Public Education Secretary Kurt Steinhaus
PED News:
SANTA FE – The Public Education Department is tapping into the Emergency Transportation Fund to allocate nearly $2.7 million to New Mexico school districts and state-chartered schools to offset the rising cost of fuel.
The cost of a gallon of gas has risen 82 cents on average since most school transportation contracts were signed last summer.
“We have the Emergency Transportation Fund for situations like this when – through no fault of their own – districts and schools face an extraordinary increase in the cost of getting students to and from school and school-supported activities,” Public Education Secretary Kurt Steinhaus said. “This funding is offered in the same spirit as legislation Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham signed last month giving New Mexicans tax rebates to offset inflation.”
“This is a perfect and appropriate use of the Emergency Transportation Fund,” said Antonio Ortiz, the department’s director of Finance and Operations. “Without this money, school districts would have to absorb these costs some other way, perhaps from operations budgets, and contractors would likely face financial losses.”
The emergency funding must be spent by the end of the fiscal year on June 30.
The amount each district/charter receives will be based on the average of the total miles driven as reported at 80 days and 120 days, divided by the average of 8 miles per gallon used by most school vehicles. Amounts range from $467,888 for Albuquerque Public Schools, the state’s largest district, to $538 for South Valley Prep, a charter school in Albuquerque with about 160 students.
Every year, districts and charters receive a transportation allocation from the PED. At the end of the year, districts normally are required to return half of whatever remains unspent to PED for the Emergency Transportation Fund. At the start of the current fiscal year, the fund had about $2.7 million, but that amount increased over the year because the Legislature required 100% of the unspent FY21 funding to be returned to PED since the COVID pandemic reduced transportation needs in that year.
