RGF has remained steadfastly opposed to subsidies for the film and television industries in New Mexico. Nonetheless, we had remained on the sidelines on HB 379 which originally was written to increase the subsidy for TV shows from 25% to 30%. In and of itself, that was not too big a problem as the subsidy was capped at $50 million and TV shows like “Breaking Bad” do have a longer-term presence unlike movies which come and go freely with little lasting impact.

Unfortunately, a separate provision was later added into the bill that would allow the unused cap space to “roll over” to following years. Thus, if $10 million were not used this year, the cap would be $60 million. This is not good as it adds uncertainty back into the program. This provision alone merits a veto or at least a veto of that line-item if possible. Oh, and union rep John Hendry has no idea what he’s talking about when he says “We bring more money in than we spend on these film incentives. This idea that it’s costing the state of New Mexico a penny is absurd.” Economists left, right, and center have come to the same conclusion that these subsidies are economically-harmful.

Now, as KOB-TV reports, Gov. Martinez is upset (justifiably) because the Legislature has not given funding for merit-based teacher pay. Again, this proposal is something worth considering and the refusal to fund it shows that when it comes to education reform, many in the Legislature are not serious. Check out the KOB TV story here.

UPDATE: Gov. Martinez has vetoed the “Breaking Bad” Bill.

SB 15 is innocuously titled “Campaign Finance Requirements.” And, it passed the Senate with NO opposition. Does that means it’s a good bill? Absolutely not.

According to the Center for Competitive Politics, SB 15 “proposes to create broad and burdensome disclosure requirements for individuals and organizations that make communications to the public that merely mention the name of a candidate in a specified time period before a primary or general election.”

The case against SB 15 goes on, saying:

The disclosure information required by S.B. 15 could also result in the harassment of individuals by their political opponents, and the proposed reporting thresholds for organizations speaking before the public on an issue could result in “junk disclosure” by associating a donor with a communication they have no knowledge of or may not even support.

In short, the language in S.B. 15 is so broadly defined that in order to comply with the bill’s far-reaching reporting requirements, it’s likely that many groups will instead opt not to speak. “This legislation proposes extensive and burdensome reporting and disclosure requirements that could chill the speech of many organizations,” said Nese. “If this bill is signed into law, a nonprofit organization in New Mexico that publishes a simple scorecard rating of legislator votes on its website could be forced to fill out complex paperwork with the state and reveal many of its donors.”

UPDATE: This bill will be heard on the floor of the House of Representatives and Senate prior to the conclusion of the 2013 session. Contact your legislators today!

If you haven’t already purchased your tickets for our upcoming luncheon on Margaret Thatcher on the 25th, our reception in Santa Fe later that day, and our breakfast in Albuquerque on Tuesday, you need to do so by Monday in order to get the best price.

More noteworthy is that it is women who are leading the charge for liberty here in New Mexico. It has been well-documented that we have the nation’s first Latina Governor, a conservative, but even in the Legislature, women are showing a strong resolve to vote for freedom. With just a day or so remaining in the 2013 legislative session, I logged on to our “Freedom Index” vote tracking site and noticed that the top five legislators in terms of pro freedom votes are ALL women. Reps. Herrell, Brown, Crook, Ezzell, and Espinoza currently hold the first five slots in the analysis of the voting patterns of New Mexico’s legislators when it comes to pro/anti liberty issues.

As if having such a strong contingent of pro-liberty women in the Legislature were not enough, I have always been struck by the large number of women who lead business and industry groups around New Mexico. Here is a (partial), by no means exhaustive list of women who lead pro-freedom, pro-business organizations in New Mexico (if I’m missing anyone, email me at info@riograndefoundation.org)

Terri Cole, Albuquerque Chamber;
Beverlee McClure, Association of Commerce and Industry;
Carol Wight, New Mexico Restaurant Association;
Minda McGonagle, National Federation of Independent Businesses New Mexico;
Karin Foster, Independent Petroleum Association of New Mexico;
Carla Sonntag, New Mexico Business Coalition
Marita Noon, Citizens Alliance for Responsible Energy
Lynne Anderson, NAIOP

Check out the following chart from the Heritage Foundation:

Another legislation is almost over and the Legislature has once again done nothing to improve educational performance in our state which so often trails the nation (which in turn trails the world) in educational performance.

Interestingly enough, the Obama Administration (unlike many Democrats in the Legislature) has actually been quite supportive of Gov. Martinez’s reforms. Now, we have Peter Orszag, Obama’s former Office of Management and Budget head, has written this article detailing how standardized tests can and should be used to evaluate teachers.

