Legislators had other plans for an other revenue equalization exclusion.

 

Senators defeated Senate Bill 111, which excludes certain wind energy tax revenue from the state aid formula, on a 12-22 vote on Tuesday (2/11).

 

SB 111 would have excluded wind energy from the current other revenue equalization process by going through an eight year step up process and finally settling on school districts collecting 60 percent of the revenue from a wind farm built on land in their district counting as local effort for the district.

 

Currently, the six other revenue sources that can be collected by school districts – gross receipts tax on utilities, local revenue in lieu of taxes, county apportionment of revenue from traffic fines, county revenue in lieu of taxes, wind farm tax and bank franchise tax – are being equalized between the 149 public school districts in a five-year step down process at a rate of 20 percent each year.

 

The other revenue equalization process was initiated in 2016 as part of the Blue Ribbon Task Force legislation package that brought $67 million in new money to increase teacher pay and opponents of SB 111 asked for that package to remain intact.

 

“It’s (SB 111) well intentioned,” Sen. Wayne Steinhauer said. “I get the concern, but I think we need to see this (current) formula out.”

 

ASBSD was monitoring the bill, which is not the only other revenue related bill  in the process, as Senate Bill 168 freezes the step-down process at 60 percent counted as local effort for each other revenue source.

 

For updates on bills from the 2020 legislative session, check the ASBSD Blog and Bill Tracker page.