Report Links New Mexico In-Office Mandate to Increased Sick Leave

In February 2023, New Mexico state government employees who had been working remotely during the pandemic were brought back to the office, per a mandate from New Mexico Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham.

Nearly three years later, a New Mexico State Personnel Office (SPO) report finds the amount of sick leave taken by state employees has steadily risen during that time; an increase the state’s labor union leaders say is likely an outgrowth of the governor’s decision to curtail telework options for state employees.

As reported by the Albuquerque Journal, data from New Mexico’s State Personnel Office found the state’s approximately 17,600 employees taking more than 1.6 million hours of paid sick leave during the 2024 budget year. That’s an increase from about 1.4 million hours in 2022, and roughly 1.1 million hours during the 2021 fiscal year, according to the SRO report.

“People are using sick leave now that we don’t have telework,” Megan Green, president of Communications Workers of America. Local 7076, told the Journal.

Linsey Hurst, the union’s vice president, told the media outlet that she’s had to use nearly all of her accrued sick leave in recent months after dealing with COVID-19 and another serious virus, adding that an option to work remotely would have likely enabled her to get back to work sooner.

“Everyone reacts differently to having someone coughing in the office than they used to,” Hurst said in an interview with the Journal.

Others weren’t so certain that Grisham’s edict is solely responsible for the spike in sick leave usage.

For example, State Personnel Director Dylan Lange told the Journal that this uptick could be tied to a 2020 budget year change that increased the amount of sick leave state employees accrued per pay period from 3.69 hours to four hours, or a total of 104 hours annually.

“If you have more, you’re going to use more,” Lange said.

Overall, the cost of sick leave taken by New Mexico state employees in 2024 was roughly $51.3 million, or nearly double the $25.7 million cost the state incurred three years earlier, according to the State Personnel Office.