Superintendents call on General Assembly to back Gov. Wolf's education budget proposal

If the $1.3 billion investment in education comes through that Gov. Tom Wolf included in his proposed state budget, it would just about make up for the increased costs Pennsylvania schools are set to absorb between this and next school year, according to Jamie Baxter, policy director for nonprofit Allies for Children, formerly Child Watch of Pittsburgh.

“Across Pennsylvania, schools were forced to cover mandated pandemic costs that spiked by a total of $665 million,” Baxter said Thursday at a press conference held at Franklin Regional Senior High School and included several superintendents from the region. “Districts are expected to be faced with another mandated increase of $485 million next year, for a total increase of $1.2 billion.

“This is simply unsustainable,” Baxter said.

Franklin Regional Superintendent Gennaro Piraino agreed, saying that underfunding at the state level contributed heavily to district’s decision to raise taxes 15 of the past 16 years, including to the state-imposed limit the past three years.

Wolf proposes using the “fair funding formula” created in 2016 by a bipartisan commission to determine more basic education funding. Though enacted five years ago, the formula has been used for only 11% of state school funding — the rest determined using enrollment figures from 1992, nearly 30 years ago, Wolf said.

“Franklin Regional has experienced significant increases in mandates and other necessary costs,” Piraino said.

That includes money that is leaving the district and going to charter schools, using a funding system that Piraino and other superintendents said was broken, as well as a moratorium on state reimbursement for schools through its PlanCon program.

Franklin Regional’s Sloan “elementary campus” project, under normal PlanCon conditions, would be eligible for $10 million to $12 million in state reimbursement.

Northgate School District Superintendent Caroline Johns said her district, which serves Bellevue and Avalon in Allegheny County, already was financially distressed before the pandemic hit.

“We’re a small district, with limited ability to raise funds locally,” Johns said. “And, with approximately half of our students being economically disadvantaged, we’re very sensitive to raising taxes, as we know the strain it puts on our community.”

Johns said she’s thankful for federal stimulus funding, but noted that it is not a sustainable funding source.

“Since the 2016-17 school year, we’ve seen our basic expenses increase by 4.2% per year, while state basic education funding only increased by 0.2%,” Johns said. “Special education costs have gone up 9% annually, with only a 2.3% increase at the state level.”

Johns said the situation left Northgate “in a position where we have to routinely increase taxes on an already-struggling community, while also drawing down our own fund balance.”

McKeesport Superintendent Mark Holtzman said his district’s $72 million budget is “ravaged by charter schools, retirement contributions, debt service, the cost of a 1-to-1 technology initiative and new positions to address all the trauma that’s occurred for not just our children, but our staff.”

“Capital projects, and the funds to complete them, do not exist,” Holtzman said.

All three called on state legislators to back Wolf’s education budget.

“Our local legislators, Reps. Bob Brooks and Eric Nelson, and our state Sen. Joe Pittman, agree that the cyber/charter funding system is broken, and needs fixed,” Piraino said. “We’ve been actively engaged with legislators throughout the entire pandemic.”

Baxter said the group is calling on the General Assembly “to invest significantly in our schools, increase basic education funding, special-education funding and career and technology education funding.”