A bill that would have let New Mexico and Los Alamos County tax production of plutonium pits died quietly in the New Mexico legislature after a committee of jurisdiction declined to take up the measure.
On Wednesday, with only one more scheduled day in the state’s legislative session, the bill was still waiting for action in the New Mexico House of Representatives’ Taxation and Revenue committee. The committee had scheduled debate on Feb. 9, but that did not happen. Someone familiar with the committee’s plans said the committee decided not to hold a vote.
Rep. Derrick Lente (D), chair of the Taxation and Revenue committee, did not immediately reply to an email request for comment on Wednesday.
Introduced in the state House of Representatives and sponsored by state Rep. Kristina Ortez (D), HB 0117 would have stopped Los Alamos National Laboratory prime contractor Triad National Security from claiming some $157 million in state and county tax credits over four years.
The state House’s Commerce and Economic Development Committee narrowly approved the bill on Feb. 3 by a vote of 5-4. One member recused herself because she is employed by the Los Alamos National Laboratory. The bill then went to the Taxation and Revenue Committee, the final stop before the House floor.
The bill would still have needed a vote in the House and approval in the state Senate before it could be signed into law by Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham (D), and time was running short in the legislative session, which was scheduled to end Thursday at 2:00 p.m. Eastern time.
New Mexico’s legislature meets for 30 days in even-numbered years and for 60 days in odd-numbered years.
The bill could have been worth more than $81 million to New Mexico and more than $76 million to Los Alamos county between the state’s 2025 and 2028 fiscal years, according to an analysis by the state Department of Taxation and Revenue. New Mexico’s fiscal year begins July 1.
In its report, New Mexico’s Department of Taxation and Revenue said Ortez’s bill might not be necessary and that pit production would create new jobs that would bolster the state’s tax base.
Los Alamos National Laboratory prime contractor Triad National Security “and the federal government can be assumed to have factored in the tax code of New Mexico when budgeting for this pit production project,” the state taxation department wrote in its report.
Los Alamos National Laboratory plans to start stockpiling plutonium pits for the W87-1 intercontinental ballistic missile warhead in late 2024 and to manufacture at least 30 such pits annually by 2028, senior lab officials told the Exchange Monitor in February at the Monitor’s annual Nuclear Deterrence Summit.
