ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. — Substance abuse and violent crime carry many unintended consequences, changing the lives of families in New Mexico.

Thousands of families, in fact. In many families, grandparents have to raise their grandkids. Now, new resources are coming online to help them.

“Grandparents raising grandchildren is a big issue in New Mexico. It’s a challenge raising children, especially when they’re very young. And if you haven’t been in the parenting game for a while, it can be a rough transition,” said Micah McCoy, the communications director for the New Mexico Early Childhood, Education and Care Department.

The ECECD is working to make that transition easier for grandparents raising grandchildren, especially those under five years old, with programs like home visiting.

“A home visitor will come to you at your home and provide families parenting support, connections to resources, advice on parenting and child development,” McCoy said.

They also have new family resource centers coming online in Roswell and Española. Those centers will serve as one-stop shops for families.

“A family support navigator will be able to help them get enrolled in income assistance or SNAP or Medicare, Medicaid, and help them find home visiting or childcare assistance,” McCoy said.

According to research by the LANL Foundation, tens of thousands of grandparents could use these resources. Researchers say, in 2023, there were roughly 36,000 grandparents and kin raising children in New Mexico. Six years ago, that number was 30,000.

One of the root causes in our state is alcohol and drug misuse.

“So we knew that it really was very, very important for us to start really looking at some of the things that we could do, not only as a community, but as a state, to start supporting these grandparents and kin,” said Anna Marie Garcia, the vice president of early childhood education at the LANL Foundation. “We recognized that it wasn’t enough just to support children and grandparents and parents. We really needed to focus on that whole group together. And it’s not always easy, but that is our goal.”

Garcia believes there are three aspects to stemming the growth of this issue: Advocacy, education and collaboration. She says it’s about building grandparents’ capacity to advocate for their grandkids, educating families on childhood trauma and healing, and groups collaborating to make it happen.

“We’ve talked to our policymakers, our state leaders, and everyone has been so open to looking at this issue our governor. So hopefully in the next coming years, we can really make a dent,” Garcia said.

The statistics may be shocking but Garcia says, “the care and love that we have seen from grandparents. That’s what’s staggering.”