Ways & Means hears JFO scenarios for Universal Pre‑K funding; report handed to Human Services and Education
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Summary
The Ways & Means committee heard a Joint Fiscal Office presentation outlining three funding scenarios for Universal Pre‑K (UPK), discussed tradeoffs (money‑follows‑student, prorated weights, CCFAP interactions) and scheduled a tri‑committee hearing to review the JFO report next Friday at 1 p.m.
The Ways & Means committee on Feb. 12 continued its review of universal prekindergarten (UPK) funding after the Joint Fiscal Office released a report and presented three scenarios showing how money might flow to public districts and private providers.
Emily Byrne of the Joint Fiscal Office told members the report modeled three broad options: UPK provided in‑district, UPK provided entirely outside the district (tuitioning to other public districts or private providers), and a mixed approach in which districts operate some slots and tuition others. "We don't we don't have all the answers. We went through this exercise. We learned a whole lot," Byrne said after walking members through district‑level examples.
Why it matters: the scenarios show how payments and administrative obligations could shift under different policy choices. In one hypothetical district Byrne used as an example, a district that filled 60 in‑district UPK slots would receive roughly $900,000 in education opportunity payments but would still bear overhead costs for unfilled capacity. Byrne stressed that per‑pupil weights (for poverty, English learners, special education) and local operating costs would change the net fiscal outcome and that the state lacks comprehensive district‑level data to predict exact impacts.
The JFO presentation highlighted three policy levers lawmakers are weighing: prorating UPK weights by hours provided (link funding to hours of instruction), adopting a money‑follows‑the‑student model (so tuition payments travel with the child), or changing how Child Care Financial Assistance Program (CCFAP) hours are counted when certificates are calculated. Each option carries administrative and incentive tradeoffs, Byrne said.
Committee members pressed on quality and staffing standards if funds are split between public and private providers. Byrne said public schools must staff UPK classrooms with licensed teachers while private providers operate under different staffing rules; she suggested the regulatory committees would need to address how quality standards align with funding decisions.
On timing and next steps, the committee agreed to finalize a list of follow‑up questions and hand those, plus the JFO report, to the House Human Services and House Education committees. The chair scheduled a tri‑committee joint hearing to review the finished report next Friday at 1:00 p.m., location to be determined.
The presentation and subsequent discussion emphasized uncertainty: the state does not have complete data on which pre‑K students attend private providers or how many qualify for additional weights, creating large margins of uncertainty in fiscal modeling. Byrne warned that the UPK and CCFAP systems are interconnected and that policy changes will create offsetting effects that are difficult to predict without better data.
The committee took a short break and planned to reconvene to finalize the written questions it will send to the other committees.
