A Pennsylvania school district that has challenged the constitutionality of Pennsylvania’s school funding system says it will have to close in January unless the state passes a resolution on the budget impasse.
The William Penn School District in Delaware County sued the Pennsylvania Department of Education in 2014, and in 2023, the state’s Commonwealth Court found that Pennsylvania’s school financing system violated the Education Clause of the state constitution and equal protection laws.
But during Monday evening’s school board meetingsuperintendent Dr. Eric Becoats announced that the district would only have enough money to operate schools for about three months unless the state budget was approved.
“If there is no state budget, we will be able to operate until the end of January,” Becoats said. “If there is no state budget by the end of January, we will definitely be in uncharted territory. And let me tell you, we are already in uncharted territory.”
The Pennsylvania Constitution calls for the General Assembly and the Governor to develop a spending plan no later than June 30 of each year. However, the Democrat-controlled House and GOP-led Senate have been unable to reach a resolution over the past 120 days and retain necessary funding from the state’s school districts.
William Penn, which includes Aldan, Colwyn, Darby, East Lansdowne, Lansdowne and Yeadon, is underfunded by $28 million a year and spends $6 million a month on payroll, utilities, transportation and crucial services, according to the board.
“I don’t want to scare anyone, but we are going through difficult times” – president of the management board Monica Boykins he said. “I just want everyone to know what we’re going to face.”
William Penn has already taken out a $9.9 million loan to keep its doors open this academic year.
“We can’t keep borrowing money from banks,” she added, because “that means taxpayers will have to keep paying more money. We already know that people are losing out by having their homes foreclosed on because they can’t cover their taxes.”
“Our state representatives are helping. We are politically connected. It’s people higher up than them who have this opinion and things are not going our way right now.”
Nicole Reigelmanpress spokesman Speaker of the House of Representatives Joanna McClinton (D-Philadelphia/Delaware), whose district includes William Penn, he said Questioner from Philadelphia that “chronically underfunded” systems like William Penn “suffer the consequences of the state Senate rejecting commonsense budgets passed by the House. This is unfair to our school districts and the students they serve.”
Becoats said state representatives stood with the district and supported it in Harrisburg.
“This is not about scaring anyone, it is about being transparent and honestly informing you about the situation we find ourselves in,” he said.
