Responsibility for kids’ welfare lies with us all

As the 2020 legislative session continues and your legislators begin the task of hammering out the budget and addressing the many priority issues around the state, I would like to draw attention to the needs of our most important constituents — the children of New Mexico.

How many children should we allow to go hungry each day? How many homeless children is it OK to have living in the streets? Just how many children should we allow to live with adults who abuse them? How many children don’t deserve the best preschool, or the same quality education that the most a±uent have access to? How many children shouldn’t receive timely health care? These aren’t just rhetorical questions — this is our reality.

Children in our towns don’t have enough to eat. Children are homeless, living in cars, parks, and tents. Children are living with adults who abuse, mistreat and neglect them. We let it happen.

Some people are quick to blame to others. Or, they claim that it is not society’s problem. “Parents should step up and ensure the children are fed, housed and cared for.” This attitude blames the child for making a poor choice of parents in the lottery of life. Children don’t have a choice.

It is up to us, all of us, to ensure they have the resources to survive and thrive. It is not the child’s fault.

Another oft-used excuse is money. Leaders claim we don’t have money to solve the social problems affecting our children. There is money for prisons, the arts, roads, police, fire, parks, animal services, health care and a host of other issues. Does the number of hungry, homeless or abused children we can tolerate change when there is more money in the budget?

What is a number you can tolerate? One percent? One percent seems pretty insignificant. We can’t help everyone, after all. One percent represents over 200 children in my community of Las Cruces. The real number of kids in great need is of course higher, but assume it is only 1 percent. How do we decide who those 200 children should be?

Accepting 1 percent is so much easier than acknowledging that it would mean 200 kids will go hungry each night. Two hundred children will not know where they will sleep. Two hundred children will be in a home where they are not safe. Imagine their faces. Why do they deserve to be hungry, homeless or abused any more than our own children, grandchildren or neighbors?

What will you do to move that number to zero in your community? It isn’t someone else’s responsibility. It is my responsibility, your responsibility, our collective responsibility to ensure that 100 percent of children are fed, housed, safe, and all of the other seven surviving and thriving factors outlined in the plan for healthy communities from the Anna Age Eight Institute.

So what are your numbers? Which children need suffer? If you can’t answer that, then let’s get to work to ensure 100 percent have access to services they need. This shouldn’t be controversial. One hundred percent of our children are counting on us.

Join the Anna Age Eight Institute at the Roundhouse where its leaders will share more about their work with lawmakers and the public. The gathering takes place from 10 a.m. to noon Saturday at the Roundhouse in the Senate Chamber. This is an opportunity to voice your concerns and ideas, and begin working together to create a New Mexico where every child can succeed.

Bill Soules is a Democratic state senator from Las Cruces. For more information on this event and other related efforts around the state, email info@ AnnaAgeEight.org