School Board Hears Gloomy Forecast

  Glasscock County's School Board on July 15 heard a school finance specialist paint a dark picture of Texas school finance, especially in West Texas.  Doug Karr, who is employed by the Midland and Lubbock educational service centers, said the entire area is "on a slippery slope" because families are moving, largely to Central and East Texas, and state educational funds go where kids are.

Karr said the Midland service center's area, consisting of 34 school districts, led the state in enrollment decline from 1994-95 through 1999-2000, with a 5.4 percent loss of students. Other West Texas areas had the state's next highest declines: Lubbock (-4.9); Abilene (- 4.3); Wichita Falls (- 3); San Angelo (- 2) and Amarillo (-1.3). Only El Paso registered a gain (+ 4.5). Karr said school districts need a steadily growing enrollment and steadily growing tax base, neither of which exists now in most of West Texas.

Conservative Local Policies Praised

Karr praised GCISD's board and administration for raising taxes, reducing expenditures, balancing the budget and building cash reserves, even while sustaining a 12 percent drop in average daily attendance over the last three years. He encouraged the board to continue its conservative fiscal policies, to keep the district from being "behind the [financial] eight ball," where he said most West Texas districts already are.

Karr said the Texas legislature's passing the nation's first public school fiscal accountability system, to begin in 2003, has made it even more important that schools not operate from a deficit budget. He said a tax rate at the state maximum of $1.50 per $100 valuation is in GCISD's best interest. (The current rate is $1.307.) He said using cash reserves for operating funds is the beginning of the financial end for schools. "Stay Alive 'til '05" is the name of the game right now, Karr said, since the state legislature is not likely to increase school funding before then, when an overhaul of school finance is a possibility.

Parents Confront School Board

Before Karr’s presentation, a group of approximately eight parents told the school board they thought the school should hire a second teacher for the incoming class of first graders. Rebecca Halfmann and Sharon Halfmann, speaking for the group, said they didn't think any one teacher would be able to manage this particular class of 24 youngsters.  (In grades K – 4, the state mandated ratio of students to teachers is 22 to 1.  However, the state can grant a waiver for one class.) They said the class is very diverse in its needs, with several children having both learning and discipline problems.

            The board, while sympathetic to the parents' concerns, made no move to hire another teacher for first grade, apparently comfortable that the administration's and faculty’s plan for the class was adequate. Elementary School Principal Brad Jones and teachers Tanya Multer and Micki Wesley met with parents July 18 to explain how the school plans to manage the class. School Superintendent Steve Long said in no case will budget constraints compromise student services.

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