The use of such standardized testing to even partially evaluate New Mexico teachers has been anathema to the unions which have effectively killed any and all such reforms. Now, are standardized tests perfect? No. If we had a truly free market education system where resources were commanded by parents and children, not bureaucrats and politicians, they could choose whatever method of teacher evaluation they wanted. But that is not the reality. Standardized tests, imperfect as they are, accurately measure teacher effectiveness. Unfortunately, that accountability is not welcome in the world of education.

HT: George Richmond

Over the weekend, the Albuquerque Journal ran an excellent story on the UNM Campus in Rio Rancho, built at a cost to taxpayers of $13.5 million, which is severely underutilized. The story details the paucity of students who take classes on the campus and includes interviews with several local politicians who attempt to defend the white elephant.

Of course, the proliferation of college campuses is right in line with previous RGF research on the topic of New Mexico’s many college campuses and the fact that these buildings are too often built for “economic development” purposes and not due to actual demand.

This “build first, ask questions later” attitude is common in government, but especially common here in New Mexico. And, if you think it has gone away, you better think again. For one example, check out the scope of UNMH’s Master plan which includes adding an astonishing 1.5 million sq/ft of office space by 2020. And yet the plan spends more time discussing sculpture gardens than it does analyzing the budget or any demonstrated demand for that kind of massive development.

Are you or someone you know qualified to be a principal at a New Mexico school? New Mexico Connections Academy is hiring a principal to head up the unique virtual school which will open this coming fall. If you are a go-getter and interested in getting involved in this innovative educational option, check out the job qualifications and apply.

(Albuquerque) Responding to the ongoing debate over whether to increase state government employee pay in New Mexico, the Rio Grande Foundation has produced a new report, “Public v. Private Sector: Income Differences in New Mexico” that attempts to create an “apples to apples” comparison of the overall compensation of workers in the public and private sectors.

According to the Foundation’s analysis, New Mexico government workers are paid an 8.6 percent premium over their private sector counterparts.

“It is widely known and reflected in our report,” notes policy analyst Ben Sugg, “that government workers give up some upfront pay in exchange for more generous health care, pension, and time-off/retirement. The question is whether those ‘fringe benefits’ lead to relatively higher pay for workers in New Mexico’s state government or not.”

The Rio Grande Foundation analysis used a statistical technique called “Regression Analysis” in order to better understand the differences in pay among various types of workers. Regression analysis is a statistical technique for estimating the relationships among variables. In this paper, it is used to account for the relevant differences between state and private sector workers.

According to the report’s findings using regression analysis, despite having not received a raise since 2008, New Mexico’s public sector workers remain better-paid overall than their equivalents in the private sector. That difference is 8.6 percent. Read the brief for yourself here.

Update, appropriate to this study, check out this new article from Albuquerque Business First which states that “Private employers paid their workers an average of $28.89 an hour in wages and benefits in December 2012, while state and local governments paid an average of $41.94 an hour according to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics.”

One of the tricky things about economics is that isolated instances or well-publicized stories (like a factory closing or a big store opening) can lead to inaccurate assumptions about the world around us. I today’s Albuquerque Journal business section, I attempt to explain that we need to use data not anecdotes when dealing with New Mexico’s economy and overall economic health.

Letter writer Christopher Timm misunderstands the work of my Foundation and others who are concerned about New Mexico’s weak economy. He cites the fact that new businesses open in our area “all the time” as a refutation of our repeated statements that our state’s economic situation is dire.

In a state of more than 2 million people, jobs and businesses will come and go. Usually no single business opening or closing will by itself drive the economy. The question, rather, is “how does New Mexico stack up relative to other states?” On this score we don’t fare so well.

Our poverty rate is the highest in the nation according to the Census Bureau; Economic freedom (according to the Canadian Fraser Institute) is worst among the states; according to The Economist, New Mexico is the most economically-reliant state on an increasingly erratic federal government, and our state has been losing jobs year-over-year since June 2011 while states throughout the west have been adding jobs. We were also named the top “Death Spiral” state by Forbes and made it onto the list of states from which people are moving (the only western state to do so) in a recent United Van Lines report.

Most depressing is the fact that the leadership in our Legislature would rather raise the economically-harmful minimum wage and throw more money at the film industry and a broken education system than make the tough choices needed to turn our state around.

