After meeting for a couple of days this week, passing four budget bills and tabling a massive tax overhaul bill, the New Mexico Legislature has recessed and the special session will reconvene next week to follow up on Governor Susana Martinez's actions.

Under state law the governor must act on passed legislation within three days while the legislature is in session. She will have until Monday---Memorial Day---on which to act. Lawmakers will reconvene at 1 p.m. on Tuesday, May 30.

Governor Martinez called the special session following her March vetoes of budget and revenue bills dealing with the state's tight budget. Her plan was to balance the budget without any tax increases and passing an extensive tax reform package. The Democrat-led House and Senate's plan came in the form of four bills that would balance the budget and add monies to the reserves.

Here's what the Legislature passed this week:  

• HB1 - a supplemental appropriations bill to restore funding to Higher Education and the Legislative Branch.
• HB2 - a tax bill that addresses gross receipts tax on internet sales, removes the non-profit hospital exemption from gross receipts tax, suspends distribution to legislative retirement fund, and creates a rainy-day fund from oil and gas revenues.
   
• SB1 -  a bill that would increase the general fund by $100.4 million with $81.4 million in capital outlay "swaps" and $19 million in other state fund "sweeps."  Based on the legislative proposals for restoring FY18 funding for the legislative branch and higher education institutions during the May 2017 special session, this bill would balance the state's FY18 budget and restore general fund reserves.
   
• SB2 - a tax bill that would increase the gasoline tax by 5 cents per gallon (from 17 cents to 22 cents), increase the special fuels tax by 5 cents per gallon (from 21 cents to 26 cents), create the state road maintenance fund, increase the motor vehicle excise tax by 1 percent (from 3 percent to 4 percent), delay the five-year phased reduction of corporate income tax (CIT) by two years, and impose a new weight-distance identification permit fee of $55 per vehicle.

The proposed gross receipts tax reform bill was introduced in the regular legislative session earlier this year but did not advance. The revised bill, HB8, favored by the Governor and introduced by Rep. Justin Harper, was heard in the House Labor & Economic Development Committee but was tabled by a 6-5 vote along party lines.

There appears to be interest and some support for the massive 430-page bill, but some lawmakers expressed concern that the actual impact of the extensive tax reform bill was unknown and wanted more time to determine the bill's bearing on the budget.