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Following the preparation of Monday’s Update, legislators in each
house continued to work through the respective Concurrence and Dispute
Calendars. The House and Senate each took final action on three
education-related bills last night. The House concurred in Senate
amendments to HB 2635 (school district boundaries), HB 2679
(students in foster care) and HB 2722 (African-American
achievement gap). Each bill will now go to the Governor for her
signature or veto.
The Senate, last night, concurred in House amendments to SB 6743
(students with autism), SB 6313 (disability history) and SB
6377 (career and technical education). All three bills will now
move to the Governor for her action.
Also last night, the House and Senate agreed to establish a Conference
Committee on the 2008 Supplemental Transportation Budget, signaling
that an agreement had been reached on that important issue. Earlier
today, the Senate adopted the Conference report and sent the
negotiated agreement to the House for its final action.
We have also received word that at least tentative agreements have
been reached on the 2008 Supplemental Operating and Capital
Construction Budgets. On Tuesday, the House and Senate officially
created Conference Committees on each of those budget bills.
Negotiations on the budgets had been on-going; however, only majority
Democrats (and representatives of the Governor) had been involved in
those negotiations. The fact that Conference Committees have been
established (which are required to meet in public) indicates that
agreements have been reached on the budgets. In fact, this morning,
several newspapers released the news that deals had been struck on the
Operating and Capital Budgets; however, details of those agreements
were sketchy at best — and legislators today have been very reticent
to discuss any details of the budget negotiations. An indication that
agreements are only tentative? It is too early to know. What seems
apparent (but still unconfirmed), however, is that agreements have
been reached on three key pieces of the budget: budget reserves,
teacher raises and kindergarten.
• Budget
reserves. The House- and Senate-adopted budgets included
approximately $750 million in budget reserves for future budgets
(both unrestricted reserves and hard-to-reach reserves in the new,
voter-authorized Budget Stabilization Account). In recent weeks, we
have heard that Gov. Gregoire wanted more money left in reserve, but
she was unwilling to publicly declare what amount she had sought.
Apparently, her request was for $900 million to remain in reserve,
while the budget-negotiators have agreed to leave approximately $820
million in reserve — an amount higher than legislators had earlier
adopted, but still lower than what the Governor requested.
• Teacher
raises. Teacher cost of living adjustments required by
Initiative 732 are set to be 3.9 percent (which is above the 3.1
percent COLA anticipated when the original 2007-09 budget was
adopted). The House-adopted budget included an additional 1.0
percent across-the-board COLA for educators, while the
Senate-adopted budget did not include an additional COLA. The
rumored agreement is a split down the middle of the House and Senate
proposals — providing a 0.5 percent COLA to educators (on top of the
I-732 COLA and any additional funds being provided for salary
equalization).
• Kindergarten.
The original 2007-09 Operating Budget provided funding to phase-in
full-day kindergarten. Grants were provided to support full-day
kindergarten for the highest poverty schools (top 10 percent of
poverty rates) in school year 2007-08. Under the original biennial
budget, funds were to be provided to the top 20 percent of high
poverty schools for school year 2008-09. The House-adopted
Supplemental Budget maintained funding for schools with the top 10
percent of poverty rates, but suspended the phase-in for schools in
the top 20 percent of high poverty schools. The Senate-adopted plan
maintained the full initial two-year phase-in of full-day
kindergarten. It is our understanding that the final budget will
include no cuts to the full-day kindergarten program, maintaining
the funding provided in the underlying 2007-09 Operating Budget.
In other bill action, on Tuesday, the Senate concurred in House
amendments to three bills: SB 6483 (local food production),
SB 6556 (anaphylactic policy) and SB 6534 (mathematics
standards). Each bill will now go to the Governor for her action. The
Senate also receded from its amendments to HB 2598 (online
curriculum), as requested by the House. The Senate then added new
amendments requiring OSPI and the State Board of Education to work
collaboratively to develop a request for proposals to adapt
mathematics curriculum to be aligned with Washington’s EALRs and GLEs
and make the curriculum available online at no cost to school
districts. The newly modified HB 2598 was then returned to the House
for its acceptance or rejection. Finally, as requested by the House,
the Senate receded from its amendments to HB 3212 (student
achievement). The bill will go to the Governor as it passed the House.
The House today
has only taken action on one education-related bill: SB 6426.
SB 6426 would enact the Interstate Compact on Educational Opportunity
for Military Children. The House earlier amended the bill to establish
a task force to review the Compact, rather than to enact the Compact.
The Senate rejected this idea and immediately asked for a Conference
Committee. Today, the House, perhaps playing a little hardball,
insisted on its position and asked the Senate to concur in the House
amendments. If the Senate continues to force a Conference Committee,
the bill may end up just dying. We will soon see how far each side is
willing to push this issue.
NOTE: Just prior to posting today’s Update, we received official word
that the Conference Committee for the 2008 Supplemental Operating
Budget will meet tomorrow (Wednesday) morning to sign the Conference
Report (meaning that a final agreement has been
reached). Additionally, the Conference Committee for the 2008
Supplemental Capital Construction Budget will also meet tomorrow to
sign its report. We will provide details of the final, compromise
budgets in tomorrow’s Update. |
