Opinion ID: 1789805
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 15

Heading: Who Benefits?

Text: One may ask why these valuations are locked in for so long. Perhaps the explanation may be found by answering the age-old question: Who benefits? Are they mostly the fast-growing suburbs? School districts in rapidly growing areas of the state would seem to do well because they would continue to get state aid based on their 2004 valuations even though newly built properties are coming onto the tax rolls and producing local revenue without having that revenue deducted from their state aid entitlements. Are the losers, relatively speaking, the slow-growing or declining areas that are mostly rural school districts? These are questions to be answered in the legislative process, not in the courts. If school finance legislation follows the golden rule of he who has the gold makes the rules, it is of little or no concern to the courts. But the rulesregardless of the gold of those who make them-must conform to constitutional requirements. That is the courts' concern. It is not my purpose to revive old resentments that pit urban or suburban areas against rural interests but simply to point out that when the system is rigged unconstitutionally, the losers should have a judicial remedy. This is not the first time this Court has been called upon to evaluate the state's property tax system for funding public schools. In Jones , this Court considered the equalized assessed valuation system employed under the state's school funding formula. The Court held that equalization of a district's assessments required that the state consider real and tangible personal property separately in determining the true value of property in a district. 653 S.W.2d at 191. The Court in Jones also noted the long history of judicial review of the state's school funding procedures, explaining that similar statutory procedures for apportioning state school funds have been in effect for more than 100 years during which time numerous legal challenges to school fund apportionments have been instigated by school districts and determined on the merits. Id. at 187. [49] Jones , decided only 26 years ago, may be a relic of an era when this Court played its proper role in our system of checks and balances. I hope it is not a relic. I recognize that plaintiffs in this case abandoned a direct attack on the question of equalization of the assessments. Though I make the argument that this Court should address the equalization issue in evaluating the constitutional validity of the school finance law, as the Coalition to Fund Excellent Schools urges, I read today's principal opinion as keeping the door open to a direct challenge to the state's failure to equalize property assessments properly. I agree with the principal opinion that the Court should look to specific provisions of the constitution. Article X, section 14 explicitly mandates creation of a commission to equalize assessments as between counties. Pursuant to this constitutional mandate, section 138.010 et seq., RSMo Supp.2008, establish and set forth rules of operation for county boards of equalization. The requirement of using equalized assessed valuations is specific. It requires no interpretation but simply is to be applied. Because the state's school funding formula is built upon a foundation that violates article X, section 14 of the state constitution, I believe the state school funding formula presently before the Court is unconstitutional. The Court should require the General Assembly to use another basis for funding Missouri's schools if the present property tax structure is not brought up to constitutional standards and unlocked to allow distribution of state funds to be affected by equalized valuations, not unequal valuations that are locked in for eight years.