Incentive included in education reform bill raises concern

Under a section of the House education governance reform bill, school districts that close buildings would no longer be financially liable for repaying the state for construction costs.
http://vtdigger.org/2015/03/19/incentive-included-in-education-reform-bill-raises-concern/

INCENTIVE INCLUDED IN EDUCATION REFORM BILL RAISES CONCERN AMY ASH NIXON MAR. 19 2015, 5:39 PM 2 COMMENTS Share on facebook Share on twitter Share on reddit Share on email Share on print Under a section of the House education governance reform bill the state would forfeit money spent on school construction. School districts that close buildings would no longer be financially liable for repaying the state for construction costs. Alice Emmons Rep. Alice Emmons, D-Springfield, chair of the House Corrections and Institutions Committee, expresses concerns her committee has with the House Education Committee’s “big bill.” Photo by Amy Ash Nixon/VTDigger That provision of the bill is drawing concern. Current law requires that the state be repaid its share of the investment if a public building that received state construction aid is sold. Rep. Alice Emmons, D-Springfield, chair of the House Corrections and Institutions Committee, proposed new language Thursday to Sec. 19 of H.361, which gives that benefit to districts if a school building is no longer in use. The House Corrections and Institutions Committee is asking the Agency of Education to estimate what that could cost the state, Emmons said. The suggested amendment can be seen here. Rep. David Sharpe, D-Bristol, pushed back on the amendment’s reference to “closed school buildings,” and said although the education committee’s bill is being cast as a consolidation law, requiring districts to try to form regional larger school systems does not automatically mean school closures. By not recouping the state’s share of a school’s construction costs — which range from 30 percent to 50 percent most often, and up to 100 percent for a handful of tech centers built completely with state support — those dollars would be lost to build up a fund for future school construction, Emmons said. “The language right now in our state statute is that when a building is sold, that received state aid, depending on what that aid was, we need to pay that back. And those dollars would then be attributed to new construction projects that were in the pipeline,” Emmons said. “Your bill takes that out completely.” What Corrections and Institutions proposes, Emmons said, is that the forgiving of the state aid for construction would be “only for those who merge and when they sell that building, so that’s the first amendment.” Emmons said the amendment proposed by her committee seeks information from the Vermont Agency of Education by Dec. 1 to help it understand what the incentive could cost the state down the road. Sharpe said there is no way to know, and the agency is focused now on H.361 and other initiatives. The Corrections and Institutions Committee also is suggesting that the section on the sale of school buildings be repealed July 1, 2017, so the committee could review the impact. Sharpe said he doesn’t expect a rush to sell buildings not in use after the larger systems are formed. “We have decided to give a lot of leeway to communities,” Rep. Sarah Buxton, D-Tunbridge, said of the incentives in H.361. “And within a year we’ll know what this looks like.”