Joint committees hear JFO analysis of Vermont grand-list values and pupil counts by VSBA regions

Julia Richter, an analyst with the Joint Fiscal Office, briefed a joint hearing of the Senate Finance Committee and the House Ways & Means Committee on Tuesday, Feb. 18, on an analysis of FY25 equalized grand-list values and pupil counts divided by Vermont School Boards Association (VSBA) regions.

The presentation outlined how grand-list value and pupil demographics vary across the 11 VSBA regions and why those differences matter for the administration's proposed state guarantee for school funding. "JFO is a nonpartisan legislative office dedicated to unbiased analysis," Richter said, adding that the material "is not meant to serve as any sort of policy recommendation, but rather to just provide some information for legislative consideration."

Richter said the office used preliminary FY25 equalized grand-list data and FY25 pupil counts so the tax base and pupil measures align. Because school district boundaries and town boundaries do not always coincide, the JFO prorated a town's grand-list value to a school district based on the share of that town's pupils who attend each district. Richter also said she excluded some gores and unincorporated towns from the analysis because the office lacked the ratios needed to prorate those grand-list values to districts.

Key fiscal findings included that Central Vermont holds about 15% of the state's total equalized grand-list value while Kingdom North holds about 4%, and Eastern Chittenden accounts for about 16% of the state's homestead grand-list value. Richter highlighted that homestead and non-homestead pieces of the grand list shift regional shares: Central Vermont was highest for non-homestead at about 16%, while Addison was lowest at about 4% for non-homestead.

Using long-term average daily membership (long-term ADM) to normalize values per pupil, Richter reported the statewide long-term ADM for FY25 as 83,368 pupils. She noted the ratio of highest to lowest grand-list value per pupil varied by how the grand list is split: the total equalized grand-list per pupil showed a highest-to-lowest ratio of about 2.0; the homestead-only ratio was about 1.9 (comparing Eastern Chittenden highest to Kingdom North lowest); and the non-homestead ratio widened to about 3.1 (comparing Windham and Franklin-Grand Isle in her figures).

Richter explained why those spreads matter for a state guarantee: if a policy benchmarks against the median grand-list per pupil, districts below the median would require state dollars to reach that benchmark while districts above the median could be brought down depending on policy design. She emphasized that the mechanics of any guarantee (whether to benchmark to the median, highest or another point; whether to bring districts up or down; and how the guarantee would be funded) are policy choices the administration and Legislature must decide.

The JFO also presented pupil-demographic breakdowns by region. Richter said Kingdom North has the highest share of pupils from economically disadvantaged backgrounds among regions, while Eastern Chittenden has the lowest share. Central Vermont holds the largest share of the state's total count of students from economically disadvantaged backgrounds. On English learners, Western Chittenden had the highest share of the state's English-learning students and Kingdom North the lowest.

Committee members asked procedural and policy questions during the briefing. Representative Odie asked whether prorating by pupil share should be refined further by grade cohort (for example, distinguishing high-school pupils from elementary pupils); Richter said she had included grade-cohort and demographic breakdowns in the slides and noted year-to-year pupil composition would matter for any ongoing proration. Several members pressed that geographic realities (school locations, town lines, physical barriers) and historical district configurations must be layered onto any financial analysis before policy changes.

Richter flagged other limitations of the analysis: it uses FY25 data and does not model future demographic change; it does not analyze within-region variance (parcel counts or the range of property values within a region); it omitted CTE regions for consistency with prior analyses; and it did not apply all weighting categories discussed in the administration's proposal (for example, sparsity and other special weights).

The committee paused the briefing to receive the next witness. Richter and committee members said Jake Feldman from the administration would present the state guarantee proposal next after the break.

Ending: The hearing continued after a recess; the committee scheduled a follow-up presentation by Jake Feldman on the administration's state guarantee proposal.