Paul J. Gessing
President
Rio Grande Foundation
PO Box 40336
Albuquerque, NM 87196
505-264-6090

Although we are far apart when it comes to public policy, I’d always gotten along personally with Sen. Jerry Ortiz y Pino. Unfortunately, when someone starts spreading lies about you in a public forum, that respect can evaporate in a hurry. So it happened during the ongoing show-trial of Secretary-designate Hanna Skandera in the Senate Rules Committee on Saturday.

Go to the video and fast-forward to the 1 hour mark. After stating accurately that I am a prolific op-ed and letter writer in the local media, Ortiz y Pino falsely claims that I am making 2% off of the contract for New Mexico Connections Academy. He goes on to state that (correctly) Rio Grande Foundation won’t be running the school, but goes on to falsely claim that Connections will be running the school.

Before making false claims in a public form in order to hurt Skandera, Ortiz should have checked his facts. I would have informed the Senator that:

1) I am just one of the members of New Mexico Connections Academy’s Governing Council, nothing more, nothing less;

2) Rio Grande Foundation, the organization which I run, has no direct involvement in New Mexico Connections Academy. We have researched and philosophically support school choice and digital learning options;

3) I and my colleagues on the Governing Council are not compensated by Connections Academy or anyone else for our work;

4) The Governing Council of New Mexico Connections Academy made up of New Mexico citizens “manages” the school not our curriculum/virtual learning partner.

The mail-in election in Albuquerque is turning into a debacle with more than 10 percent of votes being thrown out due to lack of signatures. Democrats are saying “count every vote” and are naturally critical of City Clerk Amy Bailey.

Of course, we were critical of the process at the outset and recognize that voting entirely by mail is problematic and should probably be abandoned entirely.

Rather than just blindly counting every vote in what is clearly a problematic process, how about just tossing the entire election out and putting the issue on the ballot at a time when turnout might be more respectable and when voters can show up in person? Just a thought and throwing out the election seems to be no further beyond the bounds of city law than “counting every vote” in a way that clearly violates the law.

Albuquerque’s City Council has signed on with $1.5 million of taxpayer money in support of a “hub” economic development concept from Florida. On one hand, we totally understand and appreciate Mayor Berry’s efforts to do something to spur economic growth independent of the federal government in Albuquerque.

Unfortunately, we remain skeptical about the likelihood of an investment of $1.5 million of city tax money (or more as the project develops) having the kinds of impacts seen in Florida. Rather, we’d like to see New Mexico’s liberal legislators wake up and realize that Florida’s success is driven by:

1) Having no personal income tax;
2) Being a “Right to Work” state;
3) An improving education system in which reforms (instituted by leaders like Hanna Skandera with the support of legislators) have led to dramatic improvement in areas like 4th grade reading. Check Florida vs. New Mexico.

These are just a few of the biggest reasons why entrepreneurs and small businesses are likely to set up shop in Florida and not New Mexico. I don’t know if the $1.5 million that City Council allocated to this “hub” concept will be wasted or not, but chances for success would be much higher if New Mexico embraced the business-friendly policies found in Florida.

Thanks to the folks at New Mexico’s Human Services Department for the following information on how fewer and fewer workers are paying the bills for the state’s Medicaid and SCI programs. Of course, this problem will be exacerbated by the ObamaCare Medicaid expansion.

With just a few weeks left in the 2013 legislative session, the wheat is beginning to separate from the chaff among legislators in terms of pro-and anti-freedom votes in the New Mexico Legislature.

Click here to access the site.

The good news is that two bills (both of them positive in terms of freedom) have passed both houses at this point.
Under the “Index Summary” tab, you can see how many points, positive or negative, your legislator has earned so far this session;

Under the “Compare Parties” tab you can find out which of the two parties in Santa Fe are voting FOR freedom and which are voting AGAINST freedom;

The “Legislators” tab allows you to look at details of each legislator;

The “Legislator Record” allows users to see which bills are included in the analysis and whether they are pro or anti-freedom;

The “Rated Legislation” tab allows users to access analyses for each bill included in the report and better understand the ratings.

Unfortunately, not much in the way of needed reforms has passed out of either house this session to date. Fewer bills have made it through both houses.

And, so far, the following priorities have either been killed completely or are on “life support.”

No “Right to Work;”

No pro-business tax reforms;

No serious effort at deregulation;

No school choice; and

No serious education reforms;

Our tracking site called “Freedom Index” allows users to see how all members of both parties are voting on freedom issues. More importantly, users (including legislators) can find out how pro-or anti-freedom various pending bills are.

