NMHA has an excellent lobbying team and we focus a great deal of time and attention on advocacy. However, the essential ingredient in NMHA’s advocacy success is grassroots involvement by its members. There are numerous ways in which that involvement can occur and the association works very hard to equip members with information, strategies and tools to enable that involvement to occur.

Described below is some information for use by members. As new resources are developed they will be added. Please make every effort to be engaged in and do your part to protect and further the interests and issues of New Mexico’s Hospitality and Tourism industry.

Local Meetings with Legislators

No other strategy can match the results that individuals meeting with legislators can deliver. It is a must for NMHA members to meet with legislators in-district and hopefully on-site at a travel industry location. Although the best approach is for constituents to reach out to legislators with the invitation, if NMHA can assist with scheduling, please let us know. We are happy to provide customized information for your legislative meetings. If you need to identify your legislators, you can visit the Secretary of State’s website (https://www.sos.state.nm.us/legislation-and-lobbying/lookup-your-legislator/).

Leveraging Free Media

There are several opportunities for doing this:

  • Speaking Opportunities – Rotary, Kiwanis, Lions, Women’s clubs and most importantly Chambers of Commerce represent excellent opportunities to tell tourism’s local and statewide stories and to reach legislators, local officials and business leaders with our message. Local CVBs should take the lead on contacting these organizations and attempt to schedule speaking opportunities. NMHA’s CEO is available to make these presentations as her schedule permits. Local tourism directors and other key local tourism leaders should also make themselves available.
  • Op-Eds & Letters to Editors (LTE) – Opinion columns and LTEs submitted to local newspapers are important communication tools for explaining to the community at large, elected officials and local thought leaders the economic importance of tourism, how the local industry functions and how tourism marketing funds are received and used. NMHA is available to assist members in the development of op-eds and LTEs.

Social Media Campaign

NMHA shares our legislative issues on social media to keep our message in the public domain. This effort is being pushed primarily through our NMHA Facebook (@nmhospitality) account. We encourage members who have not done so to begin following NMHA and share NMHA’s messages. Additionally, we encourage all members to integrate local information and use similar messaging on their respective accounts to further drive home these points.

One Click Politics

NMHA is currently using One Click Politics to engage our members in direct communication with legislators. This platform makes it simple for our members to share our collective messages with federal, state, and local policy makers (it really is as simple as clicking a link to instantly share the message). Members can also customize the messages to reflect their individual business perspective. One Click notifications go out to our current email subscribers, so if you are not currently signed up, email kkomoll@newmexicohospitality.org to be added to the distribution list.