April 9, 2008

Legislative proposals to transfer categorical education funds

The California State PTA strongly opposes proposals to transfer restricted categorical education funds to schools’ general funds as a strategy to address the State’s current budget crisis. These transfers do not create additional revenues for our schools. The transfers merely take money and programs away from some children and give it to others.

Categorical programs were created to protect funding intended for essential programs for children—arts and music, child nutrition, counseling, libraries, mental health, and more. Several Assembly Bills were recently presented to the California State PTA Legislative Action Committee for review. We chose to oppose these bills (AB 1908 Wolk, AB 2831 Fuller, and AB 2832 Fuller).

While categorical funding is one of the areas that deserves careful consideration by the Legislature, it should be considered as part of a comprehensive education funding and reform plan, rather than being addressed separately, as these bills attempt to do.

We believe that these bills are a distraction from the real issues of the financial crisis facing our public schools. The PTA will be calling upon the authors to look at investing in our children by providing for adequate education funding rather than engaging in a financial shell game.

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