Friday, January 12, 2001

The school aid formula

Given failing grades by a State Supreme Court justice, New York now has some homework to do. A Byzantine school aid distribution formula, driven more by partisan politics than pupil needs, now requires revamping.

Gov. George E. Pataki, who has already promised to make such an effort, ought to meet the challenge head-on: No legal appeals, and no delay. Just get on with it.

Justice Leland DeGrasse of Manhattan ruled the state has been shortchanging New York City schools in a way that violates both state constitution guarantees of a universal "sound, basic education" and federal civil rights laws that mandate equal treatment for minorities.

The court order mandates reform of the way New York distributes $13.6 billion in school aid statewide. It also may give Albany the political cover lawmakers need to craft what could be controversial reforms and send more critically needed aid to the poorest school districts - urban and rural - that need it most.

Pataki already promised such reform in his recent State of the State address, criticizing a "dinosaur" system of nearly four dozen separate funding streams.

The catch, of course, is that reformers can't bolster aid to New York City and other hard-pressed districts without either increasing the total supply of money or draining it from richer districts.

The likeliest options, none of them popular, are raising state income taxes, diverting money from other state programs to education or forcing suburban school districts to raise local school taxes to make up for cuts in state aid.

But lawmakers have a better chance of finding new money in a time of state surpluses. Pushed by the court here and the cumulative force of similar rulings in more than two dozen other states, they have strong reasons to do so.

While Pataki's promised reform proposal will be revealed with his budget next week, the Midstate School Finance Consortium, which includes about half the school districts in Erie County, already has a proposal to simplify the current state formula from 58 pages to 2.

The reform would set a statewide per-pupil spending base of $8,176 and a standard $13 per $1,000 school tax rate, well below this region's norm, on true property valuation. State aid would cover the difference between tax revenues at that rate and the per-pupil goal. Districts that can meet the goal at lower tax rates could do so, and districts that wanted higher per-pupil spending could set higher rates to match.

The formula also would include an "extraordinary needs" provision that would increase aid to the neediest districts, including New York, Buffalo and Niagara Falls. In Buffalo, current per-pupil spending is about $8,600, lower than New York's $9,000. But the reform formula would increase Buffalo's already large share of state aid by $59 million.

By adding $3 billion in stages to the annual statewide aid package - about the same increase already granted over the past four years - the proposal would keep wealthier districts from losing their current levels of aid. And it would offer a more predictable way to set school budgets, despite chronically late state budget decisions in Albany.

There are political impacts still to be gauged, including the potential fracturing of a local State Legislature delegation that has been unified and effective on school aid. But there is hope, at least, of better aid distribution based on pupil needs, and not just so-called district "shares" of state spending.