The way the New Mexico Public Education Department’s funding is set up, Sierra County property owners’ taxes will either pay $20.2 million to repair what’s wrong with the 40-year-old T or C Middle School, or, hopefully, if NMPED agrees to pay a larger portion than it’s required to, property owners’ taxes will pay about $10 million for a $42-million new middle school.
To get NMPED to pay a larger portion, the school district must demonstrate a “good faith” effort to raise and spend local property tax revenue. In concrete terms this means the district must tax county property owners at least $7 per $1,000 of assessed property value. It had been $10 for school districts with a student count of around 800 or more, but legislators changed the student count to 1,500 during the 2024 legislative session, allowing the T or C school district to qualify for the “waiver” of its 61 percent local/39 percent state match requirement this year.
The local school property tax is over $8 per $1,000 assessed property value and has been for years. The current three school taxes are: .49 mills for operations, 5.65 mills for debt and 1.96 mills for capital projects, which adds up to $8.09 per $1,000.
In fiscal year 2024, according to the school district’s yearly audit, available on the state auditor’s website, the .49 mills generated about $185,000, the 5.65 mills about $2.2 million and the 1.96 mills about $740,000, which is about $3.125 million total.
Getting NMPED to “waive” the school district’s 61 percent match has other hoops and requirements besides keeping the tax rates up. Participating in NMPED’s very involved yearly facilities assessment and inspections program is one of them, which ranks buildings and only considers funding the top 100 a year. The middle school is ranked number 40.
Another requirement to be considered for a match waiver is to maintain a facilities master plan. The district uses Visions In Planning of Albuquerque. School Superintendent Nichole Burgin, in a phone conversation with the Citizen, said the district worked with Visions for a year to put together the 2025-2030 facilities master plan, which was completed March 2025. Replacing the middle school is the top priority. See two excerpts from the master plan below, which lay out the repair and new-building costs. The master plan states the total for the new building is about $40 million, but some other costs have come into play since March, and Burgin is currently quoting a $42-million price tag, which includes demolition of the old building and grounds. NMPED gives them no choice about demolition, Burgin said.
Issuing bonds and getting voter approval for it is another demonstration of good-faith effort and public support. The district hired Bosque Advisors of Albuquerque, principal Mark Valenzuela, as bond counsel, who gave a presentation at the August 11 school board meeting. In conferring with NMPED, Valenzuela said it had been considering lowering the district’s local property taxes from 8.09 mills to 2.85 mills, which would have disqualified the district from a match waiver, meaning that locals would pay $25.6 million and NMPED $16.38 million for the $42 million new middle school.
Valenzuela convinced them to keep the tax close to what it is currently. The new rate for the school district tax in the upcoming year will be 8.07 mills, the NMPED has determined.
NMPED told Valenzuela that a waiver consideration would require the school district to spend down $480,000 in its capital projects fund and to issue the $1.5 million remaining on the $3 million G.O. bond voters approved November 2023.
And here’s the big one: the district needs to issue as big a G.O. bond as it can, and get it voter approved. Without raising the 5.65 debt tax, without exhausting the district’s bonding capacity and thus its ability to carry out other needed building repairs, $8 million in G.O. bonds, structured as a 20-year debt, is what Valenzuela advised.
Below is a link to the Aug. 11 agenda. Click on the highlighted-in-blue “Bond Advisor Presentation” to pull up Valenzuela’s presentation.
The people probably wouldn’t approve the $8 million if it meant higher taxes, Superintendent Burgin told the Citizen. I don’t agree. The people, in my experience, don’t know G.O. bonds could mean higher taxes, since local governments don’t tell them. Sierra Countians have never rejected a school district G.O. bond request.T or C voters approved the city’s $3 million bond issue in 2023 with an approval rating over 80 percent and then many people were shocked their property taxes more than doubled.
In the 20 years I’ve watched local government, I’ve never seen T or C, the school district or the county give town halls or do much public outreach to inform the public on any ballot question. Low information voters and low voter turn out have worked better for local governments. Burgin wrote in an email that “As we get closer we will have a town hall and advertisements to explain the bond and what it is for.”
The school board did not decide how to spend down the $480,000 in the capital projects fund or when to issue the $1.5 million in bonds which are already voter approved. School Board President Christine LaFont said the $1.5 million was intended for the new middle school. Burgin told the Citizen those expenditures will be decided in future meetings.
What the school board did approve at the August 11 meeting was an election resolution that puts the question whether to issue $8 million for capital projects. The wording on the ballot will be general, but the understanding Valenzuela and the NMPED arrived at was that the $8 million will go toward the new middle school. Please find the link to the election resolution document: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1mgdH5oyo5mRf2Et3yMnsi-Di9bCWBkKJ/edit?usp=sharing&ouid=107831210547927552813&rtpof=true&sd=true
The school district will have shown its “good faith” local-contribution effort to the tune of nearly $10 million; $480,000 plus $1.5 million plus $8 million, which should convince NMPED to spend $32 million on the $42-million new middle school. But first the people must pass the $8 million expenditure at the polls before we find out.
Valenzuela said, “the district is very deserving,” considering its tax rate and local-spending ratio is the 8th highest among the 89 school districts in the state.
If voters approve the $8 million in G.O. bonds, it will be the largest issuance the school district has ever made. According to the district’s FY2024 audit, the district owes $10 million (which includes interest) in G.O. bond debt. The bond issuances listed are mostly $1.5 million and $3 million issuances, with one $5 million issuance.
It will also add more than 80 percent to the district’s bond debt.
But it doesn’t make sense not to go for a new building. Even if locals paid $20 million for repairs, (including possible asbestos abatement) the old building still wouldn’t meet current and future education needs, which are more technology and career-technology-education driven. Burgin said the new middle school will have “an automotive component.”
The new building will also be sited on the high school campus, which will allow middle and high school students to share career-technology labs and spaces and sites as well as cafeteria and other common-use meeting and sports spaces, saving duplication costs in the future, as well as knitting secondary students together. The current middle school, for about 255 students, is about 65,000 square feet. The new one would be about 48,000 square feet.