School officials in the dark without education budget

Saturday, April 9th 2005, 12:17 pm

By: News On 6

OKLAHOMA CITY (AP) _ Oklahoma school administrators are making crucial teacher staffing decisions for the next school year although lawmakers have not agreed on an education budget that provides most of school districts' dollars, officials said Friday.

One week after lawmakers missed their own deadline for funding education, local school districts are beginning the process of notifying teachers whether their contracts will be renewed. Sunday is the statutory deadline for teachers to be notified.

``Superintendents are sitting out there right now and they're beginning their budget planning process,'' said Keith Ballard, executive director of the Oklahoma School Boards Association. But lawmakers have not told them how much money they will get from the state.

A law signed by Gov. Brad Henry in 2003 requires the Legislature to deliver an education budget to the governor's desk by April 1.

``The Legislature said they would do it. If the Legislature says they're going to do something, they ought to do it,'' Ballard said. On average, 70 percent of local school district money comes from the state.

``Unless an education bill is passed quickly, schools won't have the information they need to make planning and hiring decisions for next year,'' said Henry, who urged lawmakers to put other budget negotiations on hold and concentrate on an education budget.

Meanwhile, Republican House Speaker Todd Hiett said budget talks with the Democrat-controlled Senate have reached an impasse and he has asked House negotiators to launch ``a conservative single-agency budget process.''

House and Senate negotiators have tried to work out differences on a general appropriations bill for all state agencies. A single-agency budgeting process is more laborious and requires the passage of individual spending bills for each of about 80 agencies.

``It would be more responsible to take care of essential services with baseline funding in a general appropriations bill,'' Hiett said. He said waiting until the end of the legislative session to pass a budget ``would be extremely irresponsible and would lead to reckless spending decisions.''

Senate President Pro Tem Mike Morgan, D-Stillwater, criticized the GOP's budget plan and said it places more value on tax cuts ``to their rich friends'' than higher education, affordable health care and rural fire protection.

``If they valued working class families like they value their rich supporters they would be willing to come to the negotiating table without a 'my way or the highway' attitude,'' Morgan said.

The House last month passed a $5.77 billion general appropriations bill for the fiscal year that begins July 1 that includes $122 million more for public schools than last year's budget largely for teacher salary increases and to fully fund teacher health insurance benefits.

The measure also sets aside more than $200 million to allow for GOP-proposed tax cuts and possible spending on other programs.

The Senate passed a $3.8 billion general appropriations bill and a separate $2.1 billion measure for public education.

House Republicans have said the Senate's general appropriations bill is unconstitutional because it excludes education from other government functions.

They also said it includes spending for new programs including $24 million for all-day kindergarten, part of Henry's $114 million education plan. Henry said the Legislature previously approved all-day kindergarten but never funded it.