Innovate+Educate Blog

Stimulus money helps offset health insurance premiums for N.M. educators

August 16, 2010

New Mexico Gov. Bill Richardson said Monday that public school teachers, administrators and teacher’s aides will benefit from $2.5 million in federal stimulus funds meant to offset the costs of increased insurance premiums and to expand professional development opportunities.

Roughly $2 million will go toward helping 33,400 teachers and school employees across the state pay their insurance premiums, according to a news release issued by the governor’s office.

The stimulus dollars will reduce insurance premiums by an average of 2 percent for the 2010-11 school year.

The remaining $500,000 will go toward professional development for roughly 2,000 educational assistants in Albuquerque Public Schools.

“New Mexico’s teachers and school employees are dedicated public servants and I am committed to helping them through the current recession,” Richardson said in the release. “Our teachers, educational assistants and support staff are on the front lines of school reform every day, and they’ve been subject to rising health care costs in recent years. I am pleased that these Recovery Act funds will help us offset some of those costs.”

The award comes from a discretionary fund made available to the governor as part of the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (ARRA).

The $2.5 million is separate from and in addition to the $65 million New Mexico is supposed to receive after Congress passed the Education Jobs and Medicaid Assistance Act last week to help the state during the recession. President Barack Obama signed that $26 billion bill into law last Tuesday.