As the 2011 legislative session is in full swing, it’s time once again to begin to try and figure out the financial situation for our district over the next two years. As you know, our state budget is in a deep financial hole. It is difficult to predict this early in the session what the impacts will be for K-12 education. But I can lay out how our budget is built and some of the options that our policy makers may consider.
The state general apportionment is now a little over 53 percent of the district’s revenue. Another 10.6 percent is categorical, which has a very specific purpose tied to it. So total state funding covers about two-thirds of the district’s revenue.
Our state constitution mandates by law that it is the state’s “paramount duty” to provide an ample basic education for all of its students. The definition of what constitutes a basic education is the center of great debate and is currently being considered by the courts. There is no question in my mind that the current definition of basic education is inadequate. We will soon see if the state Supreme Court agrees.
Although inadequate, those items that are currently in the state’s definition of basic education are strongly protected. This definition includes our state general apportionment as well as funding for special education, learning assistance, English Language Learners, and Transportation. In each of these cases the funding is inadequate, but it is protected.
Anything that is not part of basic education is highly vulnerable to cuts. A mid-biennium cut by the legislature, impacting this school year, cut the enhanced K-4 staffing ratio money, which has been used to reduce class size in those grades. We also lost funding from the Beginning Educator Support Team (BEST) grant. This loss is on top of the suspension of I-728, I-732, and other cuts that were delivered at the end of last school year, and the year before. These mid-biennium and mid-year cuts took $1.7 million from our budget for this year. We have paid for these cuts using cash reserves, reducing our ability to cushion further blows.
When creating the budget for the next two years, the governor and each house in the state legislature get to weigh in. The governor’s proposed budget continues the elimination of the K-4 enhancement dollars and the BEST grant. She went further by also proposing the elimination of funding for the Highly Capable program.
Other parts of her proposal directly impact teacher paychecks: there would be no salary increases, including those that normally are awarded for increases in teaching experience and earned continuing education credits. Annual bonuses for National Board Certified teachers would also be suspended.
I suspect the legislature will come up with similar reductions to district funding: anything that is not paid for under basic education is now at risk. While the legislature did pass a new, expanded definition of basic education, it left room to ignore the new definition if there was no money to pay for it. Unfortunately, that’s now the case.
Fortunately in Lake Washington, our student population is growing and our local levy funds have been temporarily increased. This has given us the ability to raise additional local revenue to make up for state cuts. Our voters passed the maximum levy amount last February for four years.
Each additional student means more money in the state’s general apportionment for our district. While most of the additional money is used to hire more teachers and pay for the other costs incurred by additional students, some costs are fixed and don’t go up with the population. The cost of heating a school building doesn’t change with ten more students, for example. Instead, the cost of heating the school is spread among even more students, so the district’s dollars go a little further.
Depending on what the legislature eventually does, these two fortunate circumstances may enable us to have a status quo budget for one more year. If the legislature goes even further than expected, however, we may have to face another year of cuts. It is difficult to predict today what will happen.
What we do know is that educating our students is our best hope of ensuring economic viability for the future. With an increasingly challenging budget, it takes courage to make this a priority. But indeed it is the paramount duty of our state and we should expect nothing less.
Sincerely,
Dr. Chip Kimball
Superintendent
Lake Washington School District