Legislative candidate Debbie Colburn said Wednesday that a prime reason the county schools face continued funding shortfalls is the flawed state Better Education Program (BEP) formula.
She also said the loss of manufacturing jobs and growth here has cut back on revenue.
Ms. Colburn, who is also on the County School Board, held a press conference on the County Courthouse steps.
She said:
Today marks a time that I publicly become a candidate for the TN House of Representatives from the 30th District. I have waited and worn my school board hat until the current budget issues were finalized. Today that has happened.
So it is an appropriate time for me to once again, as I have for years, underscore the reasons that our community has been embroiled in controversy. It happens every year at this same time and every year we tend to get caught up in the fray and forget why we’re in this situation. Why is the school system always requesting additional money? Why is it that Hamilton County property owners are always being asked to raise the money for county government?
The Hamilton County School Board and Hamilton County Commission have been showcased in a public pressure cooker while our citizens have taken sides and the division has grown. It is time to reflect on what has caused the heat to intensify and more importantly what can we do about it.
I am running for the House seat because I’ve been on the receiving end of the action, or usually lack of action, from some members of the state legislature. Its time Tennessee has a representative from District 30 who understands the state’s lack of support for public education.
In the early 90’s a funding formula, the BEP (Basic Education Program) was implemented due to a lawsuit and Hamilton County has lost state revenue ever since. It’s ironic that I was elected to the school board in 1994, the same year that my opponent was elected to the TN House of Representatives. During that 10- year space, I’ve watched our Department of Education percentage of state funding drop from near 50% to 38%.
Let me give you a quick overview of the BEP funding formula and how it negatively affects Hamilton County. Our county has been deemed the 4th wealthiest in the state of Tennessee. So when our tax dollars are sent to Nashville for redistribution we receive the 4th LEAST amount back. We are said to be a county that has fiscal capacity to raise more money locally without the recognition that we, as a large, urban school district have challenges that smaller school districts do not have.
We have pleaded for years to the previous administration of Don Sundquist to hear our concerns. We were ignored. Over the last 10 years if you asked Jack Sharp, my opponent, about the BEP funding formula, he would tell you, as he has me, that the state has been fully funding the formula and Hamilton County should adjust. He will also say that he is abiding by the terms of the lawsuit in 1992 and there is nothing we can do. What he and others will neglect to tell you is that the formula is flawed and was inadequate to begin with.
But there is a ray of hope. Finally, we have a Governor who “gets it”. Phil Bredesen understands the challenges of the larger school districts and that our requests for adequacy needs to be addressed. He has promised that he will focus on K-12 next year and will investigate the BEP’s unfair funding formula.
When the Governor asks to hear from the Representative from District 30, I want that to be me. I want to tell him that first hand experience has allowed me to “get it” also.
I will share with him that Hamilton County’s hard working citizens send their fair share to the state every year, and every year we fail to get our fair share back. As I mentioned earlier, Hamilton County is the 4th wealthiest county in the state and receives the 4th least amount back. Well, this year was a red- letter date for all of us. Out of 137 school districts, Hamilton County received the LEAST amount of per pupil expenditure than any other Tennessee school district. Why, we all asked? I went to Nashville a few months ago and could not find one person who fully understood the formula applied and why we received so little. Folks, this is scary. I will work to simplify and change the formula.
The BEP does not consider adequate funding for our at risk students. The large school districts in TN represent a large share of the state’s struggling children. The formula barely recognizes the needs of these children by sending a small portion to those who are in K-3. No additional monies are sent for at risk students in grades 4-12. Children in poverty do not stop being poor just because they enter the 4th grade. We have 19,000 at risk children in our school system. The percentage of additional dollars sent is woefully inadequate to meet their needs and places a larger financial burden on local dollars. I will work to expand this piece of the funding formula.
Couple the unfair formula with unfunded state mandates and you can begin to see why we’re in the pressure cooker locally.
And lastly on the BEP, I want to briefly bring up the Cost Differential Factor to lead into another area. The CDF is an adjustment for above-average personnel costs in a county and this factor hurts us. In a nutshell, an illustration would be if counties had high paying industry jobs that had the potential to draw our school employees away, the Cost Differential Factor would be applied to increase the salaries of our employees to be competitive. With Hamilton County’s lagging economic growth this factor does not exist for our school district, the largest employer in the county.
Now, let’s talk for a minute about this lagging economy. The County Auditor performed an analysis of growth in Hamilton County’s property values and property tax base over the past 12 year period. Hamilton County’s growth in commercial, industrial, and residential property values over this time period has lagged behind the growth of the other 3 large urban areas in Tennessee (Davidson, Knox, and Shelby). The report went on to say that had Hamilton County generated a growth equal to the other urban counties over the 12- year period, we would have earned over 87 million more dollars with nearly $15 million in FY 2002 alone.
The gap between the growth in Hamilton County’s tax base and the growth in county expenditures, along with the failure of the state of Tennessee to adequately fund public education, is causing our current pressure cooker scenario.
The problem is a diminishing rate base largely caused by the exodus of manufacturing. This causes us to rely heavily on residential property taxes. The solution is to expand the tax base. I will pledge to work with Mayor’s from county and city governments and our local Chamber of Commerce to bring jobs and economic development back to Hamilton County to alleviate this pressure on homeowners.
It is time for the School Board and their supporters and the County Commission and their supporters to join forces and tackle these challenges together. I am proud that the school board has remained focused and has worked with integrity and openness throughout this year’s budget process. It would have been much easier to take public “swings” and finger point rather than do the public’s business that we were elected to do. But we chose to take the high road in the face of innuendo’s and the spreading of divisive, untrue rumors. But today is the time to begin again. The School Board and County Commission MUST do a better job of communicating. I am more than willing to do that.
It takes courage to shine a light on challenges and problems as opposed to hiding in the darkness and hoping they all go away. School improvement is scary and controversial and I believe this has been a major obstacle between the school board and the county commission. It’s scary to recognize that we must stop educating children for our past instead of their future. It’s terrifying for most to realize that the real world outside of classrooms is vastly different than inside and we, as a community, must reconcile the difference. The Education Summit was a wonderful beginning and Mayor Claude Ramsay is to be applauded for his efforts. I sincerely hope and pray that the good ideas continue.
I would like close by quoting the findings of the Financial Task Force of the Education Summit. “The lack of fair and proper funding from the state of Tennessee is the most pressing problem facing Hamilton County public schools today. It is impossible to put enough emphasis on the state’s failure to provide adequate funding for educational opportunities for Tennessee’s children.” I pledge to do my part, if elected to the House of Representatives, to make sure that public education, which is a state responsibility, will be attended to.
I am excited about the possibility of serving my state as a member of the House of Representatives. I will work my heart out for the folks in Hamilton County!