By News Director Jared Atha
A bill that seeks to correct funding disparities for brick-and-mortar public schools in low property value areas while addressing charter school funding passed the House on Wednesday.
Senate Bill 229, co-authored by Rep. Anthony Moore, R-Clinton, creates the Redbud School Funding Act, which proposes using medical marijuana taxes and the Common School Building Equalization Fund to provide annual per-student funding grants to eligible school districts and charter schools.
The bill came after the State Board of Education’s recent settlement with the Oklahoma Public Charter School Association would have granted charter schools access to local property tax dollars that at present, only traditional public schools have the ability to access. If unchanged, the decision would shift tens of millions of local property tax dollars away from traditional public schools and into public charter schools. The decision was made in part because charter schools receive $3
Oklahoma school funding boost earns unanimous House support
Oklahoman
A bill that would do away with a polarizing charter school settlement and offer new revenue to public schools passed unanimously in the Oklahoma House.
The Redbud School Funding Act, or Senate Bill 229, advanced past the House floor on Wednesday. It will return to the Senate for further consideration.
The bill would invest $38.5 million in medical marijuana tax revenue to give grants to school districts and charter schools that receive below-average local tax funds for construction and maintenance of school facilities.
Virtual charter schools wouldn’t receive funds from this legislation.
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The Redbud School Funding Act - Senate Bill 229 - would disburse medical marijuana funds to Oklahoma schools that receive the least local tax revenues. It is being cosponsored by Rep. Kyle Hilbert, R-Bristow and will likely be heard by the House of Representatives this week.
If it had been in place this year, it would’ve led to $39 million going to schools for building-related improvements.
The measure works like this: if a school district receives below the state average of per student building fund dollars - from either local or state revenues - that district would receive a grant to make up for it.
The state funding formula is designed to cover the gap between local revenue and the amount necessary to have quality schools in each community. Charter schools, like Epic, receive no local tax revenue and nearly all funding comes from the state.
Hilbert said preventing a sustained windfall to Epic is one of the reasons he proposed the measure.
“The district with the most to lose is Epic, because they got as high as 60,000 students at one point, and they’ll be able to use that for two years after this year if we don’t change the law,” Hilbert said on the House floor Wednesday.
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