Fiscal impact reports (FIRs) are prepared by the Legislative Finance Committee (LFC) for standing finance

committees of the NM Legislature. The LFC does not assume responsibility for the accuracy of these reports

if they are used for other purposes.

Current FIRs (in HTML & Adobe PDF formats) are a vailable on the NM Legislative Website (legis.state.nm.us).

Adobe PDF versions include all attachments, whereas HTML versions may not. Previously issued FIRs and

attachments may be obtained from the LFC in Suite 101 of the State Capitol Building North.

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

SPONSOR Swisstack

ORIGINAL DATE

LAST UPDATED

2/16/07

HJM 40

SHORT TITLE Study Truancy and Delinquency Notices

SB

ANALYST Lucero

ESTIMATED ADDITIONAL OPERATING BUDGET IMPACT (dollars in thousands)

FY07

FY08

FY09 3 Year

Total Cost

Recurring

or Non-Rec

Fund

Affected

Total

$6.5

$6.5 Non-

Recurring General

Fund

(Parenthesis ( ) Indicate Expenditure Decreases)

Duplicates SJM 36

Relates to Appropriation in the General Appropriation Act: The Executive recommendation

includes $1,000.0 for Truancy Prevention/Dropout Prevention

SOURCES OF INFORMATION

LFC Files

Responses Received From

Children, Youth and Families Department (CYFD)

Public Education Department (PED)

SUMMARY

Synopsis of Bill

House Joint Memorial 40, if enacted, requests that the Children, Youth and Families Department

(CYFD) and the Public Education Department (PED) study the subject of truancy and

delinquency notices.

It requests that the CYFD and the PED, in consultation with the Office of the Attorney General

and with representatives of public school districts, private schools, district attorneys, law

enforcement agencies and other appropriate entities, study truancy and the issues surrounding the

timely notification of public and private schools when a student is the subject of a delinquency

petition.

It further requests that the study include a review of actions that school personnel may take upon

receipt of a delinquency petition to assist the student and to discourage truancy.

House Joint Memorial 40 – Page

2

House Joint Memorial requests that the study include a comprehensive review of the intervention

and enforcement provisions in both the Compulsory School Attendance Law and the Children's

Code.

It requests that CYFD and PED report their findings and recommendations for legislation to

reconcile the inconsistencies in provisions in law dealing with truancy to the Legislative

Education Study Committee no later than November 1, 2007.

FISCAL IMPLICATIONS

This bill does not make an appropriation

SIGNIFICANT ISSUES

The goals of the dropout and truancy prevention programs are to decrease truancy and dropout

and increase student attendance. In order for students to achieve they must first be present. In

addition, the underlying issues for dropout and truancy are oftentimes associated with social,

family and health barriers that prevent students from achieving and that contribute to the

achievement gap. Dropout and truancy prevention programs help to provide supports to

students, schools and families to increase academic success and close the achievement gap for all

students.

Program outcomes established for the Governor’s Truancy Prevention and Dropout Programs

are: (1) decreased truancy rates, (2) decreased dropout rates and (3) increased attendance rates.

Truancy has been identified as one of the early warning signs of students headed for potential

delinquent activity, social isolation or educational failure via suspension, expulsion or dropping

out. Truancy is considered to be one of the top 10 problems facing school. Eighty percent of

dropouts were chronically truant before dropping out. Ninety percent of youths in detention for

delinquent acts were chronically truant.

New Mexico has a daily attendance rate of 95%, which translates to 5% or 16,300 students

absent from school each day. It is estimated that a single day’s absence by one student costs the

school district $17.30 per day or the state $281,990 per day based on a unit value of $3,165 per

student (PED Accountability and Fiscal).

PERFORMANCE IMPLICATIONS

Early truancy intervention strategies will improve attendance, consequently positively impacting

public school performance measures and benchmarks regarding reading, language arts, math and

graduation rates.

HJM 40 may positively impact the academic achievement of a number of youth who are

participating in the alternative suspension program by leading to increased attendance rates,

improved reading and math scores, improved statistics regarding bullying, alcohol use and abuse

and increased graduation rates.

House Joint Memorial 40 – Page

3

ADMINISTRATIVE IMPLICATIONS

This memorial can be accomplished by existing PED staff working in conjunction with CYFD.

The PED estimates that implementing this memorial will require approximately 200 hours of

staff time. Estimated staff time is as follows: 200 hrs x $22.74/hr x 30% salary & benefits=

$5,912.40/year, plus copying and travel costs of approximately $500.00. There could be an

additional impact depending on what resources PED would be requested to contribute as part of

this study.

CONFLICT, DUPLICATION, COMPANIONSHIP, RELATIONSHIP

Duplicates SJM 36. This subject relates to the executive recommendation of $1,000.0 for

Truancy Prevention/Dropout Prevention. Relates to SB68, HB32, SJM32

TECHNICAL ISSUES

None identified

OTHER SUBSTANTIVE ISSUES

A potential conflict exists between the need for truancy and delinquency notices and existing

confidentiality statutes.

According to the Public Education Department, the State has identified 10% of all school age

children as habitual truants during the past two years amounting to about 60,000 youth.

CYFD Juvenile Justice Services received 29,000 referrals last year. Each juvenile probation and

parole officers (JPPO) dealt with about 200 delinquent referrals during this period of time, not

including either truancy referrals or the youth on supervision at the same time, which averaged

about 55 youth per JPPO.

WHAT WILL BE THE CONSEQUENCES OF NOT ENACTING THIS BILL

Status Quo

DL/nt