Editor’s note: This commentary is by Heidi Spear, of Fayston, who is running for state representative in the Washington 7 District. She is a graduate of Middlebury College and has worked as a tech executive in Cambridge, Mass. She is currently board chair of Mil Milagros Inc. and Fayston Elementary School.
Act 60/68, our education funding system for nearly 20 years, was designed to address funding equity through a highly nuanced, complex system involving local votes on local spending that gets funded statewide. In our formula we define neither what education we commit to providing statewide nor what it should cost. We have no effective limits on the range of education we deliver or on statewide spending. Vermont’s education funding system is unique in this respect, and not in a good way. Without a growing population or economy, our spending increases have resulted in rapidly climbing property taxes that undermine affordability in our state. It is high time for reform.
Many other states’ efforts to equitably support education involve defining educational goals, the budget necessary to achieve those goals, and the manner through which the state will distribute resources fairly. Their education funding formulas are grounded in a careful determination of the cost to deliver on their educational commitment to all students regardless of district wealth. What these states spend is governed by educational goals and the corresponding need to meet them. They have something to teach us. In Vermont, we have not defined our education commitment, even though the Brigham decision made plain that the state must “ensure substantial equality of educational opportunity throughout Vermont.” The result has been unbridled spending without a clear link to achieving educational goals or ensuring substantial equality.
Defining programmatic and financial commitments would help Vermont meet its obligation and provide predictable and equitable statewide funding for local communities to achieve statewide goals. It would also contain spending. The scope of commitment, called adequacy by economists, has no fixed definition. Our definition would reflect Vermont values. Statewide commitments would ensure, as required by Brigham, that establishing educational opportunity is not “necessarily a function of district wealth.” However, as also noted in Brigham, equal opportunity does not “necessarily prohibit cities and towns from spending more on education if they so choose.” Local votes and investments would still have their place.
Absent targeted, budgeted statewide education funding, we have doubled per pupil education spending in Vermont since 2004. As a nation, we spend more than every country but Luxemburg. In Vermont, we spend 50-70 percent more than the national average and are consistently one of the top three state spenders. Here and elsewhere the tenuous link between increasing expenditures and student learning confirms the obvious: it is not how much we spend on education but how well we spend education dollars. Many states and countries at the top of the performance ladder spend far less than we do.
Meanwhile, here in Vermont, we have spent our way to the largest education funding burden in the country. Low real personal income growth and rapidly growing property taxes have not made for a loving embrace for Vermonters. The economic picture is one of struggle. If we want Vermont to be more affordable or for our state government to be able to invest in other priorities, such as higher education or mental health, we need to contain preK-12 education spending and ensure that our education dollars are invested wisely.
House leadership and the administration have put the target on the back of current education governance and that damnable enemy of efficiency — local control. Their campaign ignores the fact that the advent of local control does not coincide with the onset of rapid spending growth.
Still, powerful lobbyists stand in the way of any effort to contain education spending. Their idea for giving relief to property taxpayers is to shift the cost of education for residents to income taxes. While this reform would shift who pays how much for the rising tide of spending, it would do nothing to contain it. Meanwhile, with funding levels hovering at $10,000 for some districts and in excess of $30,000 for others, it is a surprise to watchful education funding experts outside Vermont that Act 60/68 has not yet faced a constitutional challenge of its own.
Outside experts have not awarded Vermont top honors for funding equity.The status quo is no prize pig — it is just a pig. The defining and totally unique characteristic of our statewide education funding system is not that it results in greater equity but that it will cover the expenditures of any district no matter how high or out of sync with other districts’ resources. Our excess spending thresholds, an innovation designed to stem the rising tide, have proven ineffective. While they can hit some communities no matter how basic their educational offerings, the highest spenders are so buffered by our nuanced, unaudited formula that these penalties don’t touch them. The tide continues to rise.
Of late, some are working hard to make it seem our spending problem has nothing to do with Act 60/68 and the Legislature’s failure to reform it. House leadership and the administration have put the target on the back of current education governance and that damnable enemy of efficiency — local control. Their campaign ignores the fact that the advent of local control does not coincide with the onset of rapid spending growth. It also ignores the overwhelming data that our consolidated districts are spending more, not less, than smaller districts. Further, data is very mixed on the savings and performance impact of consolidating rural districts. Focusing exclusively on reducing administration, a small and stable segment of education expenditures, is an intentional and dangerous distraction from the larger issue — continued exponential growth in education spending.
One of the most important steps we can take in restoring affordability in Vermont is to recognize the limits of our resources and define and budget our statewide PK-12 education commitment. If we do not change our education funding system, no matter if a consolidation scheme gets mandated, spending and tax burden will continue in the same direction — ever higher.
Vermonters need to decide their own fates with regard to property taxes — not on Town Meeting Day, when they can only vote on local spending, but this November. It is time to hold the Legislature accountable for doing what was easy rather than what was necessary. We need to elect those with a credible commitment to, at long last, champion and implement reform.
