by Chuck Bennett, Director of Government Relations

There’s nothing simple about closing down a Session of the Legislature. Some years the whole thing looks pretty easy and then there’s 2013.  But one piece of advice, don’t pray for simplicity if a quarter billion dollars or so are on the table. In fact, with that kind of potential addition to the currently committed level of funding, K-12 is potentially on target to receive just north of $7 billion in the State School Fund.

Here’s where the desire for simplicity comes in. To achieve that higher goal from the currently reported $6.75 billion in cash and PERS savings, legislators are going to have to vote for more PERS law changes and additional taxes on someone. That’s a complicated proposition for a Legislature divided for and against each issue. What isn’t divisive in the discussion is the common conviction in Salem that the state’s public schools, health care system and post-secondary institutions need more funding. That is a huge step in the right direction for Oregon’s school children.

Despite publicized timelines, this will be one of those classic series of meetings led by the Governor and attended by leaders from both the House and Senate that leak rumors and often yield surprisingly successful results. Gov. Kitzhaber is a veteran of this approach as are Senate President Peter Courtney and Senate Minority Leader Ted Ferrioli. House leaders Speaker Tina Kotek and Minority Leader Mike McLane are newer but gaining experience by the hour.

The most common question is, “What can I do to help make something happen on this?” The best answer is to contact your legislative delegation and tell them what a $7 billion k-12 budget would mean for the kids in your district in terms of teachers per classroom, number of school days, quality programs and especially improved achievement. Sometimes these numbers get so large, the reality of what they are used for at the student level gets lost in the per ADMw calculation. That’s where your ability to share individual stories of student or school opportunities driven by adequate funding can make all the difference.

Other than the funding, there are very few issues related to education still outstanding. The creation of an educator effectiveness network and strategic investments over and above the allocation to the State School Fund will await a final funding plan. A change in the due date for the state achievement compacts to Oct. 15 is scheduled for a vote Monday. All of the small schools issues are moving along quickly now or are passed into law. There are a couple of ESD issue unresolved but none of them represent major reorganization initiatives.

As soon as the Session ends, COSA and OSBA will go to work on an end of Session report to present a detailed review of the 2013 Legislature.

by Chuck Bennett, Director of Governmental Affairs

The first day of a legislative session has all the pomp you can expect to find in a democratic society. The state Supreme Court justices show up in robes, senators wear matching carnations and House members, often new to elective office, are surrounded by family members who are justifiably proud. And then you get to see the current and former governors, and just for the record, they each look a lot like the portraits of them in the second floor hallway of the Capitol. It’s sort of a Red Carpet event for political junkies without the high fashion commentary. It’s a lot of fun and celebration.

It also masks the seriousness of the situation. Ninety legislators and the governor are about the launch into the most polite cage fight you’ve ever seen. Topping the list of jobs to be done during what is expected to be a five-month-or-so session is balancing the state budget. Gov. Kitzhaber has already laid down the first marker on this one with his budget released in late November. For education the numbers were fairly stark --  $6.15 billion for the state school fund with the possibility of some level of savings if a package of proposed changes to PERS are enacted.

Monday’s opening day in Salem gave the governor another chance to make his case as he looked all 90 members in the eye listening to him deliver his State-of-the-Sate address. He covered a lot of territory but here’s how he framed the education issue for his lawmaking, budget balancing colleagues:

“…our long-term ability to reinvest in public education depends to a large extent on our success in proving up this (health) care model in the next biennium and then to extend it into the private market. If, for example, we could move public school teachers and state employees into the same kind of high quality, low cost care model being developed by our CCOs, the estimated ten year state savings could be as much as $5 billion. This would be a game changer for state finances and could lead to a huge competitive advantage for Oregon businesses both large and small.

“It costs $10,000 a year to keep a child in school but $30,000 a year to keep someone in prison. Our prison forecast predicts the need to build 2,300 new beds over the next decade at a cost of $600 million – and that most of those beds will be occupied by non-violent offenders. And the fact is that this $600 million – if spent on public education – would keep hundreds of people out of the criminal justice system in the first place.

“I recognize that the politics around public safety reform are often difficult – the fear of being labeled ‘soft on crime’ in the next election cycle. But I am asking you to find the courage and the honesty to recognize that if are unwilling act on this issue we will, by default, be choosing prisons over schools and condemning untold numbers of today’s students to a future in our system of corrections rather than in our system of postsecondary education.

