The New Mexico State Legislature ended its special session, intended to close an estimated $700 million gap in the budget, on Oct. 26.

Public education did not receive as large of cuts as some had initially projected. The estimates went as high as 10 percent, according to a letter from Sen. Tim Jennings (D-Roswell).

The final cut was two percent, but because the state is picking up the property insurance tab, the effective cut is .8 percent. Other agencies, however, did not escape the budget knife. Most state agencies will see a seven percent cut. Public education accounts for roughly 43 percent of the state’s $5.5 billion budget.

“We’re looking at the reality of the value education brings to the table,” said Sen. John Sapien (D-Corrales). “We’re not putting a hierarchy on our state employees and I don’t feel that our state employees have less value than educators. I looked at it from a standpoint of the exponential value of education and what any cuts would do to our educational system.”

Senate Bill 24, which passed the state legislature, appropriates $29 million from the Public School Capital Outlay Fund to the New Mexico Public School Insurance Authority to pay for property insurance premiums.

Sapien explained that property insurance premiums cost school districts, on the average, 1.2 percent of a district’s operating budget. Thus the two percent cut is offset by the 1.2 percent payment bringing the cut to an effective .8 percent.

SB 25 allows school districts to make temporary cash transfers into their operational accounts from revenue they have not yet spent from their buildings and grounds maintenance funds. The bill requires those funds be paid back and that a schedule is established at the time of the transfer.

As of press time, Gov. Bill Richardson has not yet signed any of the legislation into law. He has until Nov. 12 to sign the bills.

Rio Rancho Public Schools spokeswoman Kim Vesely said the district didn’t want to make any firm plans until the governor made his final decision.

“At this point the governor hasn’t signed anything and we’re waiting to see what comes out when the governor acts,” Vesely said. “We don’t want to speculate until we see what happens.”

As for SB 24 and SB 25, she said those bills would help.

The school board is scheduled to discuss the budget and what actions to take on Nov. 9.

RRPS’s operating budget for Fiscal Year 2010, which started July 1, is $102.2 million in revenue and $103.8 million in expenses, with the shortfall being covered with cash reserves.

Of the district’s revenue, $98.4 million comes from the state.

The operational budget supports teaching and learning in the classroom. The district uses 69 percent of the budget for salaries and 20 percent for employee benefits. Five percent of the district’s budget is for utilities and 1.4 percent is devoted to insurance. A little more than five percent of the operation budget goes to miscellaneous expenses.

State lawmakers will now look forward to January, when they must craft a budget for Fiscal Year 2011, facing a potential $1 billion shortfall.

One of the primary sources of revenue for the state is oil and gas royalties. While Sapien said he hasn’t crafted an opinion on whether or not to relax regulation on the oil and gas industry, he did say there must be discussion on the topic.

“If this economy doesn’t turn around and I’m a hopeful guy but I’m also pragmatic, we will look at this,” Sapien said. “Unless we look at tax increases, we have to look at becoming more efficient. We have to look at every avenue to stabilize the revenues in our state.”

Sapien, who is the grandson of a rancher, said he takes conservation to heart.

“I’m all for keeping our land beautiful,” he said. “If we’re going to live in a world where we have regulation that affects our revenues then either we find different revenues or we look at old standby revenues and how to enhance it.”