The Legislature passed Act 127, entitled “An act relating to improving student equity by adjusting the school funding formula and providing education quality and funding oversight,” in 2022. It comes into effect starting with the 2024-2025 school year.
Among its provisions are ones that call for providing more aid per student for districts that are more rural, have a high percentage of pupils whose first language isn’t English, or who come from low-income families.
In addition the law seeks to hold down large jumps in education property tax rates by capping such increases at 5 percent annually over the next five years.
Projections for the coming year’s school spending suggest that in the absence of any changes, the homestead education tax rate could rise by as much as 16.6 percent.
The chairs of two of the Legislature’s money committees recently send out a public letter suggesting that districts are taking advantage of the new law to make up for increased costs. They suggested they will apply pressure to those districts deemed to have done so.
In response Elain Collins, Superintendent of the North Country Supervisory Union, has written a letter pointing to factors causing rises in her unions schools, which she says are out of the control of school boards and administrators.
These include the effect of common level of appraisal (CLA) calculations from the Department of Taxes….
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