(Host intro) The Vermont House is set to have a heated debate about a controversial law that was passed last year. The law calls on towns that spend a lot on education to hold two votes on their school budgets.
Democratic leaders who supported the law last spring, now say the plan is too confusing and should be replaced.
VPR’s Bob Kinzel reports:
(Kinzel) The two-vote budget law was a compromise that emerged in the final days of the 2007 session.
While it got strong support in the Senate, it passed by only a 10-vote margin in the House. And a majority of Democrats opposed it, in part, because there was virtually no testimony on the plan.
Here’s how it works. The law applies only to towns that spend above the statewide average on education. The two-vote provision kicks in when a town, in this higher spending category, has a proposed school budget that increases by more than the rate of inflation plus one percent.
If this happens, voters would be presented with two budgets. The first vote would be on the amount of spending that represents the inflation threshold – a second vote would be held on all spending above this limit.
Burlington Progressive Rep. Chris Pearson wants to repeal the law.
(Pearson) "It’s frankly an insult to local control, it’s an insult to school boards and to local voters who make decisions about their school budgets."
(Kinzel) House Education chairwoman Janet Ancel supported the two-ote approach last year. But she says she’s concluded that it’s too confusing for voters to understand.
(Ancel) "Cost containment through confusion is not good policy. So the way I look at it, if budgets go down because voters have additional information, that’s OK. If budgets go down because voters are confused, that’s not ok."
(Kinzel) Tax Commissioner Tom Pelham says the confusion argument is nonsense. He says the Democrats are caving in to pressure from the state’s teachers’ union and many local school boards that never liked the original law.
(Pelham) "The education lobby has been hard at work to undo this because they know that in this bill there is real cost containment and real promise for property tax relief."
(Kinzel) The House Education Committee wants to replace the two-vote budget law with a plan to penalize towns that spend significantly above the statewide average. It’s a concept in current law that Ancel says works well.
(Ancel) "What school boards and administrators say is that they can work with it because it’s predictable, they know how it’s going to work. If you’re up near the threshold, you kind of have that in your mind when you’re developing your budget.”
(Kinzel) But Tax commissioner Pelham says this approach does nothing to control education costs.
(Pelham) "The threshold approach is a toothless tiger and for them to hide behind it is somewhat shameful. What the threshold system is premised upon is the prior year’s inflation in education spending per pupil. So it’s basically a tail wagging a dog. It’s not anchored anywhere in the real world."
(Kinzel) The House is scheduled to debate this issue on Thursday and no one seems certain how the vote is going to turn out.
For VPR News I’m Bob Kinzel in Montpelier.