School districts hope lawmakers address finance in next session

The school refinancing bills signed into law after a special session in 2006 did away with the state's "Robin Hood" system of financing, which took money that property-rich school districts made and gave it to property-poor districts.

Many districts in the Rio Grande Valley, where land values have remained relatively cheap, had benefited from the system.

The refinancing plan dropped the property tax cap by a third and the state promised to give more money to the districts by closing loopholes in business taxes and raising levies on cigarettes and alcohol.

School districts say things haven't quite worked out the way lawmakers said they would.

Many school districts, especially smaller and property-poor district, are laying off employees and dipping into savings to make ends meet.

"We're just totally burdened," said Fernando Castillo, superintendent of the Progreso school district.

Some district officials, like those in Mission, say they had to dig into savings and make cuts to shrink their shortfalls. Others, like Santa Rosa, laid off employees to offset their deficits. Although the Edcouch-Elsa school district fired 200 people just before Christmas, those layoffs stemmed from too many employees and financial mismanagement at the district, say state and district officials.

Even though the state made up for the loss in the beginning the system favors wealthier districts because those districts either have a larger tax base, more students or both and they can raise more money than smaller and property poorer districts, said Wayne Pierce, executive director of the Equity Center, which studies school finance issues in Texas.

School districts lost an average of $600 per pupil, he said.

"It kept them in a bad spot they were already in," Pierce said.

More than 100 school districts, including a half dozen in the Rio Grande Valley, asked their constituents to approve raising their tax rates above the state-maximum of $1.04 per $100 of assessed value.

Of those, about 70 districts successfully ratified their rates, according to TexasISD.com, which tracks school issues including the rollback elections.

Five of the six Valley district voters turned down the increase.

That property tax increase would have benefited the schools in the short term but were no benefit in the long term - districts that go over the $1.04 cap see their funding from the state drop by a commensurate amount.

And districts say their costs are going up.

Districts are in a constant teacher salary war with other districts and utility costs have increased substantially since 2006, they say.

The state is also adding mandates, like increasing graduation requirements and programs to prevent dropouts, but is not giving more money to implement them effectively, school district officials said.

"The mandates are not flawed, but we need to make sure we have adequate funding to meet those needs," said McAllen School Board Trustee Richard Moore.

McAllen and Progreso fared better this fiscal year than some of their neighbors, but they've had to trim their budgets to stay financially afloat, school officials from those districts said.

Teachers now have to spend their own money on pencils, paper and other basic school supplies for their students, said Ruth Skow, president of the McAllen American Federation of Teachers union.

"I am concerned about when we get to the Legislative session, are we going to get a raise?" asked Skow. "I want children to have stuff but how can you keep people in teaching but don't pay them?"

Local lawmakers said they hope to do something when the Legislature reconvenes Jan. 13.

"School districts are strapped. We need to do something about it," said state Rep. Ryan Guillen, D-Rio Grande City. "I don't think there's ever been a mechanism to increase funding because of inflation. It's something we need to look into."

The Legislature could increase the minimum per student average daily attendance allotment given to school districts or look at tying funding to the rate of inflation, said Guillen, who serves on the education finance committee.