Here's how much PED is paying the consultants selected for its remedial plan

The New Mexico Public Education Department is spending just under half a million dollars on its contracts with two consultants as part of the court-mandated Yazzie-Martinez remedial plan.

PED is giving $203,500 to the LANL Foundation and $200,000 to Phoenix-based nonprofit WestEd for their consulting work on the Yazzie-Martinez remedial plan, according to Jen Paul Schroer, a spokesperson for PED.

The remedial plan must be finalized by November.

In April, a Santa Fe judge ruled that the PED had not done enough to improve the state’s education system since the 2018 landmark ruling in the Yazzie-Martinez case, which found that the quality of education provided to underserved New Mexico students violated their constitutional rights. The judge determined the state agency must form a remedial plan to fix these issues.

“I hope that this is actually what gets the job done in terms of creating a remedial action plan,” said Ernest Herrera, western regional counsel for the Mexican American Legal Defense and Educational Fund, who represents the plaintiffs in the case.

He also reiterated the plaintiff’s unsuccessful request from the April hearing that the Legislative Education Study Committee (LESC) handle the remedial plan and not PED because of a lack of change over the seven years since the landmark ruling and also “no real system of accountability for how money allocated by the Legislature for education is tracked.”

“PED has not done its part in complying with the court’s orders,” Herrera said. “We learned from the depositions and what we know from the news that high turnover is part of that problem, but this is why we are where we are.”

The New Mexico Center on Law and Poverty, the other firm representing the plaintiffs, did not provide comment Tuesday. Though PED is tasked with creating the remedial plan, LESC is helping with the process.

“The court denied that request and determined that NMPED was the most appropriate entity to lead the development of the Martinez Yazzie Action Plan,” PED spokesperson Janelle Garcia wrote in a statement. “Even though it was not ordered, NMPED is working closely with LESC in the development of this plan.”

On July 1, PED completed its first step of the process as ordered by the court, selecting the two outside consultants, LANL Foundation and WestEd, to assist in the remedial plan. The LANL Foundation’s president and CEO, Gwen Perea Warniment, served as the LESC director and as PED deputy secretary before heading the nonprofit.

The landmark case was first brought over a decade ago, in 2014, when Wilhelmina Yazzie, the parent of a student at Gallup-McKinley County Schools, and Louise Martinez, the parent of an Albuquerque Public Schools student, joined other parents to file a lawsuit against the state, tasking it to improve its education system.

PED will begin seeking public input next month, starting in Farmington, Española and Las Cruces on Aug. 5; Raton on Aug. 6; Santa Fe, Mescalero and Clovis on Aug. 7; Silver City, Zuni and Carlsbad on Aug. 14; and Albuquerque on Aug. 20. Additionally, a virtual meeting will take place on Aug 26.