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Senate Finance Committee votes 7-0 to raise marriage license fee to $55
Summary
The Senate Finance Committee approved Senate Bill 290 as amended, increasing the statewide marriage license fee to $55 with adjustments to how proceeds are allocated to county clerks and child services funding.
The Senate Finance Committee voted 7-0 to pass Senate Bill 290 as amended, raising the marriage license fee to $55 and adjusting how the additional revenue is split among county clerks and the Children’s Trust Fund.
Supporters told the committee the increase is intended to create a sustainable revenue source for county clerks to preserve older records and to boost funding for child services. Catherine Clark, Santa Fe County clerk, said clerks need funding to preserve historical documents: “We need a source of funding to do that. And this is a good way of keeping up with the times,” Clark said.
The bill as amended increases the fee from the prior amount to $55. Committee witnesses and sponsors described the amended distribution as allowing county clerks to retain a larger portion for records preservation while directing an additional amount to the Children’s Trust Fund; committee discussion noted that county general fund allocations would not be changed. A clerk-affiliate witness told the committee the marriage license fee “has always been $25,” and said the increase will help offices with digitization and preservation work.
Senators debated the size of the hike and asked for examples of how much additional revenue counties would receive. Committee testimony said county impacts vary: Santa Fe County issues roughly “a little bit over a thousand” marriage licenses per year because of tourism, while some rural counties may issue only a few dozen, so local revenue gains will differ by county.
Senator Gompose moved the committee recommendation of do pass as amended; the motion was seconded by Senator Padilla. The roll call recorded seven affirmative votes, zero negative votes (Senators Campos, Gonzales, Lanier, Padilla, Trujillo, Woods and Shandoh voted yes). The committee chair declared the bill passed out of committee.
The measure will move forward in the legislative process with the committee endorsement; sponsors said the change is intended primarily to fund records preservation and to increase support for the Children’s Trust Fund. No implementation date or effective date was specified in the committee discussion recorded on the transcript.
