Legislative Action Committee 2011-12 Legislative Summary The Legislative Action Committee (LAC) is a committee of the Wayzata School Board. It is comprised of citizens, staff and school board members. LAC monitors legislation and seeks to coordinate efforts to educate legislators on the potential impact on Wayzata Public Schools. The Wayzata School Board passes a legislative platform each year that serves as a guide for LAC efforts.
We had a good year! Lease levy bill passes
LAC worked very hard on a bill that would allow us the flexibility to use lease levy funding for administrative space. Previously, schools could only use lease levy dollars to lease for instructional or storage space. Jim Westrum, Executive Director of Finance/Business, proposed the idea and demonstrated that Wayzata could save as much as $250,000 if the bill was enacted. We were fortunate to have Sen. Terri Bonoff and Rep. Connie Doepke immediately agree to sponsor the bill. They were quickly joined by Sen. Olson, and Reps. Benson and Smith. The bill was expanded by the Chair of the Education Finance Committee, Rep. Garafalo, to be available for all school districts and was passed as part of the omnibus education bill.
Early childhood funding maintained
Late in the session an amendment to the early childhood education scholarship program would have cut current funding for Wayzata and significantly impacted future funding. Had the amendment passed, Wayzata would have had to cut their early childhood education scholarship programs, Caring for Kids Initiative (this program has been collecting promising data on closing the achievement gap). Thanks to a coordinated effort by LAC, the school board, senior staff and Wayzata’s partner in the scholarship program, Interfaith Outreach and Community Partners, we were able to persuade some of our legislators to work to maintain funding for the program. Although funding for next year has been reduced, funding for the following years has been increased. More importantly, the future funding process maintains a link to quality programs, which means Wayzata’s highest ranked program is more likely to continue to be funded.
What legislation didn’t pass this session?
Early in the legislative session there were several bills that could have negatively impacted our schools. None of the bills became law. • One bill would have changed operating levy referendums to only even years so they would have to compete with presidential, gubernatorial and legislative races. • Another bill would have had referendum funding (property taxes) follow students to charter schools within the district boundaries. Wayzata currently does not have a charter school within its boundaries so this was less of a concern for us. • Late in the session a provision in the education omnibus bill would have limited bond referendums to even years. LAC contacted legislators since Wayzata’s position is that our locally-elected School Board is accountable to taxpayers and the Board should decide when to hold referenda.