$27M education cuts loom for NM

news@dailylobo.com

New Mexico public education will see a $27.3 million slash in its budget starting January of next year.

The hit is the result of federal nondefense funding cuts. New Mexico will lose a total of $41 million, thanks to the Budget Control Act that Congress passed in 2011. The act allows for automatic cuts in federal spending, called sequestration cuts, from 2013 to 2021. A large portion of the cutbacks will come from the education sector.

GPSA President Marisa Silva said that while defense will also be affected by budget reductions, the nondefense cuts will be far more devastating.

“When I see this kind of proposed cuts and that it’s coming equally from the spheres of defense and nondefense, the first thing I ask is ‘When are we going to realize that you can’t eat a missile?’” she said.

New Mexico public education took the hardest hit in the state. The $27.3 million the state’s public education will lose in 2013 alone accounts for 66 percent of total nondefense cuts in the state.

Some of the programs affected by sequestration will include Head Start, special education and Title I grants, which fund after-school programs for public schools with children who come from low-income families.

The remaining 44 percent of cuts will affect labor and health and human services with impacts on Medicare, Social Security and unemployment programs.

Silva said making automatic cuts is a mistake because there is no way to tell what will happen during a given fiscal year. She also said that without investing in human capital, the economy will suffer even more than it is now.

“With education I think we’ve been underfunding as compared to our international, industrialized nation peers for years,” she said. “And by continuing to decrease this is certainly not helping us solve the economic crisis or come out of a downturn.”

Muraida said ASUNM will work closely with the Office of Government and Community Relations and the New Mexico Legislature to address concerns surrounding funding. She urged members of the community to get involved as well.

“Be familiar and in touch with those people who represent you at the decision-making table,” she said. “You are a constituent of those representatives, so you have the power to communicate with them. And it’s imperative that people do.”