Budget would hurt urban, help suburban schools

INDIANAPOLIS  – Gov. Mitch Daniels said Indiana’s schools are “among America’s luckiest” because they have so far avoided cuts during the recession.

But only some Indiana schools would find four-leaf clovers under Daniels’ budget proposal.

Suburban schools with booming enrollments would see funding increases, while urban and rural school districts that are losing students would see decreases. Whether that approach is a fair way to distribute money is at the heart of partisan squabbles dominating budget talks as lawmakers prepare to start a special session Thursday.

But Democrats and Republicans are also arguing about the school funding numbers
themselves.

The Republican governor said his two-year budget would give schools an average funding increase of 2 percent in each of the next two years, and more than 70 percent of traditional public schools would see an increase from 2009 to 2011. But Daniels’ budget relies heavily on federal stimulus money to provide those increases. That money – around $400 million – will run out in two years.

Democrats said Daniels’ numbers aren’t accurate and argue stimulus money shouldn’t be considered school funding because it should only be used on one-time expenditures.

When stimulus money isn’t factored in, 58 percent of Indiana’s traditional public school districts would lose money from 2009 to 2011, according to an Associated Press analysis of school funding numbers provided by the Daniels administration.

Those figures do not include charter schools.

Daniels and other Republicans said it makes sense for schools to receive less money if they are losing students because they don’t need as many teachers and administrators.

“The money follows the child,” said Rep. Jeff Espich, R-Uniondale. “There are winners and losers.”

The losers aren’t happy.

The state’s largest district, Indianapolis Public Schools, warns that steep cuts could send it into a “death spiral” as more parents flee to the suburbs with their children, leaving shuttered schools and out-of-work teachers in their wake.

The district of 34,000 students is expected to lose nearly 2,000 students in each of the next two years. Under Daniels’ formula, IPS would lose nearly 11 percent of its funding from 2009 to 2011. When stimulus money is factored in, the district would see a cut of about 4 percent.

IPS Superintendent Eugene White, who has made major changes in an effort to turn the district around, said cuts proposed under Daniels’ budget would be massive. The district has already laid off 300 teachers and closed several schools.

“This would be devastating to the Indianapolis Public Schools,” White said. “Quite frankly, we have come too far to rebuild a district devastated by this.”

House Speaker Patrick Bauer, D-South Bend, noted that Daniels eliminated part of the school funding formula that helped soften the blow of enrollment declines over time. He said the proposed cuts were too deep.

“You shouldn’t just fall off a cliff,” Bauer said.

The winners under Daniels’ plan would be fast-growing districts like Hamilton Southeastern Schools in the Indianapolis suburb of Fishers. That district would see about an 11 percent increase from 2009 to 2011, not counting stimulus money.

Growing school districts say they need that cash to build new schools, hire more teachers and accommodate a crush of new students.

“We just want the best distribution system that the state can create that would include fully funding growth,” said Tim Ogle, superintendent of the Avon Community Schools Corp. Avon schools have nearly doubled in 10 years, and enrollment is now at 8,380.

Finding a fair way to divvy up limited resources will be a challenge as lawmakers meet in a special session to hammer out a new budget before the current one expires June 30. Democrats who control the House said they will start meeting Tuesday to craft their own budget – one that won’t penalize shrinking schools as harshly.

“Basically, we’re trying to cause no harm,” Bauer said.