortfall for overhead, such as travel costs for inspections or vehicle maintenance.
He said the department did not anticipate any backlogs from the three-day hiatus.
Danielle Prokop covers the environment and local government for Source New Mexico.
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