FM Talk 1065 Podcasts
State Representative Danny Garrett - The Jeff Poor Show - August 19 2024
My heroes have always been cowboys And they still are the same Sadness or charm One step in my heart For themselves And their soul can breathe Looking back to the Jet Force show that if I talk with 065 they should stay with us on this Monday morning Real quick, I didn't get into it in the last segment, but our programming note tomorrow in the program Paul DeMarco one of regulars on this show will be with us and also Alabama Republican Party Chairman John Wall and another guest to be named later So please tune in tomorrow, but joining us now you've heard we've been talking about this a lot this morning But the Chairman of the House Education Trust Fund Budget Committee Danny Garrett joins us on the line representative. Good morning. How are you? Good morning, Jeff great to be with you. Hey, thanks for making time. I do appreciate it. So The topic really and I know you dealt with it some last week Chairman The change to this formula and you guys have been working on this for some time This isn't necessarily something new it just came up in the news because of your committee the Joint Committee that convened last week The formula and how education money from the state is distributed to the various school systems around the state Walk us through that and why these why what we have now needs at least some attention you think Yeah, well first let me just clarify that we've not made any decision to change the funding formula or have any preconceived ideas But what we do know in dr. Mackey State Superintendent verified in the meeting the other last week is that the current formula we have is not something you describe as adequate and It is unlike any other formula in any other state in the country 45 states have moved away from the model that we use to a different type of model and these are very complex models and a lot of considerations have to go into it and also each state Differs because of their tax structures and the nuances of their law and things like that But we know that when you look at Alabama's educational outcomes Pretty much by most any measure we're at the bottom and what every previous study that we've had that looks at how we fund the education In the state tells you it's not adequate. It wasn't adequate 30 years ago and even now with the changing world we're in it's not Keeping pace with changes in the in the in our economy or our demographics So all we're doing at this point is basically saying look we need to tee this up again and discuss it and see if we believe Again, we validate that it's not adequate Look at what other states are doing and determine if any of that would be applicable to Alabama We started these discussions about a year ago dr. Mackey was with us at the very initial meeting and that we're now trying to We decide to get so Chairman or I decided to that we would use our budget committees as a vehicle to at least that the initial Diligence on this effort and then at some point if we decide to move forward then we will need to expand this to include a lot of different groups education groups and Of course the governor's office already engaged with us. So we're in a discovery period right now But what I can tell you is that we basically If you want to oversimplify it The way we fund education Alabama now is that in Montgomery we determine every system needs X number of teachers per student Every system needs X amount of money per student for transportation That's kind of the way we do it then we divide that big pot up to each system based on headcount We're not looking at the specific needs of a district So what if you move from that type of model which is a Resource a cost model to a student needs model you would look at systems and you would score those systems based upon those Student needs if you have a system has a high degree of poverty high-level poverty that they would give you a weighting fact for that a System or that has a high number of special needs students would would be weighted accordingly because it costs more to educate And to address those issues you have a system that has a high number of English you know ESL students Gifted students there are a number of different things, but you would weight that system and the money would be allocated Based upon the needs of systems and you would not you move away from a one-size-fits-all That's all based on headcount to try and to direct money to systems based on their needs And what occurs to me is like really what's taking kind of a directing ball if you would Figuratively speaking here to the the status quo I mean, it is this this immigration sort of policy that the federal government has bestowed upon the country But this English is a secular language thing seems to be like a very big Problem that look if you're gonna have an influx of migrant students the skill system still wants to educate those students and they don't turn many people away But not all students are created equal it does take a special skill set to deal with these students primarily a Bilingual teacher, which does this, you know, not all teachers are bilingual, right? right Well, you know I think that the kind of drivers that the federal government has mandated that public schools Provide a lot of services with respect to special needs and there's a wide spectrum of special needs and expanded that scope Special needs the federal government has mandated that we that we that the public schools Educate any child that come is in that system. So certainly a child that comes in the system that doesn't speak English Would they want there's a number of different things like that that are being mandated by the federal government and under our current funding model in the state? We're not Basically funding that we're not addressing that we're not fighting you support at all