LUTHERAN QUILTERS – Members of the Quilts for Comfort Group stand between pews draped with some of the 205 quilts they made, in the Sitka Lutheran Church Tuesday. The group made the quilts for five local non-profits and one in Anchorage. The remaining quilts are sent to Lutheran World Relief which distributes them to places around the world in need, such as Ukraine, as part of Personal Care Kits. Pictured are, from left, Helen Cunningham, Kathleen Brandt,Vicki Swanson, Paulla Hardy, Kim Hunter, Linda Swanson and Sue Fleming. (Sentinel Photo by James Poulson)
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Daily Sitka Sentinel
School Funding Bill Gets Mixed Reception
By TOM HESSE
Sentinel Staff Writer
The advancement of an education bill in the state House of Representatives is a positive step, but still comes up short of district needs, say local school officials.
Sitka School Board President Lon Garrison said that although the bill the House passed today would increase overall funding for education, it’s not an amount he expects will make a tremendous difference in the local school budget.
“I think our budget planning, being pretty conservative, is going to put us pretty close to where we want to be,” Garrison said. Any increase in state funding is welcome, he added, but “we’d like to see more because it’s not really keeping up with costs.”
School Board members are currently working on the 2015 budget, and many of the decisions they’ll have to make are dependent on what happens in the Legislature.
The funding change proposed in the House education bill will increase the Base Student Allocation by $185 this year and by another $58 in each of the next two years.
Paired with the BSA increase is a $30 million one-time package of education funding. Last year the state doled out more than $40 million in one-time funding, split between a $25 million package of aid and $21 million for security expenses.
Garrison said with the overall one-time funding package less than last year’s, the BSA increase will mean more state funds available for Sitka this year but not by as much as would be expected with the higher allocation that the school districts have advocated.
“If you tally up what we could get this next year, it’s a slight increase. It’s not a huge increase,” Garrison said.
For the Sitka school district, the proposed BSA increase would mean a little less than $250,000 more for Sitka in per-student funding that would be available under the current rate of $5,680. The budget projects a total district enrollment of 1,300 students next year.
School officials said the $185 increase in the student allocation doesn’t keep up with inflation.
Sitka Rep. Jonathan Kreiss-Tomkins said the education bill passed by the House could improve as it moves through the Senate.
Speaking with the Sentinel from Juneau, Kreiss-Tomkins said he didn’t love every part of the bill, but there was enough in it for him to join four other House Democrats (all members of the Republican-led majority coalition) who gave an affirmative vote.
“The bill I think has 56 sections, and there are a few sections that I still have problems with, but 85 percent of this bill is ‘Kumbaya’ stuff that everyone can and should support,” Kreiss-Tomkins said.
Kreiss-Tomkins said the Senate may add further to the $185 BSA increase and strip out some of the parts of the bill he doesn’t like.
“I think some of the more troublesome agreements that I don’t agree with and that I voted to take out of the bill may get stripped out of the bill,” he said. “I would imagine the bill would become even more appealing as it passes through the Senate because the Senate has been more adamant about funding education than members of the House have been.”
Kreiss-Tompkins was the only member of the minority Democratic caucus to vote on final passage of the bill by the House this morning.
He said the parts of the bill that still concern him include a provision that allows the state Department of Education to propose a salary schedule for teachers, and tax credits for donations to private schools, which Kriess-Tomkins called a “backdoor to school vouchers.”
Still, Kreiss-Tomkins said, there’s enough in the bill to garner his support, especially after amendments removed two key sticking points: one that would have shifted the burden of paying teacher pension plans and another that would have changed the funding formula for education to favor urban schools.
“The funding formula has been a brokered peace for decades now, and there used to be incredible wars between urban and rural Alaska over education funding, so opening up that again would have set a bad precedent,” Kreiss-Tomkins said.
Garrison said he’s pleased the pension change was taken out. The change would have placed more of the burden on local districts to pay into the state pension system.
Kreiss-Tomkins said the bill represents the citizen push for education funding.
“I would have liked to have seen a little bit more, but it’s a good start. We’re playing catchup and we’re getting closer to matching inflation and that’s a real positive to me, and it’s also a real testament to the tremendously effective citizen lobbying during this session,” he said.
“If there weren’t moms from Anchorage that had flown down from Anchorage on their own dime and stayed in hotels and been walking the halls of the Legislature, then I don’t think we would have seen these increases.”
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20 YEARS AGO
March 2004
Advertisement: Tea-Licious Tea House & Bakery 315 Lincoln Street Grand Opening! Freshly Baked Scones, Cakes & Pastries Innovative Salads, Soups & Sandwiches Harney & Sons Tea. Lunch * Afternoon Tea * Supper.
50 YEARS AGO
March 1974
Photo caption: National Republican Chairman George Bush takes a drink of water offered by Jan Craddick, Sitka delegate, during the Republican convention held here. Mrs. Craddick explained to Bush that the water was from Indian River, which means, according to local legend, that he will return.