South Jersey schools would bear the brunt of state aid cuts, led by Burlington County

Singleton and Tiver are sponsoring a measure that would reconfigure how funding is distributed within the state’s school funding formula.

“Essentially, every school district would receive an increase of 4.5%, which is consistent with the consumer price index here in our region,” Singleton said, adding that some districts would get more based on tougher economic climates.

“And then, we’d still – within the existing pot of money in the school funding formula – we would still have an additional pot of money in the neighborhood of about $300 to 350 or so million, that would … be utilized by the Department of Education to provide additional resources to support districts that make a case that, hey, we needed a little bit more for this reason or that.”

A formula for tension and pressure

The numbers that the Education Department calculated are guided by the School Funding Reform Act of 2008, or SFRA. A revision, known in Trenton as “S2,” was added in 2018.

Before SFRA, school funding reform was driven by a series of court decisions, according to Dr. Mark Weber, senior analyst for education policy at New Jersey Policy Perspective, starting with Robinson v. Cahill in the early 1970s and continuing through several Abbott Decisions starting in the mid-1980s.

The formula is based, in part, on a district’s ability to raise revenue.

“[With SFRA] the legislature said, ‘Okay, we’re going to help all districts, every district,’” he said. “We’re going to provide the aid for you that is commensurate with your ability to be able to tax yourself and with the population of students that you are educating,” he said.

Once the formula was executed, the amount of aid given was changed after some districts complained, and lawmakers moved to preserve funding for those districts.

Another factor was when Gov. Chris Christie, in 2010, put in place a 2% cap on annual property tax increases, limiting a district’s ability to raise revenue. A measure to allow districts to exceed the cap was proposed over the winter.

Weber said SFRA is not a “complete disaster,” but it could be better while defending the fundamental core of the law.

“The idea that if you have more students who have greater needs, you should get more funding,” he said. “If you have a community that doesn’t have the ability to raise enough in taxes, you should get more funding.”

Weber believes the problem is in the “nuts and bolts” of the law.

“​​There are…specific parts of SFRA that are subjected to economic swings and all kinds of volatility that school districts really don’t expect,” he said. “All it takes is a few changes in property values for your district, particularly if you’re a small district, you may be expected to contribute a lot more.”

Better funding targets with real data plus a more careful look at “local fair share” are a couple of ideas that Weber offered to improve SFRA.

What the long-term fix will look like remains to be seen according to Gov. Murphy. During the April edition of WHYY’s “Ask Governor Murphy” program, he said a conversation with all parties would be needed.

“Not just the legislators, but certainly them and our team, but also the stakeholders,” said Murphy. “Whether that’s superintendents, principals, the teachers’ unions, moms and dads; let’s get around a table and figure out where this is working and where it isn’t working.”