DACC, Gov. Lujan Grisham breaks ground on new Creative Campus in Las Cruces
LAS CRUCES, N.M. (KFOX14/CBS4) — Doña Ana Community College held a groundbreaking ceremony for its new Creative Media Technology (CMT) building in Las Cruces on Tuesday.
DACC’s CMT building is a 14,000-square-foot facility designed to hold classrooms and a commons area, complete with a 4,000-square-foot soundstage. The cost of the building is $11.2 million with a tentative completion date of May 2024.
"This new state-of-the-art facility will help us provide expanded mixed-use space for film, animation, game design and virtual production,” says Matthew Byrnes, Arts department chair. “Co-locating with the New Mexico Media Academy and Arrowhead Center places our students in the center of the film fast-track and entrepreneurship activities."
The CMT building is the first phase of the Las Cruces Creative Campus. The campus is a digital media complex which will also include a planned satellite facility of the New Mexico Media Academy, NMSU Creative Media Institute (CMI) building, and facilities for KRWG-TV and KRWG-FM.
Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham attended the ceremony. She proposed the creation of a state media academy in 2022 in order to prepare students for employment in the state’s film and media industry. The governor secured $40 million in the 2022 legislative session for the establishment of the NMMA and its first satellite campus in Las Cruces.
“The Las Cruces satellite campus of the New Mexico Media Academy exemplifies the collaboration that continues to grow the film and television industry in communities all across the state,” Gov. Lujan Grisham said. “The partnership between the booming industry and New Mexico’s tuition-free higher education will foster that growth and support the impressive field of top-notch production companies and media programs right here in Las Cruces.”
The campus is a partnership between DACC, NMSU, Arrowhead Center, KRWG Public Media, Film Las Cruces, Las Cruces Public Schools, and the New Mexico Economic Development Department.
“The Creative Media Technology Program at DACC prepares students for the workforce in Las Cruces and across the region,” Monica Torres, Doña Ana Community College president, said. “It is exciting to provide a state-of-the-art facility for students to develop the skills needed for a growing industry in Southern New Mexico.”
The CMT building is expected to open for classes in the fall of 2024.
It will be located at 4006 Film Street, in New Mexico State University’s (NMSU) Arrowhead Park, south of Burrell College of Osteopathic Medicine.
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