EQUITY CENTER  Advocating School Finance Equity & Adequacy in Texas
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Twenty-five summers ago, a special session touched off changes in public schools
State lawmakers on Wednesday started a special session to keep some agencies alive — probably no cliffhanger. But special sessions occasionally mean much more. Twenty-five summers ago, Texans beheld a session with life-changing significance. By that July 4, lawmakers approved House Bill 72, changing how Texas schools operate, along with tax increases to fund it.

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EQUITY CENTER NEWSLETTERS
Stopping the Cost-Shift onto Property Taxes
March 2009

A $1,000 Donut Hole:
The Flaw in Outside-the-Formula-System Target Funding

Jan 2009

Eliminating the Target Revenue Hold-Harmlessful
Dec 2008

The Facilities Issue - IFA and EDA Funding Over the Years
Nov 2008

Ensure Sufficient Funding for Adequate Employee Pay - Fixing the School Finance System
July 2008

Sometimes I Feel Like a 41 — Sometimes I Don't
May 2008


Let's Revisit Formula Funding in the '09 Session - Ken McCraw, TACS Executive Director
March 2008

Dr. Richard Middleton's Testimony to the House Select Committee on Feb 8, 2008 - North East ISD Supt.  (PAGE 4)
March 2008

Is the State Abandoning
Their Promise of Efficient
Cost-Based
Funding...?

Dec 2007

Passing the Bucks

Oct 2007

Champions of Equity
Presented to Carter
Casteel
: 80th Legislature
Largely Quiet on
School Finance

Aug 2007

The Instructional Facilities
Allotment: Too Little of a
Very Good Program

Dec 2006

School Taxpayers Forced
to Play Russian Roulette
with Facilities Funding

Nov 2006

Equity in Facilities Funding
Under the EDA: Heading
Down a Slippery Slope

Oct 2006

HB 1 Promises the Highest
Level of M&O Equity In
Our History

June 2006
 

Equity Center

   Today is Saturday, July 04, 2009   

**WHO REPRESENTS ME?**    HOUSE       SENATE

School Administrators Angry Over Gaming of School Funding in Session
Mandated teacher pay raises based on one-time stimulus dollars? One official tells school districts to create two budgets--on

Quorum Report
Tuesday, June 30, 2009
Leading superintendents in the state are now openly, and vocally, critical of lawmakers’ decision to use stimulus funding to back-fill the school finance system.
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School districts mull faculty salary scales

News-Journal.com
Tuesday, June 30, 2009
To give a step increase or not to give a step increase: That is the question East Texas school districts are facing during this summer's budget season as it pertains to teacher salaries.
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Arlington schools face a $13.6 million deficit and $128 million in capital projects
Star-Telegram
Monday, June 29, 2009
Arlington school trustees should enjoy their time off in July. They’ll need to be rested and ready for what they’ll face in August. As a matter of fact, they should come back a little early, sometime in late July, to get started on crucial decisions they’ll have to make before September.
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Districts get subsidy but also criticism

HOUSTON CHRONICLE
Thursday, June 25, 2009
Texas Education Commissioner Robert Scott has set off a heated debate after deciding last week to give extra state dollars to a select group of school districts — those that have opted to give homeowners a special tax break. The cash-strapped Cypress-Fairbanks school district will be the biggest winner, pocketing $6.2 million. Scott, at the urging of state Sen. Dan Patrick, took advantage of a little-known and rarely invoked state law that allows him to spend state money subsidizing districts such as Cy-Fair that grant an optional homestead exemption.
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Texas schools unsure whether federal officials will OK use of stimulus money for funding increasing

Star Telegram
Tuesday, June 23, 2009
School administrators waited all spring to see whether legislators would give them a funding increase. Now that it has happened, some say they’re in limbo again.
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Small school districts' finances ride on greenhouse gas legislation

The Dallas Morning News
Monday, June 22, 2009
TATUM, Texas – The high school sports coliseum in this tiny East Texas town is the house that coal built. The large 3-year-old gym with a soaring ceiling and theater-style seats looks like it belongs on a college campus. Yet the Tatum High School Eagles only recently advanced to 3A competition.
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July 1, 2009
Texas' Application for State Fiscal Stabilization Funds

CPPP - Analysis of the Texas State Budget
Building Texas: The 2010-2011 State Budget - June 2009