How did K-12 education fare in the biennial budget passed by Kentucky lawmakers?

LOUISVILLE, Ky. (WDRB) -- Kentucky lawmakers spent more than $1 billion more on primary and secondary education in each year of the two-year executive branch budget sent to Gov. Andy Beshear on Wednesday compared to current spending levels.

The new spending was buoyed in large part by an influx of more than $850 million in additional federal funding, partly from COVID-19 relief money, in each fiscal year.

The Kentucky Department of Education, through which most primary and secondary school funding flows, received $6.3 billion in fiscal year 2023 and $6.4 billion in fiscal year 2024, up from $5.2 billion allocated for KDE in the current fiscal year.

This year’s total does not include more than $4 million in additional funding for the 2022 fiscal year included in House Bill 1, the executive branch budget that passed with broad bipartisan support in the General Assembly. Spending in 2022 includes $140 million added to the budget by lawmakers in a separate bill to fund full-day kindergarten during last year’s legislative session.

Lawmakers allocated $254.8 million more from the state’s general fund in 2023 and $322.2 million more in 2024 compared to 2022 general fund spending, and federal spending nearly doubled in each fiscal year compared to this year’s KDE budget.

Federal money accounts for more than $1.8 billion in each year of the upcoming biennium compared to $971.7 million in the current fiscal year.

The state’s share of per-pupil funding for Kentucky school districts grew by 4.6% and 4.3% compared to this year’s nearly $3.1 billion in Support Education Excellence in Kentucky funding. SEEK budgets total about $3.2 billion in general fund dollars in both years of the upcoming biennium.

Base per-pupil funding will grow from $4,000 per student currently to $4,100 per student and $4,200 per student in fiscal years 2023 and 2024 in HB 1.

SEEK transportation funding increased from $214.8 million this year to $274.4 million in each year of the biennium in HB 1.

Lawmakers provided funding for full-day kindergarten in the SEEK portion of the biennial budget along with $2.3 million in each fiscal year to provide $2,000 salary supplements to certified school audiologists and speech language pathologists.

School districts will also get extra SEEK funding in the biennial budget that the General Assembly “encourages” school leaders to use for certified and classified staff pay raises, though HB 1 does not detail how much additional funding lawmakers allocated for that endeavor.

Rep. Jason Petrie, chairman of the House budget committee, said legislators did not specifically provide pay raises for teachers and school employees because they work for school districts, not the state.

“Instead of mandating an increase, we’re paying the full cost of kindergarten, increasing transportation funding, and pushing down millions in additional funding to help districts provide pay raises,” Petrie, R-Elkton, said in a statement.

Lawmakers also directed state per-pupil and add-on funding for students enrolled in the Craft Academy for Excellence in Science and Mathematics and the Gatton Academy of Mathematics and Science in Kentucky.

Learning and results services received the biggest spending boost in the KDE budget passed by lawmakers thanks mostly to federal funds that more than doubled in each year of the biennium compared to this fiscal year.

Federal funds accounted for $561.5 million of the $1.7 billion LARS budget this year. Federal spending ballooned to $1.4 billion in each year of the upcoming biennium in HB 1, pushing the LARS budgets to $2.6 billion and $2.7 billion in 2023 and 2024, respectively.

Some funding increases in the LARS budget in HB 1 include:

Spending for career and technical education nearly doubled from $64.8 million in 2022 to $126.9 million in each year of the upcoming biennium. Lawmakers allocated $70 million from those amounts in each fiscal year to specifically support vocational education centers and more than $420,000 in each fiscal year to provide step and rank pay increases for state-run area technology center employees.
$1.4 million in 2023 and $2.5 million in 2024 for Dolly Parton’s Imagination Library, up from $800,000 this year.
$3.8 million more in each fiscal year for the gifted and talented program.
$11 million for the Early Learning Initiative.
$3 million in 2023 and $2 million in 2024 for the Math Nation program from federal American Rescue Plan Act dollars.
$500,000 more in each fiscal year for Jobs for America’s Graduates program.
$250,000 more in each fiscal year for the Kentucky Alliance of Boys and Girls Clubs
$11 million in 2023 and $12.5 million in 2024 for the Kentucky Educational Collaborative for State Agency Children, up from $9.5 million in 2022.
$700,000 more for Save the Children.
$200,000 more for Teach for America. Lawmakers directed Teach for America to submit a report on the program’s outcomes to the House and Senate education committees by Aug. 1, 2023.
$250,000 more for the Visually Impaired Preschool Services program.

The General Assembly held funding flat at $13 million in each fiscal year for the Kentucky Center for School Safety and $7.4 million in each fiscal year for school-based mental health providers.

Family resource and youth service centers are also slated for a funding boost in the Cabinet for Health and Family Services budget, though the FRYSC allocation from the KDE budget remains $48.9 million each fiscal year. Lawmakers added $9.4 million each fiscal year in the cabinet's budget to increase FRYSC's per-student money from nearly $184 to $210.

The School Facilities Construction Commission is set to get $125.7 million in 2023 and $127.2 million in 2024 compared to $125.8 million this fiscal year.

KDE also received $56.4 million for schools' capital projects in 2023 and $2 million in 2024 in HB 1. KDE was allocated $6 million for capital projects this year.

Lawmakers also directed KDE to review all LARS programs and recommend changes to interim joint education and budget committees by Aug. 1, 2023 for consideration by the 2024 General Assembly.

HB 1 has been delivered to Beshear, who can line-item veto portions of the two-year spending plan. Legislators can consider overriding any line-item vetoes when they return from the veto break on April 13.

Related Stories: