IAL 012308.

• Case Date: January 23, 2008
• Court: New Mexico

New Mexico Attorney Gen eral Opinions 2008. IAL 012308. January 23, 2008IAL 012308The Honorable James Taylor New Mexico State Senator 3909 Camino Del Valle SWAlbuquerque, NM 87105 Re: Opinion Request - Interpretation of NMSA 1978, Section 27-5-6(B)Dear Senator Taylor: You have requested our opinion regarding the scope of a county's ability to use "planning funds" allocated under the Indigent Hospital and County Health Care Act. First, your letter asks whether it is permissible for a county to save unused funds that are allocated annually for health care planning and roll them over into "planning funds" budgets of ensuing fiscal years. Second, your letter asks whether it is permissible for a county to use planning funds to contract with a company to plan a local hospital that will serve the general population, including the indigent population, of a county. It is our understanding that in 2007, Valencia County submitted a budget to the Department of Finance and Administration ("DFA") that proposed to allocate more than ten years of unused planning funds (approximately $275,000) in order to enter into a professional services contract with a company to plan a new local, countywide hospital. It is also our understanding that DFA rejected this fiscal request in May 2007. Based on our examination of the relevant New Mexico statutes, opinions and case law authorities, and on the information available to us at this time, we conclude that the legislature did not authorize a county to save a portion of its annual planning funds in order to roll them over to ensuing fiscal years. We conclude that a county may use its annual allocation of planning funds to enter into a contract for professional services in order to plan a new local, countywide hospital. There are three rules of statutory construction that are applicable to this matter. First, a statute should be read according to its plain, written meaning. See Wilson v. Denver, 125 N.M. 308, 314, 961 P.2d 153 (1998). Second, "[a] county is but a political subdivision of the State, and it possesses only such powers as are expressly granted to it by the Legislature, together with those necessarily implied to implement those express powers." El Dorado at Santa Fe, Inc. v. Bd. of County Comm'rs, 89 N.M. 313, 317, 551 P.2d 1360, 1364 (1976). Third, "[w]hen the Legislature confers an...