The Island Packet Add Comment There's no way around it: When the Beaufort County School District opens new schools, its operating costs will go up.
But at the same time that the district is laying out plans to build new schools in Bluffton, it is facing cuts in state funding that could leave fewer dollars to pay the bills. The school board also will vote next month on whether to build a new high school in northern Beaufort County -- an unfinished project from the 2000 referendum -- possibly adding another building to the 26 the district currently runs and maintains.
The school board, the Beaufort County Council and local representatives in the General Assembly say they plan to work together to try to alter the way the state distributes money, which nearly cost the district $6.8 million this year. Local legislators pushed through a last-minute budget amendment that restored the money for the 2005-06 school year but did nothing to prevent future cuts.
About 20 percent of the district's $137.3 million operating budget for 2005-06 comes from the state. The rest comes from local sources.
A joint committee of some school board and Beaufort County Council members last week decided to ask their fellow board and council members to contribute $250,000 -- $125,000 from each group -- to fight the cuts, possibly through legal channels.
County Council is scheduled to consider the matter at tonight's meeting.
Richard Tritschler, a member of the school board's Advocacy Committee, said the group first will look at the district's budget to see if it can find $125,000. If it can, it will ask the full board to consider the issue.
But the battle to change the way the state distributes money to school districts could be tough to win, officials said.
Beaufort and Charleston counties get a smaller percentage of the amount the state doles out per pupil because they are the wealthiest counties, based on the total assessed value of property.
For the 2005-06 school year, the state's "base student cost" was $2,290, but Beaufort County only got about 12 percent of that, or $271 per student, said Phyllis White, the district's assistant superintendent for finance.
White said it's hard for the district to get any sympathy statewide when there are many very poor school districts in the state.
Eight of the poorest districts along Interstate 95 have sued the state, claiming they don't get enough money to educate their children adequately. They want the state to change its funding formula in a way that helps its poorest children. The current formula, according to the lawsuit, relies too heavily on local property taxes to pay for schools.
School administrators and parents in those districts complain that students lack the basics, such as books and supplies, and that they attend classes in unsafe buildings that sometimes don't have heat. Some districts have reported that plumbing is so poor in their older buildings that sewage backs up into the classrooms.
Conditions at the schools are highlighted in a documentary on the case released earlier this year. The documentary is titled, "Corridor of Shame: The Neglect of South Carolina's Rural Schools."
The state's formula also is unfair to coastal counties like Beaufort and Charleston, State Sen. Scott Richardson, R-Hilton Head Island, said. Although the county's property tax base has risen rapidly, the increase doesn't necessarily indicate the financial status of most county residents. He and other legislators from coastal counties have formed a "coastal caucus" -- a group of legislators who represent counties that have some interests in common -- to address issues such as property taxes, school funding and transportation.
Richardson said he's "fairly confident" the group again can prevent Beaufort and Charleston schools from taking a financial hit next year while looking for more permanent solutions to coastal problems.
"We are going to change these formulas," he said. "Can we do it in a year? I don't know." Contact Diane Knich at 706-8141 or .
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