“In this next biennium, the cost of primary and secondary education is going to increase by more that $1000 per student. Half of that $1000 – $500 per student – is accounted for by the increased cost of PERS alone; salary and other benefits account for another $430 per student. In short, we are faced with a situation in which we are going to increase our per pupil expenditure by $1000, and yet for this huge investment we will not see a reduction in average class size; we will not see the restoration of lost school days; and we will not be adding back programs like the arts or vocational studies.

"Let me be clear: this is not about the value of our teachers. It is not about the value of our public employees. It is also not about a major overhaul of a retirement system that continues to be one of the best funded in the nation. It is simply about trying to have a conversation that allows us to strike a balance between the cost of our retirement system and our ability to put dollars in the classroom today to ensure that our students are successful tomorrow. “

As the governor completed his remarks, lobbyists began collecting the two and a half boxes of new laws already in the legislative hopper. It was a whopping 1,122 new bills on the first day with the promise of about 3,000 more to come. On the first day, 99 bills directly dealt with some aspect of education from charter and on-line schools to proposed changes in the property tax system. We’ll take a look at those in the next few days.

Today, legislators are being trained in a range of tasks related to their new jobs. After the training sessions they will head home until Feb. 4 when they are scheduled to get down to the actual business of making law.

We’ll be keeping you posted in this column on what to expect, what’s happening and what was accomplished throughout the session. Please let us know if you have any questions by phone or email.

by Chuck Bennett, Director of Governmental Affairs

'Thumbs up' PowerPoint review

I’ll confess right out of the chute I’m not a big fan of PowerPoint presentations unless they’re part of a travelogue. My worst nightmare is a warm afternoon of slide reading as they flash onto the screen.  And when I say nightmare I mean I have fallen asleep and am jarred awake when my neighbor rips off a snore and then sounds like a candidate for the Heimlich maneuver.

I now have an exception to my “avoid-PowerPoint-presentations-at-all-costs” rule. It’s one I saw last week during a meeting of the House Interim Committee on Revenue. It was the work of Michael Elliott from the Oregon Department of Education.

Elliott took on one of the toughest issues in tax policy – explaining the state school fund formula – and he did a remarkable job of both clarifying its policy methods and objectives and explaining how it came to be.  Take a look at the presentation soothingly entitled, “Welcome to Your State School Fund.” Then, if you have the opportunity, invited him to one of your meetings and get the full value that comes with his outstanding discussion that goes with it.

Don’t think this is just an intellectual exercise. The reason he discussed the issue with the legislative committee is that there is a very likely chance there will be several legislative bills aimed at changes to the formula. I’ve been down this road enough to know that most folks don’t understand the formula, its purpose and perhaps most importantly, that it’s a distribution plan – not a spending plan. After years of listening to radio talk show hosts, it was also refreshing to have it explained that the amount spent per student is not a grant to the student for assignment in some future voucher scheme.

So, What’s the Number?

First, it’s very early in the game to set a goal for the State School Fund for 2013-15. We still have almost a year’s worth of state Revenue Forecasts before anyone knows how much money is on the table to fund Oregon government and local schools.  That said, let’s take a look at how the number might be determined.

“The Number,” as we affectionately refer to it, is the share of state revenues that goes to the State School Fund. Over the past several biennia it has been a steadily reduced share of the state General Fund. Right now it’s about 39.1% of the fund. That’s down from a high of 44.8% in 2003-05 but up slightly from 38.8% in 2009-11. The simplest way to determine where the figuring starts is to look at where the General Fund will be – and, based on the September forecast, it will be down slightly from the previous forecast by about $250 million. That means the current best estimate, if schools retain their previous share of the General Fund, is about $6.35 billion. The Quality Education Commission has done a re-do on funding needs and reset its target for school spending – to put the state school system on a trajectory to meet the ambitious 40/40/20 goal – at $6.895 billion.

What’s missing from these numbers is the poetry of politics – the slogans.  It usually sounds something like, “We’re still alive at 6.5,” or “Good but not great at $6.8.” Beyond that number you’re trying to rhyme with 7 and about all that works is “heaven.”