So the funding for those initiatives in each district has to come from either federal money Which there's a limit on that or from local money or from the local and in some systems that are affected by those issues Don't have the local money and so You know, it's and then then you've got also the correlation between High poverty and dense poverty and some of the remote area the rural areas the state we have a lot of remote issues You have students traveling a long way. So certainly transportation is a more effective there than it may be in another district So all this doing is what forty five other states have done But recently Tennessee in Mississippi is shift to say we're gonna go to this model That now looks at all of these impacts that have changed in the last 30 years and that's what systems are doing Now what set this thing off last week was I had read where dr Mackey had made a comment to the state school board and then apparently to some reporters earlier last week that To do this, we would have to would require two billion dollar statewide tax increase and It would require or it would require that we shift money from wealthy districts to poor districts and of course that's not been on our radar. That's not something we're looking at doing Chairman or I are not would not recommend to our committees that we consider such a proposal. So last week Having read that comment. I gave dr Mackey the opportunity to clarify his comments He said three times in his Remarks of the committee that he felt like this was absolutely an effort We should be looking at and he also wanted to be a part of it He supported the effort and he also understood the ground rules that we had and so you know, that's where we are So I think that's the fear at least in my mind here here. You have in this state I mean a lot of communities around the state will pay higher property taxes to to bolster the whatever funding is coming in for their public schools and I mean they have all their own reasons about but it's the haves that have nots and I guess the question would be When you start taking her with that formula How do you how do you not take away from the haves to give to the have-nots But that would be the concern, right? Yeah, well the first thing you do is that there's about and I don't don't hold me to this Number of I think so about two and a half billion dollars of local money that's right now outside the funding formula We used the state that two and a half billion in our marching orders and our ground moves We laid forth to the consultants that are going to help us analyze all of this and to our committee We said that two and a half billion dollars will remain outside this formula. So any city any system that has been a local issue our mindset and our ground rule is number one that money will not be affected by what we do now So that's the local money stays with the locals number two. We don't want any system to lose So now, how does that happen? You know that because right now if you look at the if you get the weeds to come Of the calculations you'll find that some of the more fluent systems receive less state money for a pupil than some before Systems under the current formula and that would you know, there's that that's how it is in the day We would not be looking we do not want any system to to have less funding that they would get going forward So how you do that? I don't know I don't know what is it possible that we can come up with the bottle that addresses all the ground rules We said fourth we think so, but we don't know we'll find out but What what we would do would be to make sure you know, we we set aside a couple of reserves We've we had this new educational opportunity fund and part of that fund. That's being that's building right now We believe needs to be utilized for The changes in education community part of it could be to help us transition to the funding that we're talking about This funding model change the other would be your school choice really takes hold and starts to really be a big demand We'll need you know to address that so we've this one of the reasons for this new education opportunities Reserve Fund that right now has about seven hundred million in it Will or maybe a billion in it now, but after this year about about a billion in it Will actually be you available for us to look at some of these Changes we want to make to the current way we find education in the state But our ground rule one is that no system loses money that no local money gets brought into this formula change you believe be impacted by the change and So those are the spicy ground rules that are important to both chairman or and myself as the chair of this effort And then I'm sure committees feel the same way Well, and you look at this. I mean when we start talking about these metrics and we talked about demographics and special needs I mean, or would it be Feasible or would this be a possibility that maybe some people in the legislature say hey look We're not performing as well Our test scores aren't as high as mountain brook vastavia Madison or wherever we need more money You got to make this part of your criteria, even though these systems I just mentioned are doing it right to pay more taxes They're electing competent people to their school board and these other systems don't really maybe aren't as taking as much as the Local buy-in as a the others are yeah Yeah, I think I think you know You know some some systems the reality is some systems don't have that local support So that's that's an issue. We've got it, you know, and we're required of the Constitution to to provide public education It needs to be adequate public education, which by the superintendents on a mission what we currently do today is not adequate They say it's equity, but it's not adequate that gets into the weeds of the deal But I would say too like when you