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Subcommittee approves permissive investment pools for school funds
Summary
HB 17 94 would allow local education agencies to form permissive investment pools for temporarily held funds; sponsor said it aligns with practice in many states and could increase yields on earmarked money; the committee passed the bill unanimously.
Chairman Crawford presented HB 17 94 as a permissive mechanism allowing local education agencies to pool temporarily held funds and seek higher yields rather than leave funds idle. "Basically, all we're doing is making it illegal to be able to have the teachers and local education systems be able to do a, an investment pool," the sponsor said, explaining the bill's intent and noting 35 states have similar options.
Members asked whether the county commission would need to authorize such pools and how funds and yields could be spent. The sponsor and other members clarified the measure is permissive and that the LEA would have the option to invest funds it controls. Representative Mayberry, speaking from experience as a school-board member, described funds previously transferred to LEAs for projects and how pooling could increase available resources for projects such as building repairs. The committee voted to advance HB 17 94 to full committee (8 ayes, 0 nos).
Next steps: HB 17 94 was forwarded to the full education committee.
