Vermonters and municipalities are facing a potential staggering property tax increase due to education spending, leaving lawmakers scrambling to find a solution to help.On Wednesday the senate advanced what they think is the first step, by eliminating the 5% cap created in Act 127. “A 5% cap when you’ve got 15% spending is bankruptcy, you can’t cap your revenue at 5% and put your spending up around 15% and expect the education fund to stay in business very long,” said Sen. Ann Cummings, the Chair of the Senate Finance committee. The Senate President Pro Tem said it’s one correction/step and the first of many. “There was in Act 127 a piece that produced an incentive to spend over 5% but under 10%, and there was some communities that took that incentive because we left the door open, so this corrects that,” said Sen. Phil Baruth. Some however believe this is still not much help. “Eliminating the 5% cap, what it does is put both of our districts in a pretty disadvantageous position in Stowe, it would put our taxes increase at about 27%,” said Ryan Heraty, the superintendent of the Lamoille South Unified Union. Many adding a broader conversation of education funding is needed. “We need to talk about the whole system of delivery because it isn’t the most efficient, and it definitely is one of the most expensive if not the most expensive way to deliver it,” said Cummings. Sen. Baruth added, “This is the first step, the second step is to think about cost containment and I think that is something we have to approach in a much different way. I think this year we’re going to need a discussion on how to reduce budgets and how to reduce long term costs in a way that’s new and going to be ground breaking,” said Baruth. Others added how complex and confusing education funding is for voters to understand. “Right now we have a tax system as far as education funding, I defy you any one of you to get up and truly explain it to voters on town meeting day,” said Sen. Randy Brock, the Senate’s Minority Leader. Others also dropped in. “We do have a lot of work to do on the education spending formula, additionally tweaking it. But the other half of this is I fully support having greater clarity and and transparency on how we’re spending money in our schools,” said Sen. Thomas Chittenden. “We need better metrics that we can compare apples to apples across all our districts to ensure that all of our kids have equal access to educational opportunity and not just taxpayer equity be our funding formula,” he said. The bill also means school districts can delay budget votes until later this spring which districts have been considering as they awaited action from the legislature. It’s clear both chambers still have their work cut out for them to help Vermonters over the coming years, but this first step will soon be on the governors desk.
Vermonters and municipalities are facing a potential staggering property tax increase due to education spending, leaving lawmakers scrambling to find a solution to help.
On Wednesday the senate advanced what they think is the first step, by eliminating the 5% cap created in Act 127.
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“A 5% cap when you’ve got 15% spending is bankruptcy, you can’t cap your revenue at 5% and put your spending up around 15% and expect the education fund to stay in business very long,” said Sen. Ann Cummings, the Chair of the Senate Finance committee.
The Senate President Pro Tem said it’s one correction/step and the first of many.
“There was in Act 127 a piece that produced an incentive to spend over 5% but under 10%, and there was some communities that took that incentive because we left the door open, so this corrects that,” said Sen. Phil Baruth.
Some however believe this is still not much help.
“Eliminating the 5% cap, what it does is put both of our districts in a pretty disadvantageous position in Stowe, it would put our taxes increase at about 27%,” said Ryan Heraty, the superintendent of the Lamoille South Unified Union.
Many adding a broader conversation of education funding is needed.
“We need to talk about the whole system of delivery because it isn’t the most efficient, and it definitely is one of the most expensive if not the most expensive way to deliver it,” said Cummings.
Sen. Baruth added, “This is the first step, the second step is to think about cost containment and I think that is something we have to approach in a much different way. I think this year we’re going to need a discussion on how to reduce budgets and how to reduce long term costs in a way that’s new and going to be ground breaking,” said Baruth.
Others added how complex and confusing education funding is for voters to understand.
“Right now we have a tax system as far as education funding, I defy you any one of you to get up and truly explain it to voters on town meeting day,” said Sen. Randy Brock, the Senate’s Minority Leader.
Others also dropped in.
“We do have a lot of work to do on the education spending formula, additionally tweaking it. But the other half of this is I fully support having greater clarity and and transparency on how we’re spending money in our schools,” said Sen. Thomas Chittenden. “We need better metrics that we can compare apples to apples across all our districts to ensure that all of our kids have equal access to educational opportunity and not just taxpayer equity be our funding formula,” he said.
The bill also means school districts can delay budget votes until later this spring which districts have been considering as they awaited action from the legislature.
It’s clear both chambers still have their work cut out for them to help Vermonters over the coming years, but this first step will soon be on the governors desk.
