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PAEC Horizons Newsletter on state budget
March 20, 2008 - 1:22PM
The following article is in teh most recent edition of the PAEC Horizons Newsletter:
State faces money woes; class size flexibility before Legislature
| Legislators earlier this week passed the revised
appropriations bill for 2007-08 that includes $512 million more in
budget reductions with more than half-$265 million-coming from
education. These cuts are in addition to the $1.1 billion cut from the
state budget last October. Of that $265 million, about $224 million
will come from the Florida Education Finance Program and categoricals. As for 2008-09, the Revenue Estimating Conference this week projected that lawmakers will have about $3 billion less income to work with. This year's budget was based on $27.5 billion. Next year's budget will have to make do with $24.6 billion, or just $100 million more than this year. The economists also projected that the economic slide could get worse and last longer than had been previously predicted. To help patch that $3 billion hole, Governor Charlie Crist is proposing that the state use as much as $1.1 billion in one-time reserves. That temporary fix, according to some, would avoid deep cuts in education and social programs for 2008-09 but could worsen the state's financial situation if things don't improve the following year. Meanwhile, a big money item - class size compliance - is being attacked on two fronts. First, educators are working with legislators in an attempt to pass a law that would give school districts more flexibility in complying with class size next year, when schools must count attendance in each class room. Right now class size compliance is based on a school-wide average. The House 21st Century Competitiveness Committee has been working on a proposed committee bill (PCB) that revises the statutory requirements for implementation of the constitutional class size provisions. The proposed bill would revise the school district's implementation schedule and amend the methodology and implementation schedule by which class size compliance is calculated for Fiscal Years 2008 through 2011. Compliance would remain at the school level for 2008-2009 and 2009-2010. For next year, each individual classroom could have no more than four students over the constitutional class size maximums and for 2009-2010, each classroom could have no more than two students over the maximum. The bill would also require districts to use 100% of their class size allocation for reducing class sizes if any classroom in the district exceeds those maximums. Second, the Taxation and Budget Reform Commission (TBRC) is still considering a proposed constitutional amendment that would calculate class size compliance based on the average number of students per teacher at each school. It would also allow individual classrooms to exceed the class size mandate by five students. The TBRC has the authority to place constitutional amendments on the November ballot without legislative approval. |
