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Officials: Schools need financial help |
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Wednesday, 04 June 2008 |
Local legislators and school officials agree that it’s time to do something to help schools suffering from rising fuel prices.
Their reactions came following the news that legislators agreed Tuesday to address the fuel issue as well as the spiraling cost of health insurance for teachers.
Sen. Shane Broadway, D-Bryant, serves on the legislative panel that agreed to develop a funding mechanism to help school districts that need additional dollars for transportation expenses.
He said Tuesday that lawmakers are aware of the issue facing Arkansans. High gas prices, inflation and the cost of living are on everyone’s mind, he said.
The panel is meeting to update the formula that decides what per student funding school districts receive from the state. “What we haven’t had and the panel decided to come up with is a transportation formula that tries to take into account as many pieces of the puzzle as possible,” Broadway said.
Rep. Bill Abernathy, chairman of the Joint Adequacy Evaluation Oversight Subcommittee of the House and Senate Education committees, said additional funding is needed because two-thirds of the state’s 245 school districts are spending more than the $286 per student included in the current formula.
“That reduces their possibility of providing an adequate education for those students because it goes to transportation. We’ve just got to fund it so those students can have an adequate education,” said Abernathy, D-Mena.
His son, Richard Abernathy, Bryant School District superintendent, who attended the hearings Tuesday, said transportation is a “huge issue.”
“There are districts that are having to spend $600 per student down to $69 per student,” he said. “This can mean there is less money to buy books with and there are districts out there that don’t have the money to buy needed supplies for teachers and students.”
Broadway said the current transportation formula was established during the last legislative session. “That figure was based upon consumer price index numbers, which is now wrong,” he said. “We need to compare apples to apples.”
Broadway noted that currently each district decides who is transported and who is not. There are other factors to consider, too, such as considering whether each district is conducting bus routes in an efficient manner and whether there is more wear and tear on rural areas or urban areas.
The goal now is to develop a baseline on where to start, Broadway said. “Some districts on the current formula don’t have to even spend that much,” he said, adding that his guess is Saline County schools don’t spend $286 per student. However, “that doesn’t mean they need to have money taken away from them,” he said.
Superintendent Abernathy said he thinks Bryant is under the $286 amount, noting the district’s efficient means of running the buses. For instance, students who live within a 2-mile radius of the school cannot ride the bus.
The target due date for the report indicating the new transportation formula is Sept. 1, Broadway said.
Abernathy said he doesn’t expect schools to receive any relief for next school year. What’s being worked on is setting up relief for future years after the 2008-09 academic year.
Mickey Billingsley, superintendent of Bauxite School District, said he’ll “believe it when I see it” when asked what he thought of the lawmakers’ proposal. “I’ve heard it for seven or eight years now.”
He said he suspects that larger school districts will benefit from the funding, noting that Bauxite is not a large district.
“But I would be very tickled,” he said, if schools receive some relief from the high fuel prices.
Billingsley added that he would rather see money go toward teacher insurance.
Broadway made the motion to recommend that the Joint Education Committees address the rising cost of teachers’ health insurance.
The cost of health insurance premiums for Arkansas teachers is expected to rise by about $20 million this year and to continue rising in the next two years. Some legislators have said an increase in the state’s contribution may be due.
“If I had a vote, I would vote for teacher insurance,” Billingsley said in comparison to the transportation cost issue.
The hearings come a year after the state Supreme Court ended the long-running Lake View school funding case, ruling that the state had adequately funded its schools.
Broadway said the court has said teacher insurance doesn’t have to do with the adequate education issue. He said he disagreed with that decision and that’s why he made the motion for the joint committee to made a consideration on what needs to be done.
“It’s a terrible situation,” Abernathy said. “We had a 20-25 percent increase in teacher insurance last year and salaries have not gone up.”
He suggested that the insurance system and policy need to be studied. “There may need to be some caps as to when teachers can enter the program. Younger people in the program lowers the cost for everyone,” for instance, he said.
Rep. Janet Johnson, D-Bryant, who’s a teacher at the Bryant High School, said she thinks the way teachers receive insurance is “very unfair.”
“I support the state employees, but insurance should be the same for teachers, custodians and everyone else who works in schools.”
She added, “We’ve worked on this the last few years. Health insurance in general is a major concern for the people of Arkansas. I know I’m almost ready to retire, and there are so many that have to have a second job to afford their health care. It’s an equity issue.”
Adequate education has been a priority for Republicans and Democrats alike, Johnson said. “We’re getting out of the Lake View case and out of court, and we don’t need to leave education, but we need to work toward higher education and health care issues. The people have to be taken care of.”
In regard to the fuel issue, Johnson said, “I think having a formula would be very advantageous to districts. The price should be geared toward fuel prices and it should be something specific that districts could count on and not be ambiguous like it is now.”
“Fuel prices affect the schools like they affect each family. And like most families, our income isn’t going up and we have a limited amount of money to spend.”
He added, “It’s getting to the serious point and something’s going to have to be done. We don’t have the option not to run buses, so we’ve got to find an answer.”
Health care also is a “major issue,” Henley said. “Our insurance is going up a lot next year and we don’t know if teacher salaries will go up. I don’t know what the answer is, but something needs to be done.”
She noted that she hopes something comes out of the study before school starts next year. “Otherwise, I don’t know how school districts are going to budget it in,” she said. “This could have a major impact on programs. The money has got to come from somewhere.”
Likewise with teacher insurance, she said. “I know insurance is killing my constituents who are teachers.”
The Associated Press contributed to this report. |
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