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Fiscal impact of 04 Legislature positive for
SD school districts
K-12 public education in South Dakota will
receive increased funding during fiscal year 05. Seven bills were passed
during the 2004 Legislative Session, and signed by Governor Mike Rounds, that
have fiscal impact on public school districts. Several lines in the General
Appropriations Act also move additional funds into public education.
The legislature did not pass two other bills
that were closely watched by some districts, including a pair of bills that
would have added a sparsity factor to the state aid distribution formula, and
a bill that would have eliminated the current fund balance penalties.
Here is a summary of the bills that have
fiscal impact on K-12 public education:
SB48: Revises the per student allocation for
Special Education. The new
allocations are based on the 3 year average expenditures in each of the 6
disability levels. Level 1 disability, which is based on a percentage (8.9%
currently) of the total enrollment of a district was revised upwards to
10.13%; the per-student allocation becomes $3533.13 for FY05. The other
allocations are as follows:
Level 2 $8,277.21
Level 3 $12,580.73
Level 4 $12,001.80
Level 5 $15,882.21
Level 6 $8,122.23
SB49: Consolidation Incentives for certain
school districts.
Sisseton School District
$148,972
Britton-Hecla School District
$97,498
Agar-Blunt-Onida School District
$62,948
Total $309,418
HB1081: Effort Factor in the Special
Education Formula. Currently, to
receive full funding from State Aid to Special Education, a district must levy
at $1.30. HB1081 lowers that effort factor to $1.25. The maximuum sped levy
remains at $1.40.
HB1087: School District General Fund Levy.
This bill revises the maximum
general fund levies for school districts so that the state maintains its
percentage share of the total funding of K-12 education (commonly referred to
as the "Cutler/Gabriel" amendment). The levies for pay 2005 will be:
Ag $3.32
Ag-Z $4.32
OO $5.34
Com $11.45
SB205: Distributes leftover State Aid to
school districts. This bill
directs that the one-time $7,307,896 will be distributed to school districts
on an unadjusted ADM basis. This equates to approximately $58.88 per ADM.
SB206: Revises the per-student allocations to
account for declining enrollment dollars.
The bill increases the per-student allocations
by $87.29 to account for the 2.2% inflation factor currently in statute, and
then adds another $31.39 which is derived from the decline in the number of
students from one year to the next. By having approximately 1000 fewer
students in the state, the total obligation in the formula is less than what
it would have been with no decline. The increase in the per-student
allocation is to hold the state’s total obligation to public K-12 education at
the amount it would have been if total enrollment in public schools had not
declined.
SB150: Appropriates funds earned by Ed
Enhancement Trust Fund that are available in the current (04) fiscal year.
Several programs were funded with
the earning of the Ed Enhancement Trust Fund, including $1,845,271 that will
be distributed to public school districts on an ADM basis to compensate for
less-than-anticipated revenue from School and Public Lands interest.
SB195: General Appropriations Act.
Several
items in the General Appropriations Act are direct monies towards public
education, including:
$500,000 for Educational Service Areas (ESAs)
- Ed Enhancement funds
$500,000 for Career & Technical Education - General Funds - one time
$8.6 million increase in State Aid to General Education
$1.5 million increase in State Aid to Special Education
$8.2 million in general funds to continue to provide technology services to
school district FREE of charge
Failed:
SB213: Removes the fund balance penalties on school district general fund.
The Governor’s position was
to remove all fund balance caps. This
bill was amended several times and the Senate failed to concur with these
amendments. The bill was lost. Fund balance penalties remain unchanged.
SB 169 & HB 1307: Both revise the calculation
of state aid to direct additional funds to districts that have large territory
and few students: no sparsity
factor was added to the state aid formula in spite of significant debate on
the issue in both the House and the Senate. |