look at how you how you look at a system some of the Rural systems are really struggling with the ESL issue right now Some systems have 50 to 60 percent of their students are ESL and just think about it The state's not really giving them any support at all. So whatever support they get is deluded by that effort Which is of course impacting education for all the kids in that state and the resources in the in the in that in that in that in that school system some of this They've been then able to get along because with all the influx of S for money and money from COVID Whatnot there was federal money that came down that was kind of a stop gap for some of this, but that's going away That's gone away So that's an issue then you have other systems and some of these are some of the more fluent systems where they have a little huge Special needs effort. They've kind of become a magnet for some of the special needs I talked to one CFO in an area of Metro Birmingham Metro Birmingham that has five special needs students that they're required to educate, you know under the federal requirements and that those five students cost that system $900,000 a year and That's having to come out of local coffers and this is not a system that has a lot of local money available So it's an issue where you're going from basically the Montgomery Determining what every system in the state, you know has to have on a per pupil basis and giving that money out to basically say look We're gonna look at each system score it and then allocate the money to try to help Provide for some of those student needs that are different from district to district It's complicated and again, we've laid out ground rules chairman or went through those the other day and and there were about four or five Really ground rules principles one big no system loses money. Second is that no? Local money is brought into the equation in terms of what we're just at the state level and there were a few other things But of course part of this too is transparency Because this formula would ultimately give local systems more Disability and how they spend their money because the system and the rural area is very different from out in the book So what they need would be different and so we would give more flexibility, but you've got to have the accountability as well Well, you know, we're at this point. We're not sure that that what we want to do is even possible But we're gonna we need to do the diligence to See it, but we do know right now that what we're doing is not really even a pure funding Formula I never really for a pure foundation program formula. I never heard it said that but dr. Miss Mackey said at the day He said well he's anybody outside of that what we do and would say that's not really a foundation program, so Twice there's been studies done. They've all reached the same conclusion But nobody's ever acted on it and now we're just at least in the business to see if we need to move forward for some changes Well, this is my last question. We're up and up on this Assuming and this is I guess maybe a little bit theoretical, but our hypothetical if you weren't able to find the formula that suited everybody and you got it through and you're providing more resources for ESL special needs or whatever is that y'all determined? How do you tell the local systems? That this is what you need to use this money for are you I mean, can't or as the legislature able to do that or does it fall under the like a local control issue or to state school? More like how do you say that you have to use this money for for this need one of our ground rules has to do with transparency and Accountability and so you're you would be looking for those outcomes. So if a system, you know, we've scored a system Assuming that it's got, you know a high ESL situation We would expect that system will have money out the discretion of how they utilize our money But we will certainly be from the legislative sample the State Department will we'll be monitoring this and the legislature as well because we're wanting to see outcome, so I don't that answer your question or not, but I mean, you know, we would score that system We would expect those funds to be utilized to improve that that situation address that situation and that's key to one of our ground rules was was the the transparency and the outcomes because if locals have more flexibility, we certainly want them to improve outcomes that's the whole point of this well, I guess it'd be this like say all of a sudden one benefits from The formula changing and the system gets a bunch of money, but they decide we're gonna build a new football stadium or whatever I mean, how do you keep that happening? We we specifically talked about that that as you do these funds would not be available that there's a lot of confusion Anyway around the state about, you know, what education money is used for? There's a lot of those capital pro programs you're talking about are using are coming from Bond issues or from supplemental monies or different type things This would not be these funds. We're talking about these foundation program funds would not be available for things like that And we we've had that discussion as part of our ground rules as well But they're they're really not currently and they would not be going forward. This is all about the academic center Or actually ask that question you just ask to make the point to let people understand that, you know, that's not what we want to do Chairman we got to leave it there. Thanks for hopping on this morning and talking to us about this Sure, well, thank you for your questions and any time tell me that all right Hey, stay representative Danny Garrett there from trustville education trust fund committee chairman. We'll be right back This is the jumpboard show on FM talk one oh six five Oh I throw away the blues (upbeat music)