For decades, California’s public school education funding has been a battleground with changes in property tax laws and complex formulas like Proposition 98 leading to ongoing disputes, and Governor Newsom’s new budget plan to redirect funds from schools faces strong opposition from education groups.
California’s School Education Funding History Has Been a Battleground
According to the published article in Cal Matters, for many years, how California pays for public schools has been a big fight. They used to mostly use property taxes but that meant some places had a lot of money for schools, and others didn’t. So, in 1971, the state had to start making sure all schools got a fair share of the money.
But things got even more complicated in 1978 when Proposition 13 passed. This made it so property taxes couldn’t go up much. So, the state had to give more money to schools. Then, in 1988, Proposition 98 made a very tricky system for deciding how much money schools get.
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Governor Newsom’s Plan to Address Budget Issues
Furthermore, Governor Gavin Newsom wants to fix a big education funding budget problem by taking money from schools. He says it’s like a loan that the state doesn’t have to pay back for five years. But people who care about schools say this is bad and could hurt education a lot. They’re even threatening to go to court over it. So, even though everyone wants to make schools better figuring out how to pay for it is still causing a lot of arguments.