A bill to adjust the funding formula for general and special education needs lives to fight another day. It now heads to House appropriators, but it advanced without a recommendation.
The bill is brought by Rapid City Democratic Rep. Nicole Uhre-Balk. It requires the state to raise funds for public K-12 education by three percent or the inflation rate — whichever is greater.
Under current law, it is whichever of those two options is lower.
Uhre-Balk said in testimony Monday with the current system, the state can effectively cut education funding without saying it out loud.
“When funding grows more slowly than inflation, it is not neutral. It is a cut to classrooms," Uhre-Balk said. "Current law caps growth at three percent, even when real costs rise faster, forcing districts to absorb inflation they cannot control. We, the Legislature, raised required teacher pay. Without updating the mechanism, we risk eroding that commitment year-over-year.”
Uhre-Balk said it’s a matter of prioritizing where the state’s funding is most needed, an opinion shared by the South Dakota public education lobby. Sandra Waltman with the state Education Association agrees.
“I really do believe if we move this to Joint Appropriations and keep this conversation going, you’re going to send a really powerful message to the educators of South Dakota,” Waltman said.
Some committee members said they couldn’t support the bill because they’d rather see districts cut funding. However, former Brookings superintendent and Republican Rep. Roger DeGroot reminded the committee what that means in practice after experiencing a 10 percent cut firsthand.
"The only way you’re going to cut, or “streamline” any budget is cutting programs," DeGroot said. "Eighty-three percent of a schools’ budget is personnel. So, if you want to cut your biology program, your shop program, your CTE program — that’s the only way you can streamline education. I’ve been through it. I think our school districts do a wonderful job balancing their budgets. We do not fund education to the level we need to fund education.”
A vote to advance with a do-pass recommendation was tied 7-7 with one excused lawmaker. The second vote with no recommendation advanced 8-6.