Senate committee advances education finance draft after debate over weights, homestead exemption

The Senate Education Committee on Tuesday voted to advance a draft education finance bill after a staff presentation and more than an hour of debate over funding weights, career and technical education treatment and a new homestead exemption schedule.

John, staff member, reviewed the draft line by line and told senators the proposal updates the foundation formula base to 14,541, adopts the weights used by Senate Education, and adds a contingent career and technical education (CTE) weight. "Section 25...would add in your CTE pupils," John said, and staff described a CTE weight of 1.08 that would apply to CTE full‑time‑equivalent counts. He also described a five‑year transition for the Educational Opportunity Payment (EOP) in Section 26a that aligns with the tax‑rate transition.

The nut graf: the bill would change how state education funds are calculated and distributed and would replace the existing property tax credit structure with a new homestead exemption table. Those changes affect statewide tax rates, district supplemental…