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Task force hears how Kansas local option budget (LOB) is calculated and funded
Summary
Staff explained statutes for the local option budget and supplemental state aid, including the 15% LOB minimum, a 33% statutory cap, an alternative base used to compute LOB, and required transfers from the supplemental fund to at-risk, bilingual and special-education funds.
Staff from the legislative research office summarized how Kansas law determines a school district’s local option budget and how supplemental state aid fills funding gaps. Jason Long, a reviser’s office staff member, told the task force: "School districts have to adopt at least a 15% LOB. That's 15% of the total foundation aid calculated for the school year, and they can go up to a statutory limit of 33% of the total foundation aid." He explained that an alternative base aid (originally set at $44.90) is used to compute LOB when it exceeds the statutory base aid and that the alternative amount is adjusted by inflation each year.
The presentation traced how LOB is funded: districts may levy a property tax to raise the portion not covered by other sources, and the State Board of Education distributes supplemental state aid to districts based on assessed valuation per student rankings. Director Rooker added context on recent trends, saying, "At the time... the statewide average LOB was 29.2%. Today, it's 32.3 32.4%." Staff emphasized three statutorily required transfers from the supplemental general fund: proportional amounts attributable to at-risk weightings (to the at-risk fund), bilingual weightings (to the bilingual fund), and special-education weightings (to the special education fund).
Members asked whether the alternative base is still necessary and what would happen if it were eliminated. Jason Long warned that removing the alternative base would reduce LOB dollars for districts until the statutory base caught up, and he outlined options such as freezing the alternative base or eliminating its inflation provision. The task force asked staff to provide current-year numbers on the State Board’s statewide average LOB percentage and to clarify how LOB and total foundation aid interact for funding sources and property-tax impacts.
The panel left the discussion with a list of follow-ups: updated statewide LOB statistics, district-level examples of LOB mill levies, and legal references used to justify the alternative base and required fund transfers. The committee signaled this topic will remain central to forthcoming budget and policy deliberations.
