Metro Schools Face Cash Crunch

At the end of this school year, the White Bear Lake school district will close five of its 14 schools, lay off 100 teachers, eliminate a host of physical education and music classes, and increase its class sizes dramatically.

That’s if voters in the district reject a Nov. 6 referendum that asks them to fill a $10 million gap in the district’s $70 million annual budget, according to Superintendent Ted Blaesing.

He calls the ballot a “begging event,” but he says the district has been forced to resort to it 12 times in his 15-year tenure. 

“This is a ludicrous way of funding education,” said an audibly frustrated Blaesing. “We need an adequate and predictable way of funding our schools.”

White Bear Lake is one of 36 school districts in the seven-county metro area facing funding shortages totaling $173 million for the 2008-09 school year, according to a recent survey by the Association of Metropolitan School Districts (AMSD).

That’s because the state Legislature approved biennial K-12 funding during the 2007 session. AMSD said it doesn’t expect more funding from the Legislature during the 2008 session.“Policymakers have not yet come to grips with the fact that they are not meeting the funding needs of our schools,” said Scott Croonquist, AMSD executive director.

State Rep. Mindy Greiling, DFL-Roseville, the K-12 Education Committee chair, said the House proposed $300 million more than the final bill that passed, which would have taken care of the shortfall. She blamed Governor Tim Pawlenty on the gap.

Pawlenty is currently on a trade mission to India.

School districts still have one option left under state law: They can put forward referendums asking residents to pay extra property tax to cover the budget shortfall. A number of metro school districts will have such ballots next month.

“Property tax is a very visible, regressive tax. People notice it easily,” said Blaesing, the White Bear Lake superintendent, whose district rejected levy ballots several times. “We’re caught in the crossfire.”

The Burnsville-Eagan-Savage area school district is also turning to voters next month for the fourth time in 10 years, according to Superintendent Ben Kanninen. Voters rejected a similar referendum last year, forcing the district to lay off 53 teachers.

If that happens again this year, Kanninen said the district will likely close at least two of its 16 schools, including one primary, and lay off dozens of teachers.

Blaesing and other superintendents said the Legislature got in the habit of under-funding schools and leaving them the difficult task of turning to residents for help.

Part of the budget crunch stems from unequal increase in revenue and spending. On average, metro school districts are expecting a 1.2 percent funding increase from the state next year, according to the AMSD report. Spending will increase an average of 2.4 percent in the same period at Burnsville-Eagan-Savage district. Other districts report similar or slightly higher spending rates.