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

SPONSOR Lopez

ORIGINAL DATE

LAST UPDATED

2/14/06

HM

SHORT TITLE

EARLY CARE & EDUCATION RETIREMENT

BENEFITS

SM 42

ANALYST Weber

APPROPRIATION (dollars in thousands)

Appropriation

Recurring

or Non-Rec

Fund

Affected

FY06

FY07

None

(Parenthesis ( ) Indicate Expenditure Decreases)

SOURCES OF INFORMATION

LFC Files

SUMMARY

Synopsis of Senate Memorial 42

Senate Memorial 42 indicates that professionally trained early childhood teachers and program

directors are essential to ensuring that quality programs are available for infants, toddlers and

preschoolers. The turnover rate of teachers is very high, between twenty-two percent and thirty-

three percent a year, according to the 2004 New Mexico early care and education workforce

study. Long-term, stable relationships are essential in the lives of the youngest children, and the

departure of teachers causes disruptions in early childhood programs and in the fabric of trust

and connection developed over time between young children and their teachers. High-quality

early childhood programs are necessary to ensure that children are ready for school when they

enter kindergarten. When early child care and education teachers gain more education and

acquire advanced degrees, they often leave early childhood programs to work in public schools,

where salaries, benefits and working conditions are substantially better. The New Mexico early

care and education workforce study indicates that one-third of early childhood teachers have no

health insurance. Many early childhood teachers are not eligible for the state coverage insurance

program because their incomes are more than two hundred percent of the federal poverty level.

The New Mexico early care and education workforce study participants listed higher pay and

better benefits as the top factors that would make teachers and program directors more likely to

remain in their jobs.

The memorial asks that the legislative health and human services committee be requested to

Senate Memorial 42 – Page 2

study the value and impact of providing medical, retirement and other benefits to early care and

education teachers and directors, identify methods to deliver and finance benefits and report its

findings and recommendations, if any, to the first session of the forty-eighth legislature; and

that a copy of this memorial be transmitted to the chair of the legislative health and human

services committee.

POSSIBLE QUESTIONS

Since it seems most of the early childhood programs are private entities what mechanism will be

used to direct public funds for this use.

MW/nt