State education spending sees significant increase in compromise budget
Through a combination of one-time expenditures and increases in baseline formulas, the new state budget produces significant increases in education funding over the next two years. It is no wonder that state officials hailed the compromise as a windfall for public schools.
The budget was built upon an education funding compromise that dramatically reduced the budget’s structural deficit by shifting more than $60 million in recurring education spending to one-time spending.
But the other part of that compromise built into the budget several increases in baseline education spending that will require additional revenues in the future.
As part of the deal, increases in fiscal capacity disparity aid and free-and-reduced-price meal aid expire at the end of the 2021 fiscal year rather than continue indefinitely. Those bumps in aid are financed with $62.5 million in one-time money from the state’s budget surplus.
But other education aid increases are built into the baseline budget.
The budget changes the formula for kindergarten aid to count all kindergarteners as full-day rather than half-day students. That change will cost about $9.5 million a year above what Keno revenues had previously covered, according to the Office of Legislative Budget Assistant.
The budget also eliminates the formula by which stabilization grants were being gradually reduced. Stabilization grants are supplemental funds school districts receive as compensation for student enrollment declines. That is, schools get state funds to “stabilize” their budgets as they lose students (and the state adequacy aid that comes with those students).
The stabilization grants had been scheduled to decline by four percent of the 2012 grant level each fiscal year. The compromise budget restores them to 100 percent, permanently.
That change in state law increases 2020-2021 education spending by $56 million and adds about $6.2 million a year to the state budget going forward, according to the Office of Legislative Budget Assistant.
Finally, the budget increases the base per-pupil adequacy grant from $3,363 to $3,708. This increase was already scheduled under previous law, so it is not a new change. But it does drive state education spending higher.
Figures from the Office of Legislative Budget Assistant show that, including one-time and recurring expenditures, the budget spends $196 million more on education from FY19 through FY21, a 19.9% increase in appropriations over the 2019 budget.
Of that, $41 million is added for FY 2019, and $155 million for fiscal years 2020-21.
The line-item increase in total budgeted state education spending from FY19 to FY21 weighs in at 9.6%.
Adequate education aid accounts for the largest portion of the added spending. It rises by $111.9 million over the FY 2019 numbers approved in the previous budget.
Those are substantial spending increases, celebrated by both the Republican governor and Democratic Legislature. Yet we can’t help but suspect that political attack ads next year will frame things somewhat differently.