The speculation out there right now is something like this. Start with a basic funding level for the State School Fund that is a bit higher than our current share of the budget. Figure in the usual “carve outs” for specific programs or projects. Then add the funding that is expected to come as “key investments” funding.  It is hard right now to estimate which programs being reviewed by the Oregon Education Investment Board will be brought forward for funding, but programs on the table right now conservatively add up to about $500 million worth of possibilities. Simple math gets the total to around the “good but not great” level, which seems to be a minimum funding level needed to show we’re serious about investing in education and putting us on a path toward achieving 40/40/20.

Missing in all that figuring are the real numbers that matter: one governor, 31 members of the House of Representatives (a majority) and 16 Senators (another majority). If that doesn’t add up, you’ve got nada. And those numbers are being decided in November when half the Senate and all of the House are up for election. Without these basic numbers, all of the other discussions are very speculative. We’ll take another look after the election and see if all of this multiplication, addition and slogan writing needs a serious factor of reality added to it.

by Chuck Bennett, Director of Governmental Relations

It’s beginning to have the flavor of that old Abbot and Costello bit – the “who’s on first” one.

Faces in education leadership are changing rapidly enough that if you're getting the “I’m out of the office” reply to emails don’t be surprised and think about making some changes in that listserv. Okay, it’s not as bad as tracking who’ll answer the phone with what title in the Blazers' front office, but it does make for some much needed excitement in the now summer doldrums of education politics.

To keep that Blazer thing going, there’s also those front bench injuries that will rearrange the starting lineup. In education the headline grabbing change has been the sudden fall of Rep. Matt Wingard (R-Wilsonville). The Oregonian announced last week that Rep. Wingard, a two-termer who landed the co-chairmanship of the House Education Committee, won’t seek a third term after resigning last week as Deputy Leader of the Republican caucus in the wake of news reports that he had a relationship with one of his legislative staffers.  Wingard, who has been a spokesman from one of the big on-line charter school providers in Oregon, championed several legislative initiatives last Session potentially benefitting his employer, allowing unrestricted inter-district transfers and strengthening sanctions on coaches who have relationships with their students.  There’s been no announcement yet on whether he will continue to co-lead the Education Committee but don’t be surprised if that is yanked as well.

Also leaving the scene under entirely different circumstances is Superintendent of Public Instruction Susan Castillo. Castillo is resigning mid-term to take a job with a national education organization and leaves with the good wishes of all who have worked with her as a journalist, legislator and education advocate and leader over the years. Her decision, which takes effect at the end of the month, enacts provisions in legislation passed last Session making Gov. John Kitzhaber the new Superintendent of Public Instruction and highlights the part of the new law that requires K-12 education experience in Oregon for the person chosen as Deputy Superintendent. The beefed up deputy job will take over the day-to-day operation of the 300-plus employee Department of Education and take on a highly visible public role in the major education reforms successfully initiated by the Governor last Session. Speculation on who lands the deputy job centers on several Oregon school superintendents.

And then there’s the really big news in education policy and governance (as if the Governor’s new job isn’t enough), the selection of Dr. Rudy Crew as Oregon’s first Chief Education Officer. Dr. Crew, an education leader with a national reputation, has had a distinguished careeras an educator, principal and superintendent -- including stints as chancellor of New York City Public Schools and superintendent of Miami-Dade County Public Schools and, since 2009, as a professor in the Rossier School of Education at the University of Southern California. His primary mission in each job has been to improve student achievement by working closely with all stakeholders. He already has met with several Oregon superintendents at COSA for an in depth discussion of his agenda over the next several months. He received a warm welcome -- including a standing ovation at the conclusion of his remarks -- at the annual COSA Seaside Conference last week.

Dr. Crew has indicated he plans to go on the road in Oregon to meet with rural district leaders and during discussions showed a clear understanding of differences between urban and rural districts as well as among districts along and outside the I-5 corridor. Dr. Crew also is a published author. His book is Only Connect: The Way to Save Our Schools, published in 2007. He also has served several boards including the Lincoln Center and Public Education Network. He also has  received many awards including the NAACP Educational Leadership Award, the Arthur Ashe Leadership Award, and the National Superintendent of the Year from AASA.

COSA will be keeping you posted on Dr. Crew’s travel plans in Oregon and on opportunities to hear him speak and meet him.