Opinion ID: 2518321
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 12

Heading: financing formula as a whole

Text: With regard to the financing formula as a whole, the parties basically restate the same arguments they made regarding the formula's components. The State claims that the increased funding provided by H.B. 2247 alleviates this court's constitutional concerns. The Board disagrees, but it considers the increased funding a good faith initial effort toward compliance and an installment on the first remedy year toward what may very well be a much larger obligation based on the evidence in this case. The plaintiffs argue the increases in funding fall grossly short of what is actually necessary to provide a constitutionally suitable education. The State contends that overall it considered, to the extent possible, actual costs, including the A&M study. The plaintiffs respond that actual costs were not considered; rather the financing formula as amended by H.B. 2247 is merely a product of political compromise and the legislative majority's unwillingness to consider raising taxes to increase funding of schools. The Board argues H.B. 2247 does not fund actual costs and has many inequities. We agree with the Board that although H.B. 2247 does provide a significant funding increase, it falls short of providing constitutionally adequate funding for public education. It is clear that the legislature did not consider what it costs to provide a constitutionally adequate education, nor the inequities created and worsened by H.B. 2247. At oral arguments, counsel for the State could not identify any cost basis or study to support the amount of funding provided by H.B. 2247, its constellation of weightings and other provisions, or their relationships to one another. Particularly, we share the plaintiffs' and Board's concern that H.B. 2247's increased dependence on local property taxes, as decided by each school district, exacerbates disparities based on district wealth. We fully acknowledge that once the legislature has provided suitable funding for the state school system, there may be nothing in the constitution that prevents the legislature from allowing school districts to raise additional funds for enhancements to the constitutionally adequate education already provided. At least to the extent that funding remains constitutionally equalized, local assessments for this purpose may be permissible. Clearly, however, such assessments are not acceptable as a substitute for the state funding the legislature is obligated to provide under Article 6, § 6. That should pre-exist the local tax initiatives. As of this time, the legislature has failed to provide suitable funding for a constitutionally adequate education. School districts have been forced to use the LOB to supplement the State's funding as they struggle to suitably finance a constitutionally adequate education, a burden which the constitution places on the State, not on local districts. The result is wealth-based disparity because the districts with lower property valuations and median incomes are unable to generate sufficient revenue. Because property values vary widely, a district's ability to raise money by the required mill levy also varies widely. The cost-of-living weighting and extraordinary declining enrollment provision also have the potential to exacerbate inequity. A higher LOB cap, cost-of-living weighting, and the extraordinary declining enrollment provisions cannot be allowed to exacerbate inequities while we wait for the legislature to perform its constitutional duty. We conclude that, on the record before us, a continuing lack of constitutionally adequate funding together with the inequity-producing local property tax measures mean the school financing formula, as altered by H.B. 2247, still falls short of the standard set by Article 6, § 6 of the Kansas Constitution.