Ad
The RISE welding program, a career tech class part of an inmate rehabilitation program, was temporarily halted last week but reinstated with a 5-0 vote on an Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) at the Socorro School district’s Monday meeting.
Steve Simpson, Dean of Arts and Sciences at New Mexico Tech, told the school board that their predecessors created the welding course for RISE clients.
“It precedes both Mr. Tucker and myself, and so we were kind of learning after the fact about a lot of the details. As Mr. Tucker indicated, some of the logistical items with the MOU were not done by our predecessor. So we’ve done them, and we’ve also drawn this up to be a short-term agreement so that we’re covered right now,” Simpson said.
He said he recognized the importance of legally protecting all the entities involved and appreciated the opportunity to collaborate with the school district and county to support the program and the individuals it serves.
Board president David Hicks said he took responsibility for the oversight.
“I personally will apologize that you guys jumped into this mess a little bit, as president of the board, I feel like you know this is my responsibility here. Thank you both for jumping in and getting this done,” Hicks said.
School board member Tara Jaramillo said she was concerned about the lack of a MOY and wanted to understand and address the statements made in an email from the county manager regarding potential litigation against the district.
“This has nothing to do with whether we like or dislike a program. It has to do with whether we are transparent with our community, with the children, with the parents, and with our staff, and that’s what this is about,” Jaramillo said.
Andrew Lotrich, County manager who gave a presentation on the RISE welding program along with county commissioners to the school board said the RISE participants were devastated when he told them the program was put on hold.
“Whenever something’s taken away, we have to defend it. We have to make sure that everybody knows how engaged we are, how much we believe in the program, and how willing we are to continue that fight to make sure that this community does not lose this valuable resource.” Lotrich said.
Ad
Lotrich said he wanted to move forward and continue to work together on programs for Socorro County.
During the presentation, School Board President David Hicks halted the discussion and said it wasn’t appropriate to talk about the email during a presentation and that they would discuss it during the vote. Jaramillo declared a point of order.
“I’m speaking, please. Let me finish. We have come up with solutions. We have come up with plans. Everybody’s here, everybody’s worked very hard, Mr. Tucker, everybody’s worked hard with Tech. Everybody’s worked hard with the county. Let’s move forward in a positive fashion, please. I know there’s a lot of emotion in it, I know there was a whole lot of passion in this, but we’ve got a solution on the table.” Hicks said.
The board ultimately voted unanimously for the MOU between the school district and the New Mexico Institute of Mining and Technology.
