MASC President Ways and Means testimony

I am posting here the whole of the oral testimony of MASC President Mildred Lefebvre of Holyoke.

Members of the Ways and Means Committee:

My name is Mildred Lefebvre. I am a member of the Holyoke School Committee and currently serve as the President of the Massachusetts Association of School Committees. I am also the Chair of the National School Boards Association’s National Hispanic Council.

Thank you for this opportunity to speak to the Fiscal Year 2025 budget for public education. My brief remarks today will be supplemented by a longer, written statement.

My primary focus today relates to Chapter 70 allocations and the link to the Foundation Budget. We continue to urge the legislature to fulfill the commitments of the Student Opportunity Act; to fund in full regional transportation; and to support small and rural schools. In addition, we thank the Governor’s for her stated intent to fully fund the Special Education Circuit Breaker again this year. Nevertheless, our overarching concern is the need for two key legislative revisions that would support additional Foundation Budget dollars.

First, we propose a rethinking of the inflation factor (this year 1.35%) that is the basis for the FY25 Foundation Budget calculation. This factor, technically known as the implicit price deflator, is a measure of inflation specific to state and local governments.

It is mandated by MA law as the percentage that is used to calculate growth of the Foundation Budget. This factor DOES NOT reflect what the public generally understands as the cost-of-living increase that they see at a retail outlet, nor does it take into account all the actual expenses school districts confront for transportation, utilities, salaries, and operations.

For the past several years, school districts have been sustained by pandemic-related stimulus dollars. The Student Opportunity Act did not anticipate either COVID or the inflation that followed the federal stimulus programs. During this time, Foundation Budget rates were adjusted at the legislative maximum of 4.5% even though inflation hovered at 7-8%.

Now, as inflation has abated to about 3%, the inflation adjustment under the letter of the law is what has resulted in the 1.35% increase for FY25.

This leaves many districts desperately short of real cost increases, including negotiated personnel costs.

The spirit of the Student Opportunity Act was to help us keep pace with inflation. The letter of the law—the 1.35% mandated inflation calculation— fails us for FY 2025. Accordingly, we ask that you adjust the inflation factor to maintain allegiance to the spirit of the law.

My colleagues today will provide you with the specific consensus recommendations and rationale developed by several of our organizations.

Second, we call your attention to another implication of the end of the federal stimulus. During the pandemic, thousands of students living in economic distress benefitted from newly expanded eligibility for MassHealth. For the record, students covered by MassHealth are automatically considered low income for the purpose of calculating a school district’s Foundation Budget.

We are now reverting to pre-pandemic eligibility standards and the low-income count has dropped by over 6,700 students. That also means that these same children, most of whom are “high needs,” are also ineligible to be counted as low-income students in the foundation budget. This has the effect of reducing a district’s foundation budget allocation.

However, these children remain in the districts, attending classes and receiving services. However, districts will no longer have the higher foundation budget to work with, or the higher state reimbursement that the foundation budget would have generated. This impacts not only urban districts like mine, Holyoke, but many suburban and rural communities as well. It is a trend that is likely to continue for at least two years.

We respectfully ask that the legislature adjust the inflation factor and hold harmless the low-income count to protect those districts that are losing foundation budget allocations in the upcoming budget cycle.

In conclusion, I commend to you our longer, prepared statement with more details as to our fiscal legislative agenda this year.

Thank you for coming to the Connecticut Valley and for the opportunity to testify.