At nearly 11 pm on Wednesday night Senator Peter Wirth (D-Santa Fe) added an amendment to HB 2 that would have put $3 million back into the budget for the acquisition of the College of Santa Fe. The amendment failed due to financial concerns about the mortgages involved with CSF's land as well as the maintenance of the buildings.
In discussions after the amendment failed Cisco McSorley (D- Bernalillo) said. "This is totally sad...We're turning our back on the people of Santa Fe. We're just not courageous enough to find the money."
Though the decision came down to basic financial concerns several Senators felt that there was still hope. Senator Tim Keller (D-Bernalillo) held hope that a private company would step in. "I hope that someone in our state could put together a deal," he said. Unfortunately, thus far all of CSF's attempts for private intervention (Savannah School of Design and Laureate) have thus far failed.
"We just made a decision not a half-hour ago to approve a UNM Rio Rancho campus that cost $5 to $6 million and we did it without debate...yet we are not willing to fund an institution that is a historic one in Santa Fe," Senator Dede Feldman (D-Bernalillo) said.
A transcript of New Mexico Independent's live blog of last night's Senate voting can be found here. SFR jumped in at 10:55 pm.
