Santa Fe Community College, N.M., leaders are hoping taxpayers will vote for a $17 million bond that will allow the college to build a new auto repair facility, renovate the campus fitness center and upgrade the school's technological systems.
This is the first time in eight years that the college, which opened in 1983, has asked voters to support property tax increases to help pay for capital improvements, interim college President Cecilia Cervantes told a crowd of about 25 people during a Thursday presentation at the college.
"We are very judicious in coming forward and asking the community to support us," she said.
The college is teaming with Santa Fe Public Schools for a joint election that takes place Feb. 6, although early voting has begun and continues through Feb. 3. The school district is asking voters to renew a six-year, 2-mill property tax levy to raise funds for maintenance and repair projects and facilities' upgrades. That bond would bring in about $78 million over six years.
The community college's two-question ballot asks voters to support a $17 million bond that would be spent over four years, and also approve a mill-levy restructuring plan to increase the school's operating mill and decrease its capital mill. That would basically mean that the rate for property taxpayers would stay at 4 mills, meaning that a homeowner with a $300,000 house would continue to pay $400 a year in taxes.
Cervantes and college administrators attending Thursday's event said the money is critical for serving students and the community. For example, the college's auto-repair program is renting a 2,000-square-foot garage off-campus that can only serve 70 students. The space is so tight that those students gather around a car to work on it or observe training in groups of just five or six at a time.
The college wants to use $7 million of the bond money to build a 17,000-square-foot auto center adjacent to the campus' Trades and Advanced Technology Center. It's a process that will take about 18 months and allow the college to double the number of students and teachers in the program and meet local workforce demand for auto mechanics.
"We need an actual specialized ... auto repair space on campus," Cervantes said.
Another $5 million would be targeted toward campus infrastructure repairs and improvements, including parking lots, roofs and lighting and wastewater systems.
The college will use $2 million to renovate the 25-year-old William C. Witter Fitness Education Center, including pool repairs. Another $2 million will go to technological infrastructure, including improving internet service in both the classrooms and in areas where neither students nor staff can access the internet.
The final $1 million will be used to upgrade classrooms and lab spaces around the campus.
Several people at the event said they would vote for the bond. But at least one attendee, Ray Morales, said college leaders are disingenuous when they say that by approving the bond, property owners will not see an increase in taxes because, he said, "if the bond fails, my property taxes will decrease."
Nick Telles, vice president of finance for the college, said that was true. But, by his estimate, that tax decrease would average out to about $54 a year, or less than $5 a month in savings.
"The college would be so much more positively impacted by that less-than-five-bucks-per month," he said.
The college has 5,465 students enrolled.
