The House and Senate Judiciary committees convened a joint meeting Friday to consider potential responses to the court’s ruling last month that the state’s education funding system remains unfair to poor school districts.
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The minority party’s recommendations emerged while legislative committees worked elsewhere in the Capitol on strategy for responding at a special session of the Legislature to the Kansas Supreme Court’s ruling that an element of state aid to districts violates the Kansas Constitution. It warned that schools might not be able to reopen after June 30 if legislators don’t make changes by then.
The state spends more than $4 billion a year on aid to its 286 school districts, and Brownback is pushing a plan to increase that amount by $38 million for 2016-17.
But Kansas faces an ongoing budget crunch, and the president and CEO of the influential Kansas Chamber of Commerce told lawmakers that they don’t have to increase overall spending to meet the court’s mandate.
“When the tax credits for low-income kids passed overwhelmingly, we’re not going to repeal that, when so many school districts are dependent on the virtual school funding locally”, said Republican Senator Michael O’Donnell.
The state House and Senate judiciary committees convened for a joint meeting to discuss proposed amendments to the state constitution to block the courts from threatening to close schools in education funding lawsuits.
“We don’t have a consensus”, said Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Jeff King, an Independence Republican.
The committee expected to debate proposals Friday.
But a proposed constitutional change would have to go before voters for their approval – and they wouldn’t weigh in until the November election. Now, in a drive to persuade constituents that the state Supreme Court has over-reached, they’re complaining that not enough of the proposed new education funding would go toward the classroom. “You have to have a school finance fix”.
“At some point in time, reasonable people have to get in a room and put together a plan”, Ward said.
“Equalization is about evening out the purchasing power of individual districts”, said John Robb, an attorney for four school districts pursuing the lawsuit, which was filed in 2010. The justices warned that schools might not reopen after June 30 unless lawmakers make additional changes.
A consensus had appeared to be building toward the $38 million plan favored by Brownback. Groups representing school boards and administrators also endorsed the idea. Supporters see it as the surest way of satisfying the court. The extra dollars would help poor districts, but some funds still would be redistributed from dozens of wealthier districts, particularly in Johnson County in the Kansas City area.
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Meanwhile, the Blue Valley and Shawnee Mission districts in Johnson County would gain a total of $67.5 million. If included in the Legislature’s package, Hensley said, it would need to incorporate a clause permitting the Supreme Court to find the hold-harmless unconstitutional without derailing the larger funding correction.
