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F I S C A L I M P A C T R E P O R T

SPONSOR Lujan, B

ORIGINAL DATE

LAST UPDATED

2/01/06

HB 621

SHORT TITLE Center for Study of Diverse Populations

SB

ANALYST Earp

APPROPRIATION (dollars in thousands)

Appropriation

Recurring

or Non-Rec

Fund

Affected

FY06

FY07

$650.0

Recurring

General Fund

(Parenthesis ( ) Indicate Expenditure Decreases)

Relates to Appropriation in the General Appropriation Act

SOURCES OF INFORMATION

LFC Files

SUMMARY

Synopsis of Bill

House Bill 621 appropriates $650,000 from the general fund to the Board of Regents of New

Mexico Highlands University (NMHU) for the Center for the Education and Study of Diverse

Populations (CESDP) to provide technical assistance and training for schools and school dis-

tricts.

FISCAL IMPLICATIONS

The appropriation of $650,000 contained in this bill is a recurring expense to the general fund.

Information provided by NMHU indicates that the requested funding would be used to employ

seven professional staff members and an administrative assistant. These personnel would im-

plement the proposed educational training and technical assistance program to schools and

school districts. Any unexpended or unencumbered balance remaining at the end of fiscal year

2007 shall revert to the general fund.

This appropriation would augment a recurring line-item appropriation for CESDP which is con-

tained in the annual General Appropriation Act. For fiscal year 2006, the Center received an ap-

propriation of $210,100.

House Bill 621 – Page

2

SIGNIFICANT ISSUES

This proposal was not included among the special program funding requests submitted by

NMHU to the Higher Education Department (HED) for review. Consequently, this proposal has

not been included in the HED fiscal year 2007 funding recommendations to the Legislature.

ADMINISTRATIVE IMPLICATIONS

NMHU currently provides administrative support for the Center for the Education and Study of

Diverse Populations. No significant additional administrative impact is anticipated if this legis-

lation is adopted.

OTHER SUBSTANTIVE ISSUES

NMHU reports that the Center for the Education and Study of Diverse Populations (CESDP) was

established by the New Mexico State Legislature in 1993 in order to address the unique and di-

verse educational needs of the state. During the past 10 years, CESDP has developed over 90

separate projects that have been funded totaling $31,500,000. More specifically, over 45 separate

projects have been funded by the New Mexico Public Education Department totaling almost $7.5

million.

NMHU reports that the US Department of Education ended the delivery of training and technical

assistance to school districts and tribal education agencies in October of 2005. This was replaced

by a new federal system of technical assistance delivery directed primarily at state departments

of education. This change had the greatest impact on small rural and diverse states like New

Mexico who do not have the level of fiscal resources to maintain effective programs of training

and professional development.

NMHU states that the CESDP is fully poised to fill the void through the delivery of high quality

training and technical assistance activities to local school districts, tribes and pueblos statewide

with the resource support of the New Mexico State Legislature. Under HB 621, the CESDP in-

tends to provide educational training and technical assistance to schools and school districts

statewide with an emphasis on Northern New Mexico. The training will be aligned with New

Mexico’s School Improvement Framework and will provide targeted assistance to low perform-

ing schools and districts struggling to meet the mandates of the federal No Child Left Behind

Act. All efforts will be targeted at improving teacher and administrator practice in an attempt to

help lower the achievement gap in New Mexico.

DKE/nt