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

SPONSOR Nava

ORIGINAL DATE

LAST UPDATED

2/12/2007

HB

SHORT TITLE

UNM CIVIC ENGAGEMENT INITIATIVE

SB 580

ANALYST Moser

APPROPRIATION (dollars in thousands)

Appropriation

Recurring

or Non-Rec

Fund

Affected

FY07

FY08

$100.0

Recurring

General Fund

(Parenthesis ( ) Indicate Expenditure Decreases)

SOURCES OF INFORMATION

LFC Files

Responses Received From

NM Department of Higher Education (HED)

Public Education Department (PED)

SUMMARY

Synopsis of Bill

Senate Bill 580 appropriates $100,000 to the University of New Mexico (UNM) for the

Community Learning and Public Service Program to continue to enhance civic education

through its web-based civic curriculum for classroom and community, and to sustain its annual

civic engagement teacher institutes.

FISCAL IMPLICATIONS

The appropriation of $100,000 contained in this bill is a recurring expense to the general fund.

Any unexpended or unencumbered balance remaining at the end of FY08 shall revert to the

general fund.

SIGNIFICANT ISSUES

HED indicates that this request was not submitted by UNM to HED for review and is not

included in the department’s funding recommendation for FY08.

Senate Bill 580 – Page

2

The Community Learning and Public Service Department at UNM has a program called New

Mexico Civic Engagement (NMCE) with the objective of preparing youth to lead New Mexico’s

future. NMCE is statewide, multicultural, and encourages youth to identify issues and partner

with adults to facilitate informed change. One of the tools used by NMCE is civic storytelling

whereby youth and adults contribute stories about societal needs and possible solutions for

addressing them. NMCE has annual summer institutes for students, teachers and sponsors that

provide instruction in how to organize, lobby and develop public forums (

www.nmce.org

).

According to NMCE, these funds will be used to update their webpage, created in 2004, and to

expand their capacity statewide through networking and teaching. Some professional

development resources for teachers will be added to the website.

GM/mt