Ahead of the upcoming budget season, legislative Democrats have formally launched efforts to allocate the most significant funding in state history for Pennsylvania schools, unveiling a plan that would allocate $3.75 billion to education, staff recruitment and retention, and classroom resources.
The proposal, which House and Senate Democrats hope to pass as part of the state’s 2022-23 budget, would apply $2.75 billion from the general fund and $1 billion in unspent federal American Rescue Plan funds allocated to Pennsylvania last year.
Democrats in the Republican-controlled General Assembly touted a projected budget surplus of $6 billion to $7 billion by the end of this fiscal year, saying their proposal — called Full financing plan — doesn’t touch the state’s $2.6 billion in rainy day funds. While exact estimates vary between Democrats and Republicans, the extra cash could reach more than $10 billion this year.
“This historic moment is a response to a historic problem that has existed in Pennsylvania for generations,” Sen. Vincent Hughes, R-Philadelphia, said Monday during a virtual news conference.
“Now that historic revenues are available, we must leverage a bold program like this to address the needs of our teachers, our families and, most importantly, our students,” said Hughes, the top Democrat on the Senate Appropriations Committee.
The plan, announced among an ongoing attempt to finance the school AND Staff shortages in education related to Covid-19would assign:
- $1.1 billion in Fair financing formulawhich determines eligibility for state public schools
- $750 million in Level Up Program
- $1.1 billion to fix toxic schools
- $250 million for staffing and recruitment
- $125 million for mental health support
- $100 million for academic support
“These are our future doctors, nurses, teachers, engineers, counselors, and we need to seize this moment,” said Sen. Lindsey Williams, D-Allegheny, the ranking Democrat. Senate Education Committee, he said. “The last three years have shown us that our schools are, in many ways, the keystones of our society. To make society better, we must invest in our public education system.”
Last year’s budget allocated $300 million for education, including $200 million for the Fair Funding Formula and $100 million for Level Up, a funding program that prioritizes Pennsylvania’s poorest school districts.
While the bipartisan investment was praised by Democrats and Republicans, including Democratic Gov. Tom Wolf, some argued that schools need more resources to address learning gaps and staffing problems related to the Covid-19 pandemic, as well as years of unfair funding.
On Monday, Pennsylvania Association of School Administrators, Pennsylvania School Business Officials AssociationAND Pennsylvania Rural and Small School Association he released annual budget reportin which labor issues were identified as the most essential concern for school officials.
The report recommended that lawmakers raise funding for schools experiencing increases in mandatory costs to avoid local tax increases and find ways to facilitate schools that rely on federal ESSER funds maintain their programs before the current 2024 expiration date.
Their plan also recommends that policymakers facilitate schools address supply chain, labor and fiscal challenges to ensure further updates to transportation, food services, technology and infrastructure to ensure students have access to high-quality education and classroom support.
Wolf who he laid his legacy on educationat last week’s news conference, he touted the projected budget surplus, promoting $225 million in aid for health care workers as “an indication of what we can do”with excess funds.
However, legislative Republican budget officials have been hesitant to support calls to spend the surplus dollars.
Senate Appropriations Committee Chairman Pat Browne, R-Lehigh, said at press conference last week that while a growing government surplus may look good in the compact term, current reserves must cover future bills.
“With reasonable revenue projections, mandatory spending and historical estimates of how much we put into education, we will achieve fiscal balance” by 2024, Browne told reporters.
He added: “The commonwealth must always take its short-term financial position seriously, and the long-term position of the commonwealth must always be taken seriously so that it can properly serve its constituents in the years to come.”
Wolf, who will leave office next year, is expected to present his final budget proposal next week, Elizabeth Rementer, a spokeswoman for the governor, told the Capital-Star in an email. She added that Wolf will consider the Democrats’ spending plan as he prepares to present his own.
In analysisThe Pennsylvania Budget and Policy Center, a progressive research organization that studies the economy and public policy, estimates that the Democrats’ plan will reduce the per-student state funding shortfall in school districts with the highest poverty rates by $1,350, bringing it down to $1,431 per student.
The report also found that the per-pupil state funding shortfall in the lowest-poverty school districts would decrease by $151, for a total of $111 per student.
“Additional $1.85 billion in funding would still leave K-12 students in school districts with high levels of poverty and high percentages of Black and Latino students underfunded, highlighting how radically inequitable school funding currently is in Pennsylvania,” Marc Stier, director of the Pennsylvania Center on Budget and Policy, said. “That said, the Democrats’ plan is a major step forward that all members of the General Assembly should applaud.”
Capital-Star Staff Reporter Stephen Caruso contributed to this story.