With less than two weeks left in the legislative session, a lot can happen. We’re not impressed with the lack of action on some of the big economic and educational problems facing the state, but we remain hopeful that some additional pro-freedom reforms can take place in the closing days of the session. Be sure to contact your legislators to share your views with them.

SB 416 has passed the New Mexico Senate on a party line vote. The bill raises the minimum wage, but as reported, the bill excludes businesses with fewer than 11 workers and farm and ranch workers.

I don’t get it. Why would those who claim to see an increase in the minimum wage as some kind of human rights issue not include employees of small businesses or farm and ranch workers? Farm and ranch workers, by the way, have some of the most dangerous jobs in the nation…far more dangerous than being a cop or fire fighter and yet these well-paid government workers can retire after a mere 20 years with generous pensions.  One might think that this legislation is based on political concerns as opposed to maximizing worker benefits….

And to top it all off, Sen. Bill Sharer tried to amend the minimum wage bill to $21.87 in Committee, but advocates of the wage floor voted against it. An $8.50 an hour wage is only good for a $17,680 annual salary. Why are the Democrats being so cheap? Sharer’s amendment would have set a minimum wage of $45,490. Now THAT is a real living wage! Since we have already accepted the “fact” that government bureaucrats and politicians can arbitrarily impose higher wages with no negative repercussions, I don’t understand the reluctance to go with the higher wage rate. Imagine all the extra money that’ll be pumped into the economy!!!!

While a great deal has been said and written about the minimum wage and its economic impact, the Heritage Foundation busts 5 myths of the minimum wage here.  

On February 15th, state officials and the Environmental Protection Agency resolved their long running dispute over the regulation of haze-causing emissions from the San Juan Generating Station, an 1,800 megawatt coal-fired power plant near Farmington that is operated by PNM resources.

As a result of the proposed settlement, EPA got what it wanted, and PNM reaped a windfall. Indeed, the only losers were the state’s electricity ratepayers: They’re on the hook for almost $400 million, in order to achieve dubious environmental benefits.

At issue is a Clean Air Act regulation known as Regional Haze, the purpose of which is to improve the view at national parks. Before last Friday’s settlement, the parties had disagreed what Regional Haze controls were appropriate for the San Juan Generating Station. In July 2011, state officials proposed a plan for the power plant that would cost PNM ratepayers $36 million. A month later, EPA imposed a Regional Haze plan that would cost an estimated $375 million.

New Mexico then sued EPA. In the spring of 2012, state officials initiated negotiations with EPA and PNM, in an attempt to reach a settlement in lieu of litigation. Last Friday’s announcement was the culmination of those negotiations.

The proposed deal would shutter two of the San Juan Generating Station’s boilers, totaling almost 770 megawatts of electricity capacity. This generation would be replaced with a new 150 – 200 megawatt natural gas plant. The state’s preferred Regional Haze controls would be retrofitted onto the remaining two boilers. According to PNM, the plan would cost $400 to $430 million.

So who won and who lost?

PNM is the big winner. Utilities always have an incentive to make large capital expenditures, because doing so increases the rate base on which they earn a guaranteed return. Thanks to the proposed settlement, PNM gets to build an expensive new natural gas plant, and it will earn about 10% in guaranteed profits for every dollar it spends.

EPA won, too. The San Juan Generating Station becomes the latest casualty in the agency’s war on coal. In 2008, then-Senator Barack Obama told the San Francisco Chronicle editorial board that he would “bankrupt” the coal industry, if elected. Now, EPA is executing the President’s campaign promise. Notably, former EPA Region 6 administrator Al Armendariz, who was responsible for the Regional Haze federal plan imposed on the San Juan Generating Station, now works at Sierra Club’s ‘Beyond Coal’ campaign.

New Mexico, on the other hand, lost big. Truth be told, it is unclear what state officials were thinking. New Mexico originally objected to EPA’s Regional Haze plan because it cost an order of magnitude more than the state’s plan. (EPA’s plan cost $375 million; New Mexico’s plan cost $36 million.) Yet state officials negotiated an alternative agreement that cost at least $400 million—i.e., it is more expensive than the draconian regulation it replaces.

New Mexico’s bargaining strategy is all the more perplexing in light of the fact that state was in a great position to beat the EPA in court. Because Regional Haze is an aesthetic regulation—rather than a public health measure—the Congress wanted the states to be the lead decision makers. As articulated by the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals, “states…play the lead role in designing and implementing Regional Haze programs.” Given the unique primacy accorded to states on visibility policy by the law, EPA’s decision to impose a federal Regional Haze plan rested on shaky legal grounds.

