DES Moines, Iowa — Iowa lawmakers have about two weeks to pass state education funding in order to meet their self-imposed deadline. That deadline is 30 days from when the governor released her budget proposal, which was near the beginning of session.
Governor Kim Reynolds and Senate Republicans proposed a 2% increase for supplemental state aid, which is an extra $235 million for K-12 education.
“$235 million in new spending for K-12 students demonstrates the commitment of Senate Republicans to improving education,” said State Senator Lynn Evans. “It is a sustainable increase, focused on getting more money into the classroom, and it is proposed on-time so schools can make informed decisions about their budget for next year.”
While the bill advanced out of committee in the state Senate, House Republicans are still trying to settle on a funding increase of their own.
“Right now, our conversations are looking at what additional things may have interest in within the funding formula,” House Speaker Pat Grassley said. “Obviously there’s SSA’s a part of that but there’s other things we’ve historically as a House caucus wanted to consider. Transportation, equity, per pupil equity and other things across the state that impacts our districts as well. Operational sharing’s another example. So, we are working internally in the caucus to decide where we want to finally land.”
Senate and House Democrats claimed a 2% increase isn’t enough and would force many public schools into budget cuts as more students turn to the state’s Education Savings Account (ESAs) program that uses taxpayer dollars to pay for kids’ private school tuition.
“We are proposing a 5% increase in school funding for the 482,000 kids in public schools,” State Sen. Janice Weiner said. “This is the same amount that Republicans are proposing to give to the roughly 27,000 in the voucher program. I believe that Iowans are fed up with the Republican agenda, which prioritize the few over the many.”
Last year, lawmakers ended up not passing State Supplemental Aid (SSA) funding until later in the session, which school districts said impacted their budget. They said it was hard to plan for the next school year when they didn’t know how much money they would have to work with.
