Legislative Update

As one might expect, the greatest interest at last month's advocacy conference in Harrisburg was generated by discussions about how Pennsylvania school districts would be impacted by the federal stimulus package.

Governor Rendell has proposed to use the "State Fiscal Stabilization Fund" (SFSF) portion of the stimulus money to fund years two and three of his "six-year plan to adequacy." (If you recall, the state released a study last year which indicated that the majority of Pennsylvania school districts were significantly underfunded, in terms of what it would take to provide a "free and adequate education" for every student. He proposed a six-year plan to make up the shortfall.)

This seems consistent with the spirit of the American Recovery & Reinvestment Act (i.e., the stimulus package).  However, the state senate just voted in support of the "Rollback Plan" (as it was called then), which essentially uses the money to balance the state budget. Another proposal from the house side of the hill would set these funds aside to help pay down the upcoming pension spike. I suspect that neither idea is likely to meet with the approval of Education Secretary Arne Duncan.

In any event, most school districts - as usual - are not likely to know how much money they will or won't get until after they have passed their budgets for next year.

All of this is moot for State College, which would see very little of this money under the governor's proposal, because our average spending per pupil is already just about where the costing-out study says it should be.