This week's guests on "Report from Santa Fe" are Dr. Becky Rowley, president of the Santa Fe Community College, and Dr. Joseph Shepard, president of Western New Mexico University, speaking on behalf of the General Obligation Bonds on the ballot in the upcoming November election.

These educators are followed by Dr. Mauricio Tohen, Chair of the Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences at the University of New Mexico and chief for UNM Hospital in Behavioral Care, describing one particular bond that will fund a much-needed children’s psychiatric center at the UNM Health Sciences Center.

General Obligation Bonds come before the voters every couple of years in even numbered years and for education it funds capital improvement projects and some new construction projects. The bonds are packaged so that there are projects in virtually every corner of the state, so this is not a bond that will just benefit the Rio Grande corridor, it will benefit every place that has a two year or a four year college. For many colleges the general obligation bond is almost the only way that they can have capital improvement. The financial impact of these bonds, the total of the package would be a little over $250 million dollars statewide.

Each bond, Bond #1, #2, and #3, focuses on specific needs in New Mexico:

Bond #1 = The 2022 Capital Projects General Obligation Bond Act authorizes the issuance and sale of senior citizen facility improvement, construction and equipment acquisition bonds.

Bond #2 = The 2022 Capital Projects General Obligation Bond Act authorizes the issuance and sale of library acquisition bonds.

Bond #3 = The 2022 Capital Projects General Obligation Bond Act authorizes the issuance and sale of higher education, special schools and tribal schools capital improvement and acquisition bonds.Part of Bond #3, the higher education bonds, includes thirty-six million dollars ($36,000,000) to plan, design, construct, furnish and equip a children's psychiatric center for the Health Sciences Center at the University of New Mexico in Albuquerque in Bernalillo countyReply Reply All