MANKATO — Advocating for inflation-adjusted budget increases and the ability to levy for mandate expenses topped the Mankato school district’s legislative platform they discussed with local lawmakers Monday evening.
District leaders met with DFL Sen. Nick Frentz, of North Mankato and Republican Sen. Rich Draheim, of Madison Lake, to discuss their budgeting year priorities just weeks before the start of session.
Supt. Paul Peterson said the platform came together after a series of meetings with staff members, parents, students, district leaders and board members.
In a phone interview with The Free Press before the meeting, Peterson described their ask for inflation-adjusted increases to the general education formula by saying that when there’s not inflation adjustments included, districts have to play catch up.
“As costs go up, it’s really important that the revenue also stays with that,” he said.
“That’s really important for schools so there’s a level of predictability and a level of reliability in the state funding, but it’s also important that our legislators look at the scarce resources that they’re going to have to be working with to see what other enhancements they can make to the general formula for our kids and staff.”
The school district is also requesting reductions in the special education cross-subsidy.
“(The) cross-subsidy is when the special education cost, when the state budget is no longer there, then local school districts have to pick up those (costs),” Peterson said.
“Two years ago, we were taking roughly $7 million out of our general fund every year and moving those funds over to special education because of the fact that the state and federal government were not adequately funding the services for our special education students.”
Peterson said lawmakers made significant progress in reducing the cross-subsidy during the 2023 session.
That year’s education finance bill included cross-subsidy aid, or state money that goes toward helping school districts fund special education.
Under the bill, cross-subsidy aid will be 44% for fiscal years 2024, 2025 and 2026 and 50% for fiscal year 2027 and later.
“They made significant progress, but they didn’t fully, special education continues to not be a fully subsidized program,” Peterson said.
The district and lawmakers are also eyeing projected budget forecasts as they consider what their priorities will be.
The state projected in its November forecast released this month a $616 million surplus for the next biennium but warned of a potential $5 billion deficit in the coming years.
This comes as the district is also asking lawmakers to consider allowing districts to levy for mandate expenses, including for unemployment insurance, paid family leave and cybersecurity expenses.
Peterson said it would be preferable for taxpayers if resources came from the state but said funding is drying up.
“Some of those mandates came with one-time funding. That funding is drying up across the state, I think in particular with the unemployment insurance. And so, we assume that those new state statutes are going to stay in place, and if they do, then it only makes sense that there’s funding that comes with those,” he said.
Frentz said in an interview after the meeting that education will remain a number one priority of his this upcoming year.
“We’ll have to react to what the budget allows, because the state requires a balanced budget,” he said.
Draheim expressed concern on allowing districts to levy for expenses.
“I hear people all the time calling and complaining about their property taxes. They’re on a fixed income … A lot of them are on fixed income where they don’t have extra revenue to pay higher taxes to stay in their home,” he said.
“We warned them this was going to happen. We told them. Democrats just didn’t listen. They gave a little one-time money, and here we are. This is exactly what we said was going to happen.”
Other district priorities included support for career and technical education, teacher recruitment and retention and student mental health.