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F I S C A L I M P A C T R E P O R T

SPONSOR Piicraux

ORIGINAL DATE

LAST UPDATED

1/30/2007

HB 576

SHORT TITLE Expand NM Judicial Education Center

SB

ANALYST McOlash___________

APPROPRIATION (dollars in thousands)

Appropriation

Recurring

or Non-Rec

Fund

Affected

FY07

FY08

$200.0

Recurring

General Fund

(Parenthesis ( ) Indicate Expenditure Decreases)

SOURCES OF INFORMATION

LFC Files

Responses Received From

New Mexico Higher Education Department (HED)

SUMMARY

Synopsis of Bill

House Bill 576 appropriates $200,000 from the General Fund to the Board of Regents of the

University of New Mexico for expenditure in FY 2008 for the expansion of the New Mexico

Judicial Education Center (JEC).

FISCAL IMPLICATIONS

The appropriation of $200,000 contained in this bill is a recurring expense to the General Fund.

Any unexpended or unencumbered balance remaining at the end of FY 2008n shall revert to the

General Fund.

SIGNIFICANT ISSUES

The JEC, officially named the Rozier E. Sanchez Judicial Education Center of New Mexico, was

established under a federal grant in 1991 to provide education and training to the judges,

administrators and other staff of the New Mexico judicial branch. In 1993, the New Mexico

Legislature formally established JEC within the Institute of Public Law at the UNM School of

House Bill 576 – Page

2

Law, and provided state funding for its operation. Working under the guidance of a broadly

representative Judicial Education and Training Advisory Committee (JETA), JEC produces a

total of about two dozen educational programs annually, including annual conferences, regional

seminars, teleconferences, and special interest seminars.

The HED indicates JEC plans to expand its training to distance education and online training to

accommodate outlying areas in the state and smaller courts with personnel who are unable to

travel for classroom training. JEC maintains and updates all training material to coincide with

new legal developments and new laws.

This request was not submitted by UNM to the New Mexico Higher Education Department for

review, but is included in the Department’s funding recommendation for FY08 as a continuance

of FY07 recurring funding in the amount of $163,300 with no additional funding at this time.

OTHER SUBSTANTIVE ISSUES

The JEC faces increasing demands for services due to an increase in judges and court staff, an

increase in need of training of non-attorney judges who come to the bench without formal legal

training, and an increase in the need for distance education, outreach, and training of tribal

judges. Since 2003, JEC projected revenues have dropped. Revenue projections were based on

fee collections in the state. However due to a significant decrease in fee collections JEC has

experienced a revenue shortfall. JEC has been operating understaffed due to the decrease in

revenue.

BM/nt