Rep. Robert W. Pritchard (R-Hinckley) had many things to say about Gov. Bruce Rauner’s veto of school funding legislation at a hearing Monday of the House Appropriations Elementary & Secondary Education Committee.
In discussing the amendatory veto of SB444, a bill to fund 852 school districts that was vetoed by Rauner, Pritchard directed many of his questions to Illinois State Board of Education (ISBE) Co-Director of Legislative Affairs Amanda Elliott and Chief Financial Officer Robert Wolfe.
“What is the reason it has taken four or months to date to get numbers clarified and ready to implement a new funding formula?” Pritchard asked Wolfe.
Rep. Robert W. Pritchard
“We have undertaken a very deliberate process with school districts around the state to gather and finalize enrollment data for three particular fiscal years working on that one,” Wolfe said.
“It is imperative we ensure those numbers are right because those are the numbers that go into the calculations for the adequacy target which is utilized to determine what schools are in most need,” Wolfe said.
According to Wolfe, the school districts are presently “cleaning up numbers” for data analysis verifications that will be compiled in a series of tests to identify the numbers of 97 school districts that may not have accurate figures.
“It is imperative with the design of the evidence-based funding formula that what they receive in the fiscal year 2018 will become a base funding minimum in fiscal year 2019,” Wolfe said.
Pritchard wanted to know if the numbers in the base funding formula were being tweaked and inevitably rise, would there be less than $350 million to distribute throughout all the districts in the state.
Wolfe said there should be enough.
“What you just outlined was a sequential system of verifying the numbers, so is not possible to immediately go to the districts and say, ‘verify the numbers,’” Pritchard asked, adding based on the prior panel of superintendent’s statement funding that is urgently needed should take precedence over Wolfe’s outline.
“We have the same urgency to get these numbers and new additional dollars out to school districts; however, we have this belief that we have to be precisely accurate in our calculation and the data we are using,” Wolfe said.
Pritchard continued to question Wolfe, wanting to know if the school districts are working on the numbers they have been asked to compile.
“We heard earlier from the panel that they weren’t aware that there wasn’t any problem with the data and that you already had the data so hopefully by your testimony they will know they can share with other superintendents that there is a reason for the delay and that school districts should respond because they are part of the outliers,” Pritchard said.
Pritchard asked Elliott if she was aware of any conversation between ISBE and Rauner over “override language,” which she could not answer.
“We need to take reality where it is and get this funding formula implemented,” Pritchard said.
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