Wichita would lose $4.8 million from expected funding in school finance bill, figures show

Wichita schools would see about $4.8 million less this school year under the Republican-backed school finance bill unveiled this week than under the current school funding plan, according to the Kansas Department of Education.

Republican lawmakers on Thursday introduced twin House and Senate bills to replace the state’s school finance system with block grants, saying districts would have more flexibility to spend state dollars.

It wasn’t clear Thursday how individual districts would be affected. Responding to requests, the department released numbers Friday afternoon that compared the bill with current law, which includes a $28 million statewide cut in base funding ordered by Gov. Sam Brownback to help balance the state budget. It is set to go into effect Saturday.

The block grant bill would restore the governor’s cut but make deeper reductions totaling about $51 million. It would scale back on increases in two areas approved by lawmakers last year after a court ruling identified inequities in school funding.

“They’re hiding the cut,” said Will Lawrence, a lawyer who serves as legislative counsel to Senate Democrats.

The reductions from GOP legislative leaders would total about 1.5 percent of the general aid the state’s 286 school districts were to receive.

Sen. Ty Masterson, R-Andover, one of the bill’s architects, said the bill in part addresses the fact that last year’s school finance bill ended up costing the state more than lawmakers had expected when they voted.

He said lawmakers preferred to cut from the current year rather than decrease funding for next year as the governor had proposed in his budget.

“That sets your basement and it inclines from there,” Masterson said.

Mark Tallman, associate executive director of the Kansas Association of School Boards, explained the situation to school officials from around the state in a webinar Friday.

“The budget you adopted based on current law … that formula is changed in the bill, so you will not get as much as you were expecting and it’s that reduced amount that is going forward,” Tallman said.

Impact on Wichita schools

Under the bill, the Wichita school district would receive $4.8 million less for the current year than it would otherwise. District officials note that the bill reduces district funding by about $7.8 million from what the district expected when it drafted its budget for this school year; that is partly offset by the $3 million restored from the governor’s cut.

The district would see an increase of about $4.8 million from current funding levels next year and an increase of $6.5 million the year after that. District officials say these increases would not keep up with projected cost increases.

“It doesn’t keep pace by any stretch of the imagination,” said Diane Gjerstad, government relations manager for the Wichita district.

“A block grant is a formula,” Gjerstad said, pushing back on the idea that the block grant would eliminate the complexity of school funding. “And this formula does not help districts keep pace with their changing demographics, does not keep pace with just basic cost increases.”

Gjerstad noted that the bulk of the increase districts receive in the next two years would be in pension funds, which would not be flexible and could not go toward daily operating costs.

Pension spending for the Wichita district would increase by $8.6 million next year and by another $4.5 million the following year under the bill. That’s a greater cumulative increase than the district would see in total dollars for the next two years compared with current law.

Impact on suburban schools

Derby and Maize would both see reductions of close to $500,000 for the current year if the bill passes. Goddard and Andover would have current funding reduced by around $300,000 and $200,000 respectively. These figures are on top of the amount districts would lose in the governor’s cut.

“This one act will have long-lasting impact for us,” Maize school superintendent Doug Powers said Friday. The district will have to dip into its reserves, and just as with a family living on a budget, it will mean “fewer dollars to go to later on,” Powers said.

It will mean less for things like replacing buses, fixing boilers and resurfacing parking lots, Powers said. For each of the next six years, for example, the Maize district is committed to spending $1 million for roof maintenance alone, he said.

Nicole Gibbs, communication director for the Andover school district, said the district “offers an incredibly valuable education and we deliver excellent results in a very cost effective way. Excellence takes resources and in order for us to give students in Andover the education our community expects, we need those resources.”

Some districts, such as Burlington in Coffey County, would see an increase for the current year under the bill. That’s because they would see the governor’s cut’s restored, and they do not receive equalization aid, which would be cut under this bill.

Increase driven by pensions

The governor did not fund scheduled pension increases in his proposed budget, Masterson said, and those costs would have been passed on to the districts.

He also said that pension spending should be seen as an operating expense.

Overall, the bill would increase annual state spending on pensions by about $122 million for the 2016-2017 school year compared with the current year. That’s about $4 million more than the bill increases education funding overall from current law, according to the Department of Education’s projection.

But Masterson said that if the bill’s spending is compared with spending in the 2013-2014 school year, then it’s an overall increase of more than $300 million over three years. The Legislature boosted spending for the current year after a court ruling that funding was inequitable.

The idea to shift to a block grant system was first put forward by Brownback in his State of the State address with the stated goal of creating a new school finance formula afterward.

Tallman noted that bill does not say the block grant would end after 2017, so unless lawmakers replace it in the future it would remain law.

Eileen Hawley, Brownback’s spokeswoman, said the governor appreciated lawmakers’ hard work in drafting the legislation.

“We look forward to reviewing the bill in its entirety and working with the legislature to fix a flawed education funding formula,” she said in an e-mail.

House and Senate budget committees will have hearings on the bills Monday and Tuesday, respectively.

Contributing: Tim Potter of The Eagle; Associated Press

To see the Department of Education’s numbers for individual school districts, go to this link and then click on “Computer printout” under “Summary.”

This story was originally published March 6, 2015 at 1:02 PM with the headline "Wichita would lose $4.8 million from expected funding in school finance bill, figures show."