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I recently attended a presentation by Supreme Court Justice Sandra Day O'Connor at the Albuquerque Convention Center's Kiva Auditorium.

O'Connor gave an inspirational speech about the many Supreme Court "firsts," from stories about the first court, which was assembled Feb. 1, 1790, to the first chief justice, John Jay, and his part in shaping the court's future role in defining law, to some personal stories about her challenges and achievements as the first woman to serve on the U.S. Supreme Court.

In the spirit of "firsts," O'Connor's presentation was hosted by the nonprofit, nonpartisan organization New Mexico First (nmfirst.org). New Mexico First was co-founded two decades ago by U.S. Sens. Pete Domenici, an Albuquerque Republican, and Jeff Bingaman, a Silver City Democrat, to engage New Mexicans in public policy formulation on topics of public interest through consensus-driven town hall meetings. At these meetings they develop actionable recommendations for policymakers to move our state forward and create a better place for us all to live and work.

In a similar spirit, I've always wondered what it would be like to compare our state to those states that rank first across a broad spectrum of categories to learn from their successes. Our local economy is certainly on the upswing because of Gov. Bill Richardson and Mayor Martin Chavez and others' leadership, and of course the efforts of groups like New Mexico First, but wouldn't it be interesting to explore this line of thinking?

In previous columns I've talked about the need for targeting more pragmatic goals for improving our economy. For example, we'd only need to increase our per capita income of $29,725 in 2006 by $45 to improve our national ranking from 45th to 44th and thereby surpass Utah, our closest competitor at a PCI of $29,769. As an alternative, I propose we target the "best of the best" instead of just the "next best."

I've always done that in my career whether at work or in college. When I encountered someone who performed better than me, I was always inspired to reach higher, work harder or put in an extra hour or more — after hours.

For example, if we set our goal as the state with the highest PCI nationwide, we'd target Delaware with a 2006 PCI of $57,358. I wonder what they're doing to achieve that "first" ranking? What can we learn from them?

Another area we may want to use for comparison could be the percentage of our population living below poverty. For example in 2004, New Hampshire had the lowest poverty rating nationwide at 6.6 percent while New Mexico came in 48th at 16.7 percent. What are they doing to maintain that lower rating? Do they have a program we could emulate? Even though we've come a long way in several categories, there are several others we may want to explore. For example, the Progressive Policy Institute's 2002 State New Economy Index (neweconomyindex.org) compares state rankings in such areas as work force education, globalization, the digital economy and innovation capacity to name just a few.

Other novel areas to compare might be our water conservation efforts and use of renewable energy, or how to create a sustainable community given our growing population, or how to lower our per capita "carbon footprint." Which states are leading the field in those areas? What are they doing and can we duplicate their efforts?

I like the idea of incremental change because it's more realistic in terms of getting the job done. And we've come a long way, no doubt. But maybe it's time to begin a dialogue about raising the bar and using those states that are No. 1 in key categories as our new bench mark of success.