Trent England, my fave fellow at the Oklahoma Council of Public Affairs, has posted “Legislation Lets Teachers Compete With Turf” supporting SJR 70, sponsored by Senator Bice, which I wrote about in “ The Bice Is Not Right ”. My objection then was that lifting the restriction on uses (it’s not available for teacher compensation) of the 5 mill constitutional building fund levy will add little, if any, flexibility to school districts than they already have and is therefore more of a distraction than a help. Now that Senator Bice and three-fourths of her colleagues have done the right thing by passing the historic teacher compensation increase I don’t worry so much about the distraction.
Still, I think those, like Mr. England and Senator Bice, who are pushing this as a solution to something should answer these two questions.
1. What districts can you name for which this will allow them to expend more for teacher or support personnel compensation than they already have the flexibility to do? The only reasonable answer will be those school districts that have no Function 4000 (facilities acquisition and construction services) expenditures in their Building Fund and no Function 2600 (operation and maintenance of plant services) expenditures in their General Fund. Likely without exception, any district for which both are not true that claims it would pay staff more if only the building fund restrictions were lifted, is just using that as an unchallenged excuse, apparently accepted by the uninformed.
2. Do you support, in the name of operational equity, making the 5 mill building fund a “chargeable” in the state aid funding formula? If not, why should this operational funding that is greatly skewed by local property wealth be exempt from equalization? Upon passage of your constitutional amendment the 5 mill building fund levy will be indistinguishable from the other 39 mills that support school districts’ general funds. All of that millage is a “chargeable” in the state aid formula, so this 5 mills should be also.
Go ahead and spend the time and money to amend the constitution but don’t expect any real change to result, UNLESS you also make the 5 mill building fund levy a chargeable in the state aid formula. Every legislator will know then which of their home districts have per student valuations above average (they’ll be against it like Edmond and Deer Creek) and which have below average (they’ll be for it like Piedmont and Yukon).
Look at Catoosa’s OCAS reports for 2015, the year I think that has the OCPA in a tizzy: Catoosa Expenditures 2015 and Catoosa Revenues 2015 . It collected $764, 234 from its 5 mill levy; it expended $622,385 for Function 2600 (operation and maintenance of its facilities) in its general fund. So Catoosa could have freed up that $622,385 for teacher compensation by shifting those expenditures to its building fund. The state constitution didn’t prevent it from doing so; its own local priorities determined that—maybe buying a press box, maybe paying the utilities or insurance, we’d have to ask them. But SJR 70 would not have changed it. For Catoosa, arguably, the flexibility added is about $140,000.
Well that’s something you say. But that’s not the end of it. Catoosa is a “rich” district. It’s valuation per student is $82,259 compared to the state average of $49,623. Do the right thing and run its $764,234 through the state aid formula and that $140,000 flexibility will melt away into the general fund of a neighboring “poor” district or two which struggle to pay for utilities, insurance and custodial workers. Equalization, possibly yes if Senator Bice will take the next step; flexibility, not much at all.
As always lunch is on me to the first to ID the photo location.