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F I S C A L I M P A C T R E P O R T
SPONSOR Nunez
ORIGINAL DATE
LAST UPDATED
1/25/2007
HB 278
SHORT TITLE NM Highlands Forestry Institute
SB
ANALYST McOlash
APPROPRIATION (dollars in thousands)
Appropriation
Recurring
or Non-Rec
Fund
Affected
FY07
FY08
$433.0
Recurring
General Fund
(Parenthesis ( ) Indicate Expenditure Decreases)
Relates to SB 55 and SB 57.
Relates to Appropriation in the General Appropriation Act (HB 7)
Responses Received From
New Mexico Department of Agriculture (NMDA)
Energy, Minerals, & Natural Resources Department (EMNRD)
Office of the State Engineer/Interstate Stream Commission (ISC)
New Mexico Higher Education Department (NMHED)
SUMMARY
Synopsis of Bill
House Bill 278 appropriates $433,000 from the General Fund to the Board of Regents of New
Mexico Highlands University for expenditure in FY 2008 to operate the Forestry and Watershed
Restoration Institute (FWRI).
FISCAL IMPLICATIONS
The appropriation of $433,000 contained in this bill is a recurring expense to the General Fund.
Any unexpended or unencumbered balance remaining at the end of FY 2008 shall revert to the
General Fund.
SIGNIFICANT ISSUES
Northern Arizona University, Colorado State University and New Mexico Highlands University
are jointly developing forest restoration institutes (Institutes) in each of the three states pursuant
pg_0002
House Bill 278 – Page
2
to PL 108-317, signed into law in October 2004. The purposes of the non-regulatory Institutes
are to bring the unique strengths of the member universities individually, collectively and in
partnership with other institutions to help support land managers and their collaborators working
to achieve comprehensive ecological restoration treatments on the ground
.
New Mexico Highlands University has the only certified forestry program in the state. It is a
unique opportunity for NMSU to train technical and professional forest and watershed managers
for the increasing number of jobs in this field, both in the state and elsewhere.
New Mexico First held a town hall in Las Vegas called “Looking to the Future: A Town Hall
on New Mexico’s Watersheds and Forests", jointly sponsored by the FWRI, EMNRD, and
NMDA and attended by 130 residents of the State. The Town Hall included two
recommendations to support FWRI as an institute and to provide separate, recurring state budget
appropriations.
New Mexico’s two recently adopted statewide strategic plans for watershed management (The
Forest and Watershed Health Plan (FWHP) and The Non-native Phreatophyte/Watershed
Management Plan (NNPP) both supported the Institute and identified important roles for it in
implementation of these plans,
The NMHED analysis for HB 278 states:
This request was submitted by NMHU to the New Mexico Higher Education
Department for review, but is not included in the Department’s funding
recommendation for FY08. The bill's appropriation amount for additional
funding is $433,000, whereas NMHU's request to the Department was
$25,300. The Department recommends continued funding for this program at
the FY07 level of $249,700.
PERFORMANCE IMPLICATIONS
Federal legislation calls for a preliminary review of the accomplishments of all the Institutes in
2006, followed in 2009 by a substantive evaluation that will determine whether the Institute will
continue to receive federal support. The question of state support may enter into this review.
CONFLICT, DUPLICATION, COMPANIONSHIP, RELATIONSHIP
Relates to Appropriation in the General Appropriation Act (HB 7, p. 196):
General Fund Federal
Forest and Watershed Institute $249.7 $255.4
Senate Bill 57 is a conceptual duplicate but differs in format.
Senate Bill 55 appropriates $430,000 to NMHU “to fund the forest and watershed institute."
BM/nt