Education subcommittee reviews four retained school‑funding bills, makes no recommendation and schedules follow‑up

The Chair of the Subcommittee on Adequacy and Funding Sources called a work session to order to review four bills retained from earlier hearings: HB651, HB772, HB491 and HB734. The session focused on whether any of the four retained measures should be recommended to the full committee, and on what additional information the subcommittee needs before taking action.

The subcommittee did not take public testimony and heard summaries and discussion from lawmakers who sponsored or had worked on the measures. Representative Ames summarized HB651 as “a bill that builds on [a court] finding” about the statutory base cost of an adequate education and that the bill “puts before us the proposition that the legislature should in turn define that this amount of money, at least as a minimum, is what’s required for an adequate education.” Members discussed whether the bill’s figures should be advanced now or held for a later budgeting cycle.

Representative Ames and others described HB772 as an ambitious, complex bill that would create a results‑driven, weighted funding model based on student characteristics and outcomes. Several members described the bill as “overwhelming” in scope and said it would require substantial technical work from the Department of Education and the Department of Revenue Administration to produce the weightings and calculations. Representative Patrick said a single subsection of HB772 could “take hours of discussion and data,” and that the bill in full is not workable in the current session.

Two related bills addressed the treatment of SWEPT (the statewide property tax/“swept” excess property tax) and rebate policy. Representative Ames, sponsor of HB734, said his bill would not change the total amount collected via SWEPT but would deposit SWEPT receipts into a centralized Education Trust Fund and make the $363,000,000 figure adjustable for cost‑of‑living changes. That measure also would revise the low‑ and moderate‑income property tax rebate program and create a study panel to examine tenant relief not covered by the homeowner rebate.

Representative Ames and others said a central policy question is whether SWEPT should remain locally retained or be pooled and redistributed at the state level. Representative Ladd and others argued that pooling SWEPT is necessary for the tax to have a meaningful statewide effect; opponents and skeptics said the courts have allowed the current local retention structure and that pooling would be politically difficult.

Representative Ladd also presented HB491, a proposal to create a joint legislative study committee focused on revenue sources and reducing reliance on property taxes. Some members supported a cross‑chamber study panel with ex officio revenue officials and nonvoting technical experts; others said the legislature already has ample committee capacity and that ad hoc bills and hearings could accomplish the same work.

On next steps the subcommittee agreed not to make any recommendations at this meeting and to reconvene after staff and the Department of Education provide requested data and documents. The subcommittee scheduled a follow‑up meeting for 2025‑09‑30 at 10:00 a.m. to continue deliberations and to review additional material.

Quotes in this article come from participants who spoke during the session, including Representative Ames (sponsor/summary of HB651), Representative Ladd (subcommittee member), Representative Patrick (subcommittee member), and the chair of the subcommittee, as identified in the meeting transcript.

Ending: The subcommittee paused its work to gather analysis and modeling from executive branch experts and to allow sponsors time to propose amendments; it will meet again at 10 a.m. on Sept. 30 to consider the additional information and any proposed changes.