Boon for schools
More money coming to Gallup-McKinley

Students at Gallup High School make their way to class on Friday afternoon. While teachers and administrators at the school say the new uniform policy is working and are glad is has been implemented, students thus far have been unhappy with it. — © 2009 Gallup Independent / Brian Leddy

Copyright © 2009
Gallup Independent
By Bill Donovan
Staff writer

GALLUP — The Gallup-McKinley County School District will be seeing a lot more money coming its way in the next few months from the stimulus package approved by Congress last week and possibly even more if the state Legislature approves adding to the gross receipts tax.

County School Superintendent Ray Arsenault said the district has been told by Congressman Ben Ray Lujan’s office that it will get $20 million from the funds set aside for education in the stimulus package — $14 million the first year and $6 million the second year.

However, there is a catch — the district is limited on how it can use the money.

The money can be used for counseling, special education programs ad Title I programs, among other things.

“This is not as beneficial as if you could use it for anything you want,” Arsenault said.

The district operates on an annual budget of about $170 million, so the extra funds will come in handy.

Then there’s the discussions now going on in the state Legislature that would give schools in the state some $351 million a year by adding another cent to the gross receipts tax or increasing it by one-half of one percent. Under either proposal, Gallup would be getting about $21 million more a year and these funds will not be restricted.

“I feel there is enough support to get this passed,” Arsenault said.

Another possible source of new revenue for the district is something that has been talked about for more than a decade — getting a bigger chunk of the federal impact aid money that comes to the state.

Currently three states — Nebraska, Alaska and New Mexico — keep the lion’s share of the funding and dole out only a small portion — about 5 percent — back to the school districts.

The Gallup and Zuni school districts filed a lawsuit to get all of the money several years ago, and this eventually made it to the U.S. Supreme Court, where the school lost by a one vote.

But the district has never given up on securing all of that impact aid — which would mean another $20 million or so a year to the district — and Arsenault said that the district now plans to make another attempt by working with Lujan to get a bill approved by Congress which would mandate that the states turn over the lion’s share of the impact aid to the school districts.

The issue in the court case surrounded the question of where did Congress mean for the money to go — to the states or the school district. District attorneys argued that the state had to follow the intent of the law but the Supreme Court refused to support this so the only recourse the district now has, said Arsenault, is to go back to Congress and get members there to pass a resolution spelling out in no uncertain terms where the impact aid should go.

This could have gone on several years ago, but previous district officials felt it would be better to go the court route since a favorable court decision would have given the district more than $100 million for past funds it should have received. By going to Congress, however, the district would only be able to change funding in the future and would not be given any monies retroactive to the bill’s signing.