Connecticut last week became the latest state slapped with a lawsuit claiming that its public education funding formula fails to provide equal educational opportunities throughout the state.
The Connecticut Coalition for Justice in Education Funding, which is suing on behalf of 15 students from eight communities, wants the state to restructure its school funding formula to bolster state spending and rely less upon spending at the local level.
The state’s Education Cost Sharing program, which annually allocates state education grants to municipalities, does not effectively bridge the gap between resources available to students in poor districts and students in more affluent areas, according to the complaint. Additionally, the state fails to meet its Board of Education’s “Statement of Core Beliefs,” which states that Connecticut and its municipalities must bear “an equal share of the cost of education.” According to the complaint, state grants account for only 39% of public school funding in Connecticut.
CCJEF project director Dianne deVries said that poor students should have the same public education opportunities as students in more affluent districts. In its complaint, the group alleges that the state’s formula fails to provide equal educational opportunity, a violation of the state constitution that primarily impacts African-American, Latino, and other minority students.
Gov. M. Jodi Rell, who is a named defendant, in September created the bipartisan Commission on Education Finance to address the issue. Rell’s staff declined to comment beyond a prepared statement.
“Everyone agrees that more fairness can be injected into the way grants are calculated, and this commission is the best approach for exploring all options,” Rell said in a statement, adding that the state’s executive and legislative branches, not its courts, should fashion a solution to the funding problems. “It is premature to talk about an absolute dollar amount for funding, and the best way to distribute those funds to our cities and towns. That is precisely what the commission will examine.”
However, deVries said that the commission — which will include a seat for a CCJEF representative — was created as a response to the threatened lawsuit, and that no action has yet been taken. She said the task force still hasn’t issued a charge, and a majority of legislators have yet to agree to serve.
Currently, no meeting dates for the commission have been announced. Nine members have been appointed by the governor to date, including state education commissioner Betty J. Sternberg, who is a defendant in the suit, Office of Policy and Management secretary Robert Genaurio, and Steve Cassano, executive director of CCJEF.
Along with Rell and Sternberg, state Treasurer Denise L. Nappier, Comptroller Nancy S. Wyman, and members of the Board of Education were also named as defendants. Calls seeking comment from each defendant were not returned by press time.
According to deVries, 75% to 78% of a typical Connecticut municipality’s tax base goes towards school funding, which leaves very little for other needs. She said projects such as community centers and “other things that make a community a community are taking a back seat to school funding.”
The complaint also alleges multiple facilities inadequacies that directly correlate to poorer schools. It states that in the K-8 Roosevelt School, where several plaintiffs attend and where every student is eligible to receive free lunch, zero hours of computer instruction were offered, compared to a state yearly average of 18. In addition, the library has nine print volumes per student, while the state average is 20 per student. At East Hartford High School, where 38% of students are eligible for free lunch, just 29% of its computers are high- or moderate-powered, compared to a state average of 77%.
“Unless there is equal education, there is no equal opportunity,” deVries said.
The action follows a series of challenges to the issue of school funding in states, dating back to New Jersey’s Abbott case — first filed as Robinson v. Cahill in 1970, and later filed under the well-known Abbott v. Burke in 1981 — which was over the constitutionality of the state’s method of public school funding and led to the formation of the Quality Education Act in 1990. The issue has become increasingly more common among states in recent years.“This is going to come down the pike eventually all throughout the United States,” deVries said. “I think this will make for a positive in Connecticut.”
Last week, the Texas Supreme Court ruled that the major revenue component that funds public education in the state was unconstitutional, giving the state six months to devise new school financing laws.
In New York, the Campaign for Fiscal Equity successfully sued the state in 2001 to provide additional funding for New York City public schools. The case, which was filed in 1993, is still undergoing appeals.
In Massachusetts, a school building authority was created in 2004 to finance school funding, taking the heat off individual municipalities.
In Vermont, school funding was the central issue that led to major tax increases, notably to resort towns typically enjoying lower tax rates, such as Killington. The town in central Vermont has since expressed its desire to secede from the state due to an “unfair tax burden” and join New Hampshire.
During a news conference last week, Stamford Mayor Dannel P. Malloy urged the state not to waste the taxpayers’ time and money, noting that they would have to fund both sides of this case.
“Connecticut is the wealthiest state in the union and can afford to do more, as other states have realized,” said Hartford Mayor Eddie A. Perez. “This is about equity, justice, and adequacy, and is a small price to pay for democracy.”
So far this year, Connecticut issuers have sold $158.2 million of debt for primary and secondary education, out of $4.2 billion of debt issued throughout the state, a market share of 3.7%, according to data from Thomson Financial. This is up from 2004, when primary and secondary education borrowing was at $142.6 million, a market share of 2.5% of that year’s aggregate.
