The latest hurdle in a long-running effort by McCurdy Charter School to finance an $8 million two-story school building was cleared last week, as school officials were granted an extension to the construction period, during a special Public Education Commission meeting, April 12 in Albuquerque.
At an April 8 Board meeting, McCurdy Governance Board Chairperson Deborah Bennett Anderson requested a 12- to 15-month extension to finalize and secure the financing needed for the project. Groundbreaking is expected to happen in late summer.
At the special meeting, the Commissioners approved an extension to Nov. 15, 2017. The meeting was necessary because no action item was placed on the April 8 agenda for the commissioners to grant an extension, but a miscommunication led Charter School officials to believe the commissioners could take action that day.
Following a Feb. 11 presentation to the Española Planning and Land Use Department, Albuquerque-based fbt Architects said McCurdy Ministries, which owns the land where the school buildings currently sit, retained the firm’s services for construction of the new building.
Ministries Executive Director Patricia Alvarado said the 103-year-old institution, through nonprofit corporation McCurdy School Property Incorporated, is proceeding to undertake construction of the site. Alvarado said the project involves negotiations for creating a lease purchase agreement with the Charter School.
When the financing for the construction of the proposed building is finalized, the ministries will transfer to the nonprofit, two existing buildings — Pringle and Memorial Gym — along with the land for the new building and McCurdy School Property Inc., will enter into a new lease-purchase agreement with the Charter School.
Extensions granted in the past
In July 2012, the Charter School went before the Commission and presented an 18-month plan of facility correction actions. The plan issued a timeline which included knocking down some existing buildings and starting construction on a new building by early September 2012. Students were supposed to occupy the new building by April 2013, but a number of issues led to delays in construction of the new facility.
One of the original requirements when the school first applied to become a charter school in 2012, was that all school buildings would receive a passing score on the weighted New Mexico Condition Index.
This index takes into consideration, among other factors, facility condition, educational adequacy and key priorities including life, health and safety. McCurdy’s grade was 77 percent, compared to the state average of 20. In this case, as school officials said, the lower the score, the better.
The Commission told the Charter School in 2012, they needed to detail an 18-month plan stating how they were going to meet index requirements and to provide a timeline for doing so.
Commission Chair Vince Bergman asked, why after having been granted a number of extensions in the past, the Charter School was before the Board again requesting more time.
School officials cited problems with obtaining title insurance because of a question of who owned the property, which led to a contractor, Highmark Construction, pulling out of the project. Anderson said there were title issues with entities on the East Coast.
“It was a very complex situation,” she said.
Commissioner Carolyn Shearman said she was on the Board in 2012 when the school asked for a 12-month extension.
“Last time, I was assured by what you (school officials) said, that the funding was in place and everything would be done in 24 months,” she said. “I’m sorry, but I am not convinced. It just seems like to me, that it’s not working, I am not willing to go any longer having children in these buildings.”
Anderson said it was not an easy process to complete new construction funding applications and the school has been working hard to find financial institutions willing to finance the project, after some of the previous funding fell through.
She said even though the current buildings are not the best, they do meet state safety standards.
“We would never put any of our kids in harm’s way,” she said.
During a December 2013 meeting of the Commission, Anderson said the contractor put contract negotiations on hold after hearing the Public Education Department suspended the school’s Board of Finances because of their accounting being in an unauditable state.
Public Education Department Public Information Officer Robert McEntyre said via email last month, the Department reinstated the Board of finance.
McCurdy Director Janette Archuleta said the action acknowledged the Department believes the school has made significant improvements in their finances over the past 27 months.
Anderson said last fall, the school’s leadership discovered there were tax credits available through the New Mexico Finance Authority’s new market tax credit program, which the school could apply for, in order to partially finance construction.
Leo Valdez, a financial adviser to the school at Chicago-based Hutchinson, Schockey, Erley & Co., said school officials were preparing to go before the New Mexico Finance Authority, but a major consideration was whether there would be enough time to complete the process prior to July 2017.
He said the project was placed on the tax credit authority’s priority list and the Charter School secured Clearinghouse as the lender, and the Charter School Development Corporation, a 501(c)(3) nonprofit with offices in Arizona and Maryland, as the borrower.
Laura Fiemann, senior vice president at Charter School Development Corporation, said construction is anticipated to take 10 months, but school officials were afraid a February 2017 deadline could not be guaranteed by a contractor because of winter storms and other events, which could delay the work. That was the reason school officials sought a time buffer — in case of any such contingency.
“It’s a chicken and egg deal,” Anderson said. “The Commission wants to know the funding is in place, but the people with the finances want to know that a Commission extension is in place.”
Archuleta said the funding terms are expected to be finalized sometime between May and June. There was discussion at the last Finance Authority meeting, March 31, that the Charter School would be on their April 28 agenda.
According to a Charter School’s renewal timeline, its second five-year charter is scheduled to begin July 1, 2017. McCurdy must submit a renewal application by Oct. 1 in order for the Department to review the application in December.
Archuleta said the design is 100-percent complete and will be submitted to the New Mexico Public Schools Facility Authority on May 1 for final approval.