What's wrong with the delay in state aid runs |
On Board Online • February 9, 2015
By Lynn L. Lenhardt
NYSSBA President
In Greek mythology, Tantalus was punished in Hades by standing beneath a tree with succulent fruit just out of reach. He stood in a pool of water, but it would recede whenever he bent to take a drink.
That's the way it is with school districts and the healthy amount of state aid proposed by Gov. Andrew Cuomo. The governor has proposed increasing state aid by $1.1 billion, but has refused to release district-level details in documents called school aid runs.
The governor wants the state Legislature to pass his package of education reforms before revealing district-by-district aid figures. According to the Division of the Budget (DOB), schools should expect to receive state aid runs on April 1, the legal deadline for the state budget to be adopted.
This is a really awful plan. Schools end up being the casualty in what amounts to a game of legislative three-dimensional chess. Let me explain why.
First, we have no idea what action lawmakers will take on the governor's reforms, especially with new leadership in the state Assembly. I haven't seen too many lawmakers rushing to embrace Cuomo's proposed changes, which include increasing the weight of student growth on state exams in educator evaluations, as well as requiring new teachers to receive five consecutive effective (or highly effective) evaluation ratings before earning tenure. So, these are not slam dunk proposals with the Legislature.
Second, you would not believe what, according to NYSSBA's analysis, is absent from Cuomo's Executive Budget. There are no formulas describing how state aid to schools will be distributed! In fact, there is bill language that says school districts will not receive any state aid increase in 2015-16 and beyond unless the governor's education reform proposals are enacted. For local school districts, this is a critical fact. It means that conservative budgeting requires us to assume no increase in state aid from last year. What a nightmare. Districts that are highly dependent on state aid will feel the greatest impact.
Did I mention the gap elimination adjustment? It would stay at $1 billion. Foundation Aid would remain nearly $5 billion behind full funding levels.
Next, consider the effects of the property tax cap enacted in 2011. It requires school districts to use the executive budget aid runs to formulate a tax cap calculation. More specifically, schools must submit a 2016 proposed levy to the state by March 1 as part of their tax cap reporting requirements. Someone please explain to me how districts can establish a proposed tax levy without knowing their projected state aid revenue.
Finally, there is the issue of community involvement in the budget development process. School boards must adopt their budgets by April 24. Under the DOB-April 1 scenario, school districts would have to cram a large portion of the budget process into a three-week period. In the meantime, why put school districts and their communities through the unnecessary exercise of planning a budget without a better understanding of their state aid? What cuts will districts have to contemplate if they must plan their budgets using last year's state aid numbers, only to find out that those cuts - and the conversations that accompany them - are unnecessary if lawmakers increase state aid?
Putting together a school district budget is like completing a puzzle: the more the pieces come into place, the clearer the picture becomes. State aid is a major source of revenue for some schools. It's difficult to develop a solid financial plan for the coming year without having that piece of the puzzle in place.
That's why NYSSBA and its partner organizations in the Educational Conference Board have called on the governor to issue school aid runs for the $1.1 billion aid increase he proposed in his State of the State. This is a matter of allowing school districts to function properly and communities to make informed decisions.
The governor has up to 30 days to make amendments to his budget proposal. Those amendments ought to include formulaic language that would allow for the production of the runs, but unfortunately, I'm not very optimistic. The governor sees release of aid runs as something he can control, and it's another way to pressure the Legislature to do things his way, regardless of the effect on many steps that are part of school districts' budget development process.
The governor wants a good result. But sharing information has to be part of the process, even when the final aid amount is uncertain. Otherwise, schools will be in the position of Tantalus, forever grasping for what's just out of reach.