Longview News Journal

ET reps share school thoughts
Merritt, Hopson speak to Texas Association of School Boards on funding

By KATHERINE SAYRE

Friday, February 03, 2006

Texas lawmakers should focus on funding the state's public schools in the next legislative special session — not school consolidation, school vouchers or mandatory school start dates, two East Texas representatives told a group of school board members and superintendents on Thursday.

Rep. Tommy Merritt, R-Longview, and Rep. Chuck Hopson, D-Jacksonville, spoke to East Texas school officials gathered for a regional Texas Association of School Boards meeting in Kilgore. School board members from across East Texas — including Longview, White Oak, Union Grove and New Diana — attended the meeting.

"We want real tax cuts," Merritt told the school officials. "We want real accountability, and we want be sure that the dollars flow to classrooms and the teachers and the students."

Gov. Rick Perry is expected to call a special legislative session on school finance in the coming months after the Texas Supreme Court ruled in November that the state's cap of $1.50 in local school property taxes per $100 in property value amounts to an unconstitutional statewide tax.

The court set a June 1 deadline for lawmakers to come up with a new school finance plan.

Since 2004, lawmakers have met in three special sessions and one regularly scheduled session to replace the state's school funding plan and lower local school property taxes, but have not been able to reach an agreement.

Leaders in Austin have discussed bringing up school district consolidations, a private school voucher program and a state-mandated fall start date during the special session, Merritt said, a move that would make approving a school finance plan difficult.

"When we start dividing ourselves over issues, we're not going to be focused on starting pay for teachers and total dollars for the public education system," Merritt said, adding that he doesn't think state lawmakers are "on the same page."

State lawmakers should identify the amount of money necessary to fund teacher pay raises and pull Texas' school system into the top 10 in the nation, he said.

Lawmakers should then find the funding to meet those goals.

"It's critical that we draw good, reliable, long-term serving teachers into the system," he said.

Hopson, a former school board member in Jacksonville, said local control in school districts is important to smaller communities.

"I want to give you the ability to govern that school to the best of your ability," Hopson said.

Longview Superintendent Dana Marable said state lawmakers need to focus on the No. 1 question at-hand — how to fund public schools.

Otherwise, Marable said, "we're going to be lost in the shuffle again."