“LEGISLATIVE REFORM MOVEMENT OF TH 1970'S

“Legislative reform movement of th 1970's

“Legislative reform movement of th 1970's

Creating and factual legislative and congressional agencies after each decennial census have been unbelievably contentious outcomes in agreement with U.S. law. Two events, the 1971 decision of the State Supreme Court in Serrano v. Priest and the 1978 passage of Proposition 13, have revolutionized school finance in California. Before Serrano, the State provided foundation aid to local school districts, and the districts supplemented that aid by levying their own property tax rates. Districts had fiscal autonomy; not surprisingly, revenue per pupil varied widely across districts. Now, property tax revenue for each district is determined by a formula devised by the State Legislature, and the State allocates its aid to offset inequities produced by the property tax formula. Districts have lost their fiscal autonomy, and revenue per pupil is quite equally distributed across school districts. Furthermore, average spending per pupil in the state has fallen about 20% relative to the national average. Equalization combined with the lower average has left many districts with less revenue than they would have had under the old system. To supplement their revenues, several districts have turned to voluntary contributions from parents and others. This paper documents the size and distribution of these contributions. To set the stage, we first review the history of California's school finance reforms. California's system of public schools is large and diverse. In the 1989-90 school year, the system had 4.7 million students and 1,001 school districts. About 1 million students were enrolled in one of 615 elementary school districts; another 400,000 were enrolled in one of 105 high school districts. Many of the elementary districts were quite small; 182 had enrollments of less than 200 students. In contrast, the 281 unified school districts totaled more than 3.3 million students, with nearly 1 million students enrolled in one of the five largest districts. The largest, Los Angeles Unified, had more than 600,000 students. This picture was much the same in 1969-70. Total enrollment was nearly the same. There were a few more elementary districts and a few less unified districts, but the distribution of students across the three types of districts was virtually the same as 1989-90. As now, about one-quarter of all students were enrolled in one of the five largest unified districts, with more than 10% in Los Angeles Unified alone. While the number of students and school districts is much the same, the system of school finance has changed dramatically. In the 1960's, school districts set their own property tax rates, and the State provided foundation aid to each district. A district's state aid equaled a foundation level less a minimum amount it was required to raise through local property taxes. In 1971-72, the foundation level for high school students was $488 per student, and a district's minimum property tax revenue was 0.8% of assessed valuation per pupil; for elementary school students, the foundation was $355 per student, and the minimum was 1% of ...