Cities push for more educational aid
Courtesy Photo
Lawmakers representing the state's mid-sized, lower-income cities plan to lobby for more school aid in the House version of the budget, arguing their school districts are under financial strain and have limited other revenue options.
The fiscal 2017 budget proposed by Gov. Charlie Baker increases the money paid to local schools, known as Chapter 70 funds, by 1.6 percent to $4.58 billion. Baker said his administration went "above and beyond" what the standard formula would have called for in growing the account, but a majority of legislators, along with school officials and municipal leaders from throughout Massachusetts, say they want to see more funding in the final version of next year's budget.
The funding struggle comes as ballot law proponents press to lift a state cap on public charter schools to open up educational opportunities for students on wait lists. Opponents of the charter cap lift say charters pull dollars away from traditional public schools and that policymakers need to focus on improving opportunities for all public school students.
Rep. Antonio Cabral, a New Bedford Democrat who serves as the House chair of the Legislature's Gateway Cities Caucus, told the News Service the caucus has urged its members to "advocate on behalf of additional Chapter 70 aid" when meeting individually with legislative budget writers. Cabral said he asked for more Chapter 70 money in a discussion with House Ways and Means Committee Chairman Brian Dempsey.
"My hope is that when Ways and Means, when they report out the House budget for us to debate sometime at the end of April, I'm hoping that their recommendation for Chapter 70 is higher than the governor's proposal," Cabral said. "I believe we can do more, and we ought to do more."
Seventy-four lawmakers signed a letter asking the House and Senate to include an additional $20.2 million for Chapter 70 in their budget proposals. Separately, 11 boards of selectmen, eight finance committees and 46 school committees have adopted versions of a Suburban Coalition resolution calling on the Legislature to boost education funding.
House leaders have already announced they will not include new or higher taxes in their budget proposal. Baker limited overall spending growth in his $39.55 billion budget bill to 3.5 percent. He prioritized reducing the use of one-time revenues and building the state's reserves, goals that limit investments in other budget areas but aim to put the state on a more sustainable fiscal footing.
Last month, Education Secretary James Peyser said he was "not surprised" to hear of lawmakers seeking additional Chapter 70 money.
"It's typical that the administration will put forward a number and the Legislature will increase it," he told the News Service.
For the state's so-called "gateway cities" -- former industrial centers with populations between 35,000 and 250,000; median household incomes below the state average; and below-average rates of bachelor's degree attainment -- Cabral said that additional state funding "can make all the difference."
"Those communities have less resources to put into their schools or to put into any other program," he said. "Gateway cities don't have the capabilities as other cities such as Boston or Cambridge, for example, to raise resources in different ways, so the majority of the local resources come from property taxes, and I think our residents and our voters are already highly taxed. It's limited any additional resources we can get from that."
Describing the Chapter 70 funding formula in an interview on Boston Public Radio Thursday, Baker said that the amount of aid is determined by the number of students in the schools and the inflation rate on the various factors comprising a district's foundation budget.
"The number of kids who were actually in the schools went down last year heading into this year, and the second thing was the inflation piece was relatively light," Baker said. "And we actually went above and beyond what the Chapter 70 formula called for because we thought that was simply too light a number, but the fact that the number of kids went down is an interesting phenomenon and one that raises all kinds of interesting questions about how we're going to deal with this going forward."
Baker's 2017 budget proposes a 1.6 percent increase in Chapter 70 money, and a 4.3 percent increase in unrestricted local aid to cities and towns. Unrestricted aid is increasing at a rate that matches expected growth in state revenues. If education aid were to grow at the same clip, it would increase by $194 million in the next fiscal year.
"I think we should probably be in the same area of what the governor recommended for local aid," Cabral said. "Unrestricted local aid, the governor recommended a 4.3 percent increase based on revenue growth, so perhaps we should use that number and try to achieve that, if not higher."
Suggesting the same 4.3 percent increase at a Ways and Means Committee hearing in Everett last month, Chelsea City Manager Thomas Ambrosino called Baker's Chapter 70 proposal "woefully inadequate."
Chelsea officials have said that the city is facing a schools aid allotment of $2 million less than they would have expected under previous calculations. The state is proposing changes in the way it calculates the number of low-income students in the district, which affects aid amounts.
According to estimates from the Massachusetts Budget and Policy Center, Chelsea -- along with the cities of Lynn, Revere, Worcester, Everett and Brockton -- is among the municipalities where the adjustments result in the most significant drop in Chapter 70 aid from what would have been expected, though no communities are slated for Chapter 70 cuts.
Research conducted by MassBudget found that the governor's proposed low-income changes increase Chapter 70 "modestly for many districts," though some districts receive less than they would have under the old methods. The center suggested that the state could carry over its old low-income percentages as a temporary stopgap while working to refine its counting of students.
Cabral, at an education briefing Tuesday, said a quality education opens "doors of opportunities" for low-income students, English language learners and other children facing disadvantages.
"Without that, kids in my city and throughout the other gateway cities will have a struggle," he said. "The only way for us to move economically as a state -- as a state -- is by focusing on education. It's by focusing on those communities across the state that at one time were economic hubs, not just Boston."
Dempsey plans to release his committee's budget bill on April 13.
WBJ Web Partners
Most Recent
Most Recent
0 Comments