House Appropriations committee gives straw-poll backing to education amendment creating school-boundary task force and nonhomestead tax study

Representative Casey Tuft, a member of the House Education Committee, introduced an amendment to an education bill during the House Appropriations Committee’s April 11 meeting that would expand a school-district boundary subcommittee, establish a task force to study school-district voting wards and direct a study of the nonhomestead property tax.

Tuft said the amendment contains five instances. The first adds four legislative members to the mapping/boundary subcommittee — two from the House and two from the Senate — and specifies that appointees cannot be from the same political party or the same school district. The House members would be appointed by the Speaker of the House and Senate members by the Committee on Committees. Tuft said the four added legislative members would be nonvoting.

The amendment also increases…