A Washington House committee heard testimony Monday on a proposal that would help the bottom lines of struggling rural school districts.
For decades, districts with federal forests nearby have received some of the money from timber harvests on that federal land. That was part of the arrangement when the national forest system was created. That helps to offset the fact that the districts receive no state or local property tax money from land owned by the federal government.
As districts cashed their federal checks, the state of Washington withheld from districts part of their basic education funding to offset what they get from the feds. Then, during the last legislative session, lawmakers said districts could keep all of their funding from both sources, at least for the next two years.
The bill before the House Appropriations Committee would make that arrangement permanent.
As you can imagine, rural school board directors, such as Russ Pfeiffer-Hoyt, like the legislation. Pfeiffer-Hoyt is a member of the Mount Baker School Board and chairman of the Trust Land Task Force for the Washington State School Directors Association.
“About 215 school districts across the state receive some revenue from federal forest lands," Pfeiffer-Hoyt said. "However, the bulk of the revenue that comes from this source goes to those poor rural school districts that have few other local resources."
The bill has been approved by the Senate by a 43-to-six margin.
Our thanks to TVW for the sound in this story.