Rural schools say change in funding rules would hurt them

Rural-school officials Monday told the Assembly Ways and Means Committee that a bill to change part of the public-school funding structure would cost them badly needed funding.

The provision is the state's "hold-harmless" rule, which says a school district with a declining student population gets the same money it has gotten in the past two years. The rule is designed to allow the school district to reduce staff and other costs.

Charlotte Peterson, superintendent of the Humboldt County School District, said the plan to change that to a year-old harmless period, instead of two, would cost her district an additional $535,000.

Humboldt, like several other rural county school districts, is facing a shrinking student population. Humboldt, said Peterson, has lost more than 800 students since 1998, and now has only 3,451 attending public schools.

Deputy Churchill Superintendent Don Lindeman said it would cost his school district as well -- about $300,000 next year.

He said the districts need their funding protected for two years in the face of declining student populations in part because they have to make budget decisions long before the school year starts.

He said, for example, his district must inform teachers of any work force changes in the upcoming September by April 15.

Esmeralda Superintendent Curtis Jordan said the change would cost his district $99,597 next year. He admitted that doesn't sound like much, but in tiny Esmeralda County, he said that is 9 percent of his total budget.

The district, he pointed out, has only six teachers for 74 students.

Assemblywoman Chris Giunchigliani, D-Las Vegas, a former teacher, said those kinds of numbers raise the question of whether each county should have its own school district.

"Maybe it's time to start talking about consolidating some of our rural school districts," she told the other members of the Ways and Means Committee.

The committee took no action on the proposal, which would save the state several million dollars over the coming two years.