Back in 2023, the “historic” DFL trifecta enacted a K-12 education bill which included a $2.2 billion hike in spending on schools. The bill indexed the per pupil funding formula to the rate of inflation in future years — capped at 3% — with a boost of 4% the following fiscal year and 2% the year after that; it included additional money to cover some of the costs of special education programs; there was money to recruit more teachers of color and hire more school psychologists; it awarded additional funding for stocking schools — including, notoriously, boy’s bathrooms — with menstrual products free of charge to students; and there was money for a supply of the opioid antagonist naloxone, in schools, for use in fentanyl overdoses.
“This entire bill is about investing in our future, in our Minnesota learners,” said Rep. Cheryl Youakim (DFL). “It’s our job as legislators to make sure that every one of our public schools are a healthy and safe learning environment for all of our kids.” With full control of the state government, the DFL was able to deliver on its 2022 campaign promise of “fully funding education.”
Last year, I noted that, two years on from Minnesota’s schools being “fully funded” by the DFL trifecta, they needed more cash. Another year on, the story is the same.
The Star Tribune reports:
Staffing cuts are underway at Minnesota schools as districts again face sizable budget gaps and uncertain funding prospects at the State Capitol.
Minneapolis Public Schools is poised to eliminate 187 full-time school positions after a projected 2026-27 deficit of $30.3 million rose to $50.5 million.
St. Michael-Albertville and St. Paul are grappling with shortfalls even after voters agreed last November to back new taxes for schools.
Districts have been here before: The Association of Metropolitan School Districts, which represents half of the state’s public school students, reports that its members are confronted with $223 million in red ink in the latest installment of a three-year run of deficits and layoffs. That’s less, though, than the more than $280 million shortfall that the 47 districts faced last year.
The Strib gives a number of reasons for these dire fiscal straits: falling enrollment numbers, “rising costs during the recent surge in immigration enforcement,” and, incredibly, “the state’s adoption in 2023 of universal free school meals.”
But there is another culprit which goes unidentified: the “trifecta,” that gift that keeps on taking.
Last year, the Minnesota Reformer explained “Why $2B in new school funding Is leaving Minnesota districts scrambling for cash.” Going back to that 2023 education bill, it noted that:
…even before the ink on Walz’s signature was dry, school leaders were bemoaning the fine print…
…the Minnesota School Boards Association, the Association of Metropolitan School Districts and others estimate that up to half the $2.2 billion had already been earmarked for as many as 65 new mandates, ranging from free meals for all students to menstrual products in school restrooms.
Lawmakers also extended unemployment insurance to cover bus drivers, some substitute teachers, cafeteria workers, classroom aides and other seasonal workers. This made Minnesota the first state to mandate this benefit for hourly employees, but it was unclear who will pay the premiums in the long term.
After a grueling fight, the Legislature allotted $135 million to pay for the first year of unemployment insurance premiums, promising to revisit funding in the future. District leaders were only partly appeased, noting that even if the state subsidized the premiums going forward, the employees who typically staff summer programs could choose not to.
…
Welcome though the money and new benefits are, says [executive director of the Minnesota School Boards Association Kirk] Schneidawind, districts will still have to scramble to cover some costs. Part of the difficulty of calculating just how much that will be is that school systems keep discovering new ways that the costs are showing up. The private companies that supply substitute teachers, for instance, are passing along their new state benefit costs.
These are the “unfunded mandates” which drive up costs for local governments and school districts who are then forced to hike property taxes to cover them.
I have noted this problem before:
An obvious solution is to ditch these things. Failing that, those who make these mandates legal commitments ought to be responsible for appropriating the funding necessary to finance their provision.
At present, state politicians can have their cake and eat it. Those who passed this tidal wave of unfunded mandates have been able to tout their role in providing paid family and medical leave or unemployment insurance for part time workers, while it has been people at the county level who have been tasked with finding a way to pay for it. The opprobrium for hiking property taxes is falling, unjustly, to a large degree, on them.
If we want to bring property taxes in Minnesota under control, we need to ensure that those who propose expansion of local government spending incur the political costs — or benefits — of financing it. When state policymakers internalize that cost, Minnesota’s hard pressed property tax payers might catch a break.
This is a necessary part of any affordability agenda in Minnesota.