Los Lunas councilors approve SODA property purchase

LOS LUNAS — School of Dreams Academy made some significant strides forward recently in its plan to build a new, expanded facility.

The charter school currently occupies 10 acres of property on Juan Perea Road in Los Lunas and has a lease purchase agreement in place with the village of Los Lunas.

However, SODA leadership has noted they have outgrown their current area and are seeking to build a new campus encompassing about 20.5 acres. This would include the land they are currently on, as well as about 10.5 acres of village-owned property directly south of the school.

In May 2023, the Los Lunas Village Council voted to enter into a memorandum of agreement with SODA Educational Foundation lasting until December, stipulating the village would not seek other development on the property during this time while SODA worked on securing financing of a permanent facility.

RFP proposal

At the July 11 Los Lunas Village Council meeting, the council unanimously approved a proposal put forth by SODA Educational Foundation for the purchase and development of the southern 10.5 acres.

This proposal was submitted in response to a request for proposal posted by the village for a charter school facility. Los Lunas Deputy Village Administrator Erin Callahan said being that the property is located in the village’s metropolitan redevelopment area, it requires them to put out a RFP every time they are seeking to sell or lease village-owned property in that area.

The SODA Educational Foundation was the only response to the RFP.

At the meeting, SODA Superintendent Mike Ogas announced that the New Mexico Public Schools Facility Authority ranked SODA as No. 1 in the state for schools to be considered for funding of a new facility.

“It’s not easy for a charter school to be positioned in this manner,” said Ogas. “We’re in the process of writing an intent to apply letter and set that process in place, but we cannot proceed with them unless we have control of the southern 10 acres.”

Callahan said the proposal itself does meet the terms of the RFP that was requested, and the foundation has agreed to pay the fair market value of the property determined to be $686,895.

“That fair value was determined on council’s direction as the remaining debt service on the overall property from when we acquired the 20.5 acres back in 2016,” Callahan said.

However, she said the RFP review committee did have some concerns about the proposal, including funding not yet being in place and a lack of a timeline for a full build out of the facility.

Los Lunas Mayor Charles Griego said setting strict deadlines and timelines is unfair because funding for the facility is based on pending funding from state appropriation, which is outside of SODA Educational Foundation’s control.

Village Councilor Christopher Ortiz expressed concern about the uncertainty of the situation.

“It seems like we keep on holding these 10 acres for you guys, but it’s been eight years and nothing is really coming through,” said Ortiz. “I understand where the mayor is coming from; we don’t want timelines, but can we keep it another eight years with no activity going on it? I want some assurance.”

Ogas said in order to get back into the rankings for funding of an entire new school, they had to rescind a $5 million pre-k award they received a couple years ago from the PSFA .

“That’s my assurance to you,” said Ogas. “We’ve done everything you’ve asked us to do. You gave us a MOA, we met the MOA. Then you decided that you needed to do an RFP, so we responded to the RFP.”

Ogas said SODA was recently awarded $1 million in planning and design funding from the Legislature to go toward the new facility.

“We’re prepared to begin spending that as soon as it gets allocated to us,” Ogas said. “What we’re planning to use that money for is to see what needs to be done on the southern acres. There’s a lot of infrastructure on the southern part that needs to be either taken out or reassessed or redrawn with the water and gas lines and stuff like that.”

Next steps

Ogas said the timeline he can offer currently is that they will be submitting an intent to apply letter to PSFA and then they would begin their process which would include a site visit. Then, SODA will be given the opportunity to submit the full application and present it to the capital outlay council in November.

“Then in December, the capital outlay council will make the recommendation as to an award,” said Ogas. “That’s my understanding of the timeline.”

Councilor Gino Romero said he doesn’t see the harm in approving the proposal so long as they provide annual funding updates to the council so that they’re fully informed as to what’s going on and to ensure that “it doesn’t go on forever”.

Romero made a motion for the approval of the proposal with annual reports, which all the councilors, minus Councilor James Runyon who was not present that evening, then voted in favor for.

Callahan said now that the proposal is approved, they will be amending SODA’s current lease purchase agreement to include the southern parcel in addition to the parcel they’re currently on, and when they decide to purchase the property, it will be deeded to the SODA Educational Foundation.