New Mexico’s lawsuit was further bolstered by the absence of an appreciable environmental benefit attendant to EPA’s Regional Haze plan. According to peer reviewed research, there is only a a 35 percent chance that the average person could perceive the “improvement” in visibility achieved by EPA’s controls over the state’s measure.

In abandoning promising litigation and instead adopting last week’s announced settlement, state officials appear to have snatched defeat from the jaws of victory.

William Yeatman is an energy policy analyst at the Competitive Enterprise Institute, a free market think tank in Washington, D.C.

The Rio Grande Foundation will be hosting a series of events with author John Blundell on his two books, “Margaret Thatcher: A Portrait of the Iron Lady” and “Ladies for Liberty: Women Who Made a Difference in American History.”

There will be a luncheon in Albuquerque on Thatcher on Monday, March 25;

An evening reception on “Ladies for Liberty” in Santa Fe on Monday, March 25; and

A breakfast on Lady Thatcher in Albuquerque on Tuesday, March 26.

Reserve your seat at one or more of these events today!

We have two recent newspaper columns, one by Ron Stern, the CEO of Lovelace, the other by Bernalillo County Commissioner Maggie Hart Stebbins. Stern argues that a bed-sharing agreement could save taxpayers hundreds of millions of dollars while Stebbins says that is not the case. I happen to agree with Stern, so I want to address the points Stebbins makes in today’s paper.

Stebbins’ first point is that UNMH is New Mexico’s only Level 1 trauma center and that such patients cannot be shifted to other hospitals. It is true that UNMH is the state’s only Level 1 trauma center and it is also true that shifting those patients to other hospitals is not a workable solution, but that doesn’t mean that every patient at UNMH is a “Level 1” patient that could not be shifted elsewhere. It has been noted that many of the new beds at the $146 million UNMH expansion will be “elective.” These are not Level 1 by definition.

The Commissioner’s other point is that Medicaid expansion will create an influx of additional patients into New Mexico’s health care system. This may be true, but it doesn’t follow that New Mexico will need more Level 1 trauma beds or even another hospital. In fact, it would be far more cost-effective to build community clinics that help avoid the need for high-cost emergency rooms.

Stebbins seems to be saying that more people will get shot or will have car accidents when Medicaid is expanded. That is just silly.

There is no doubt that easy solutions to our local health care issues are scarce, but the onus of proof must be on those looking to construct this expensive, taxpayer-financed hospital. It seems that Lovelace has made a reasonable proposal for an alternative. Opponents of that solution must come up with some better arguments than those put forth by Stebbins.

The New Mexico House of Representatives has passed legislation that would tap the State’s permanent fund for more education spending. Supporters claim that spending more money on K-12 is an “investment in the future.”

Regardless of the tenuous connection between education spending and results (New Mexico is in the middle of the pack when it comes to education spending, but at the bottom in results), the fact is that New Mexico’s education system seems to be mis-allocating resources. One thing is definitely true, according to a new report (see table 8) from the Friedman Foundation for Educational Choice, “New Mexico is one of 21 states that employs fewer teachers than administrators and other non-teaching staff.”

We certainly don’t have much use for the “Three Tiered Licensing System” which according to the Legislative Finance Committee “has not improved student performance with (increased) taxpayer investments in teacher pay.”

So, in conclusion, the proposed constitutional amendment would tap the permanent fund to the tune of $60 million annually (starting out) as a political payoff to the unions, nothing more, nothing less.

Secretary Designate for Education, Hanna Skandera, has been under attack by the status quo crowd (led by the unions) since day one. Why? She supports reforms to our educational system — like charter schools, digital learning, A-F grading of schools, elimination of social promotion, and “pay for teacher performance” that upset the status quo.

This issue is about to come to a head as confirmation hearings have been scheduled in the Senate Rules Committee. Skandera has been performing the role as “Secretary Designate” as no confirmation hearings have been held, but we believe that opponents of education reform are looking to oust Skandera from her job by getting a “No” vote on the Senate floor.

Skandera’s approval of a “virtual” charter school of which I am on the board may have been the final straw, but there is no doubt that the unions and the establishment that have given us a 49th in the nation education system are gearing up to defend their turf (this has nothing to do with educating our kids, of course).

