Guinn’s recommendation for school funding is criticized

Friday, March 11, 2005 | 11:37 a.m.

CARSON CITY -- Gov. Kenny Guinn's budget for funding the public schools ran into early criticism today.

The governor is recommending that the state provide the schools with $4,382 per pupil next year and $4,465 the following year. The current per-pupil annual funding amount is $4,424.

Assemblywoman Chris Giunchigliani, D-Las Vegas, chairwoman of a legislative budget committee examining the state aid to education, said it was "distressing" that the per-pupil funding drops in the first year and that education was "going to take a hit."

"We don't agree on this issue," she told representatives of the state Education Department that appeared before the committee to explain the Distributive School Fund.

Guinn has recommended a 2 percent raise for schoolteachers in each of the next two fiscal years. Giunchigliani, a former teacher, told the department to compute how much a 5 percent raise would cost in each of the following two years.

"It's time we try to make up a little of the cost of living," said Giunchigliani.

The 2 percent cost-of-living raise that Guinn incorporated into his proposed budget would cost $41 million next year and $86 million in 2007. The governor recommended a 2 percent cost-of-living raise for all state, university and school workers.

Guinn's budget for the 2005-2007 biennium calls for a state general fund of $5.7 billion with 32 percent of that going to support programs from kindergarten through high school. That's down from the 34.7 percent in the present biennium.

But Guinn officials say that's due to higher local revenues being put into the programs. And the drop in per pupil guarantee doesn't include the $100 million the governor is recommending over the biennium for at-risk schools.

The present budget of $1.63 billion for support goes up 4.8 percent to $1.7 billion in the next two years.

Doug Thunder, deputy superintendent of public instruction, told the committee that the budget must be increased by close to $9 million to provide inflationary costs for electricity and natural gas. This was left out of the original budget.

Thunder also said the Guinn budget includes increases for payment of health care insurance premiums for school employees -- a 2.6 percent increase next year and 3.5 percent the following year. Giunchigliani said that appears to be insufficient as well because the school districts are experiencing 10-14 percent increases in health insurance rates.