Puerto Rico education secretary requests $3.04 billion for FY 2024–25, highlights teacher pay and infrastructure priorities

Secretary Yanira I. Raíces Vega told a joint session of the House and Senate budget committees on April 26 that the Department of Education is seeking a minimum general‑fund appropriation for fiscal 2024–25 of "el presupuesto mínimo solicitado por el departamento de educación ante esta asamblea legislativa es de tres mil cero cuarenta y un millón quinientos diez mil." She framed the request around four priorities: infrastructure, academic proficiency, human resources and administration, with a particular focus on stabilizing and reconstructing school buildings damaged by recent hurricanes, earthquakes and the pandemic.

The department said the requested total represents an increase of approximately $423.076 million over the current fiscal year. Raíces detailed how those additional resources would be allocated: $162.4 million to sustain the $1,000 monthly salary increase already granted to teaching staff, $100.8 million for purchased services (including $55 million for private security contracts), and roughly $114 million for transportation (split between regular and special‑education routes). The presentation also flagged investments to expand Montessori environments, hire special‑education coordinators and sustain supplemental tutoring and premium pay programs.

Officials emphasized the magnitude of the infrastructure effort. Raíces said the department has received an historic, non‑recurrent federal allocation and is executing a multi‑phase plan — stabilization, planning and reconstruction — to repair and modernize thousands of school buildings. The presentation included aggregated figures for FEMA and emergency funds dedicated to school rehabilitation and a projection for finishing a large set of repair works by late December of the same calendar year.

Committee members pressed for itemized backup and for the department to show compliance with Law 85 (the education reform statute) and related reporting requirements. The session closed with a request that the department provide additional program‑by‑program line‑item detail and responses to follow‑up questions within five days.

The hearing produced no formal vote; it was a budget presentation and question‑and‑answer session.

Provenance: topicintro SEG 076 — "Para efectos de récord mi nombre es la doctora Yanira Raíces Vega secretaria del departamento de educación de Puerto Rico." topicfinish SEG 116 — "Quedamos a su disposición para responder preguntas. Respetuosamente sometido Yanira Raíces Vega."