{"id":28486,"date":"2024-03-29T16:26:59","date_gmt":"2024-03-29T22:26:59","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/cortez-superintendent-speaks-on-boces-decision-says-best-grant-considered\/"},"modified":"2026-03-31T00:30:43","modified_gmt":"2026-03-31T06:30:43","slug":"cortez-superintendent-speaks-on-boces-decision-says-best-grant-considered","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/cortez-superintendent-speaks-on-boces-decision-says-best-grant-considered\/","title":{"rendered":"Cortez superintendent speaks on BOCES decision, says BEST grant considered"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"Remote
Remote learning is mandatory for all Kemper Elementary School students through Oct. 22.<\/span>The Journal file<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>\n

After the Montezuma-Cortez school district\u2019s appeal to withdraw from BOCES decision was rejected, the district is considering the possibility of applying for a BEST grant and boosting teacher salaries.<\/p>\n

On Thursday, Tom Burris, superintendent of Montezuma-Cortez School District RE1, told The<\/em> Journal<\/em> more about the BOCES decision, saying that they had hoped to become their own administrative unit and provide their own special education.<\/p>\n

In 2023, the district applied to leave the San Juan BOCES and an administrative unit, but the request was denied by the Colorado Department of Education late last year.<\/p>\n

The district then appealed the decision.<\/p>\n

According to Burris, the district proved it could be an AU without BOCES, but it could not prove that BOCES and the other school districts that rely on BOCES could continue without Montezuma-Cortez\u2019s participation.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s an interesting process to be removed from BOCES,\u201d Burris said. \u201cI felt like we could do the job of administering special ed. We\u2019re big enough to do it, and we can do it better just focusing on our kids. That\u2019s why I wanted to pull out.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cWe proved that we could handle it,\u201d Burris said. \u201cI think having people who are local who know our kids is a better situation. \u2026 I saw us as big enough that we could serve our own kids, and we\u2019d have our own people in house under our roof and that would have been a better situation for us.\u201d<\/p>\n

Burris said BOCES and the district now will find a way to move forward.<\/p>\n

In the wake of the CDE\u2019s decision, Burris said the district is exploring passing a bond and applying for a BEST grant next year to build a new elementary school.<\/p>\n

Many of the elementary schools in the district are more than 50 years old, and most schools have a life span of 25 years, according to Burris.<\/p>\n

If the district decides to move forward with this plan, they will propose putting a bond on the ballot in November.<\/p>\n

\u201cMesa and Kemper are both in the same boat,\u201d Burris explained. \u201cThey were built in the 1950s. So, my thought is to do one elementary school out close to the high school. There\u2019s some land for sale out there. That would leave me with Lewis-Arriola, the new school, middle school and high school.\u201d<\/p>\n

Burris emphasized that discussions are in the beginning stage.<\/p>\n

\u201cThat would be something the voters would have to vote on,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

Burris also spoke of talks in the district of overriding the mill levy to improve teacher salaries, something the district had tried to do in the past, but were unsuccessful.<\/p>\n

He went on to explain that teacher salaries in Cortez are about $40,000 per year, while Shiprock and Durango are paying their teachers $50,000 and up per year.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019re not being competitive at $40,000,\u201d Burris said, noting that they wanted to be able to attract and retain high-quality teachers to the schools in the community.<\/p>\n

More information on the status of the potential BEST grant and bond, as well as a potential mill levy override, will be provided as more information and updates are given from the Montezuma-Cortez school district.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

district is considering applying for the BEST grant to build a new elementary school<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":22480,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[21,155,28,60,216,29],"naviga_topic":[],"class_list":["post-28486","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","tag-cortez","tag-education","tag-headlines","tag-montezuma-county","tag-montezuma-cortez-school-district-re-1","tag-newsletter"],"acf":[],"author_name":"dh_admin","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/28486","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=28486"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/28486\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":80433,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/28486\/revisions\/80433"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/22480"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=28486"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=28486"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=28486"},{"taxonomy":"naviga_topic","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/naviga_topic?post=28486"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}