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Editorial
"Scribblings"
- An Occasional Newsletter from the Legislature
 By
Rep. Thomas F. Koch Barre Town
It’s called LEAF (Local
Education Affordability Formula). One might suspect that the name was adopted
to fit the acronym, rather than the other way around, but that wouldn’t
be the first time that happened, and it might just be the most critical
comment I have about this plan at the present time.
Developed with much hard
work over many months, Reps. Hube of Londonderry, Branagan of Georgia,
and McDonald of Berlin have brought forward a plan to replace Act 60/68.
The plan is based on the premise that any successful education funding
plan must conform to three principles.
First, it must provide fairness,
equity, and educational excellence. Any plan to replace Act 60/68 must
pass the equity test of the Vermont Supreme Court’s 1997 decision in Brigham
v. State of Vermont, which requires substantially equal educational
opportunity for all Vermont children. And, it must provide educational
excellence, or it is not worth doing.
Second, it must provide simplicity
and local control. Any plan, such as Act 60/68, that cannot be understood
by the majority of citizens (and, one might add, by some of the people
in charge of administering the act!), is bound to become so unpopular that
it will eventually be replaced. And to the greatest extent possible, the
law should enable and encourage local control.
Third, the plan must offer
affordability and cost-containment. A school funding plan that encourages
spending to escalate continually, well above the level of general inflation,
is not sustainable. But cost-containment mandates are not popular and frequently
don’t work; this formula attempts to contain costs with "carrots, not sticks."
Based on these principles,
the architects LEAF have offered up a plan that, in outline form, is fairly
easy to explain:
1. Special education
will become a state expense rather than one that is borne by individual
school districts.
2. Technical education will
also become a state expense.
3. The statewide residential
education tax will go away. The non-residential tax will stay.
4. Each student will be counted
as one student—no more counting 1.2 students because English is a student’s
second language.
5. The state will give each
school district a block grant for each student in the district. There is
no magic in determining the amount of the grant, and that will have to
be worked out as the bill progresses through the legislature. For purposes
of offering their proposal, however, the designers of LEAF have proposed
a grant amount equal to 85% of the previous year’s average per-pupil cost,
which would make the grant $8,500.00 this year.
6. If a town votes to spend
more per-pupil than the block grant, the additional funds will be raised
through a residential property tax in that school district only.
7. If a town spends less
than the block grant, it will return 80% of the difference to the state
and keep 20% as a credit against its municipal property tax.
8. Prebates for educational
taxes will no longer be necessary, because there will be no statewide residential
property tax.
9. Rebates for municipal
taxes will be continued.
So what would this mean for
Barre Town, for example? Based on the most recent figures available (FY
2008), Barre Town’s per-pupil spending is below the block grant amount,
the town would not need a residential education property tax, and it would
receive a credit from the state of $166,000 toward the municipal tax bill.
Barre City’s credit would be nearly one and a half times that amount.
The initial reaction of a
number of critics of this plan is that it might not satisfy the standards
of the Brigham decision, because it does not provide equal funding,
or equal tax burdens, for all towns. In my view, that should not be a problem,
provided that the block grant is large enough to provide an adequate education
for every student in the state. And I believe that the suggested $8,500.00
is, indeed, large enough to accomplish that objective.
One needs to remember that
the Supreme Court did not require absolute equality of funding. Quoting
from the Brigham decision:
[W]e emphasize that absolute
equality of funding is neither a necessary nor a practical requirement
to satisfy the constitutional command of equal educational opportunity.
…differences among school districts in terms of size, special educational
needs, transportation costs, and other factors will invariably create unavoidable
differences in per-pupil expenditures. Equal opportunity does not necessarily
require precisely equal per-capita expenditures, nor does it necessarily
prohibit cities and towns from spending more on education if they choose,
but it does not allow a system in which educational opportunity is necessarily
a function of district wealth. Equal educational opportunity cannot be
achieved when property-rich school districts may tax low and property-poor
districts must tax high to achieve even minimum standards. Children who
live in property-poor districts and children who live in property-rich
districts should be afforded a substantially equal opportunity to have
access to similar educational revenues. Thus, as other state courts have
done, we hold only that to fulfill its constitutional obligation the State
must ensure substantial equality of educational opportunity throughout
Vermont.
In my view, if the state provides
a block grant of sufficient size to permit a school district to provide
an adequate education for all of its students—and I believe that LEAF does
provide such a block grant—it will fulfill the Supreme Court’s mandate.
The major obstacle I see
in this proposal is that, having abolished the statewide residential property
tax, LEAF will require $158 million in new revenues in order to provide
the block grant and to assume the other new state obligations (special
education and technical education) that the plan proposes. Since the abolition
of the statewide residential property tax constitutes a substantial tax
reduction, there is certainly room for a tax increase to make up for it,
but the source of that increase would need to be worked out, and the authors
of LEAF have left that item for future discussion.
Rep. Hube has suggested that
we should look at the many, many tax-exempt properties around the state
as a source, but that is only one suggestion among many that might be made.
The point I want to make
is that LEAF is a serious proposal and deserves serious consideration.
It has much good to be said for it, and it is offered as a replacement
for a very flawed and unpopular Act 60/68. If it receives the legislative
consideration that it deserves, it will undoubtedly change in the process.
Meanwhile, Reps. Hube, Branagan, and McDonald deserve our thanks for their
work in developing this proposal.
* * * * *
I need to close on a sad
note. Rep. David Clark of St. Johnsbury died last week. He was a
good friend, a straight shooter with a big, compassionate heart. At age
85, he drove back and forth each day between St. Johnsbury and Montpelier;
he split his own wood; he took care of a 900-tree apple orchard; and he
cared for his wife, who had serious health problems of her own. He was
a conservative Republican, but I remember when he stood on the floor and
pleaded for us to "do something for these people," meaning people who are
addicted to drugs. Born and raised in Maine, he was nevertheless what I
think of as a true Vermonter. I will miss him.
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