It is time for New Mexicans who support increasing the number of educational options available to step up and make themselves heard. Let the members of Senate Rules know what you think. Let your senator know that you support Skandera’s efforts to reform education in New Mexico. The initial hearing is this Friday morning at 8:30am with a vote on the senate floor likely to occur in the days ahead.

Update: check out this story from reporter Rob Nikolewski on Skandera and US Education Secretary not having “classroom experience.” I actually disagree with the assessment that Skandera is not a “qualified, experienced educator” as required in the Constitution.

According to her bio: “taught Education Policy at Pepperdine University’s Graduate School of Public Policy.”

So, in order to teach in New Mexico, you can be at APS or Cobre, but Pepperdine doesn’t cut it?

In the days prior to the 2013 legislative session I visited Fred Martino at KRWG TV in Las Cruces to discuss the legislative session. We taped two segments of the program that recently aired and our now available online. See the segments below:

Recently it was reported that New Mexico’s proposed health insurance exchange has “stalled.” The article cited inaction from the Martinez Administration and a conflict of vision among legislators for the lack of “progress.” Everyone in the article seemed to be in agreement that failure to create a new exchange was a bad thing.

I couldn’t disagree more.

The purported demise of New Mexico’s state-run ObamaCare health insurance exchange is a good thing, not a bad one. RGF opposed ObamaCare “exchanges” from the start (even when they were a Republican idea during the Richardson Administration).

Now, it is true that the federal government will set up an exchange in New Mexico if the state doesn’t do it, but the good news is, as health care policy expert Michael Cannon writes:

Defaulting to a federal exchange exempts a state’s employers from the employer mandate — a tax of $2,000 per worker per year (the tax applies to companies with more than 50 employees, but for such companies that tax applies after the 30th employee, not the 50th). If all states did so, that would also exempt 18 million Americans from the individual mandate’s tax of $2,085 per family of four. Avoiding those taxes improves a state’s prospects for job creation, and protects the conscience rights of employers and individuals whom the Obama administration is forcing to purchase contraceptives coverage.

So, there you have it. The demise of a state-run exchange will exempt thousands of New Mexicans from an unnecessary tax increase.

Exchanges are NOT free market health reform. They have NOT been effective in states like Utah which has had an exchange for several years and upon which Gov. Martinez’a plan was based.

There ARE several market-based reforms out there and we published this report detailing a few of them back in 2008.

The wailing and gnashing of teeth over the impending federal sequestration, one might be led to believe that these are some really serious cuts. Check out the chart below from Tad DeHaven at the Cato Institute:

Of course, President Obama wants us all to believe that the sun would not rise and that we’d all starve if it were not for the benevolence of our “friends” in Washington. That is why he is putting out these lists of horribles to dramatize the draconian cuts we’ll see in the Land of Enchantment.

As I’ve noted before on this site, it is amazing we all feel worse off these days than we did say in 2000, since the federal government spends so much more more of our money on our behalf. It makes me wonder how America survived when Washington spent “only” 18% of our GDP rather than the 24%-plus it spends today. Oh, and unemployment back then was 4.2% as well as opposed to the 7.8% rate currently.

So, federal spending should fall. It NEEDS to fall. A federal government that consumes less of our economic output would be a good thing. Is sequester the best way to shrink Washington? Not by a long shot. The cuts are way too small and they don’t touch so-called entitlements which will ultimately make the federal budget unsustainable. Will sequestration be a debacle for the US economy? Only if the Obama Administration makes it one in order to prove a political point.

Tomorrow, the Public Education Commission (PEC), an elected, advisory board to the Public Education Department (PED) and it’s Secretary-Designee, Hanna Skandera, will consider an unprecedented move by the PEC to appeal the secretary’s actions on two charter schools to district court.

The PEC had denied the charters for New Mexico Connections Academy (NMCA) (of which I’m on the board), a statewide virtual school and Taos International School. Under state law, these charter schools were able to appeal to the secretary. She recently overturned the denial. The PEC agenda (see link) shows the body going into a executive session with their attorney to discuss “pending litigation.”

State law says, “If the secretary finds that the chartering authority acted arbitrarily or capriciously, rendered a decision not supported by substantial evidence or did not act in accordance with law, the secretary may reverse the decision of the chartering authority and order the approval of the charter with or without conditions. The decision of the secretary shall be final.”

The Rio Grande Foundation supports school choice, Skandera’s decision to offer more options to students in New Mexico, and state law which says the decision of the secretary is final.