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SB 334, Progress for Special Education Facilities Funding Recently the Governor signed into law SB 334, which calls for increased funding to school districts for special education facilities. This legislation is a major milestone toward providing quality educational facilities for students with exceptional needs. Prior to 1998, school facilities were funded on a square foot per student basis. Special education facilities were listed in the Education Code as severe or non-severe, and further broken down into classifications corresponding to the provisions of Ed Code section 56026. For each new construction project, if a district met the threshold level of students in a classification, square footage eligibility was given to the project based on the actual building area needed for that program. In 1998, SB 50 changed the entire school facilities funding program to a cost per student basis for unhoused elementary, middle and high school students. The new law did not apply a grant amount to exceptional needs students, but directed the State Allocation Board (SAB) to determine those amounts. SB 50 further directed the Legislative Analyst’s office to review the method of funding for new construction and modernization of special education facilities and report to the SAB by September 1, 1999. The LAO report “Special Education Facilities Funding Report” was released on January 3, 2000 and recommended a uniform grant funding for all pupils (regular and special education students). However, this recommendation was rejected as impractical by most practitioners and by the SAB. There are specific facility needs for these programs which could not be met with the basic grant levels. It was believed that a uniform grant amount would promote inequities in special education facilities from site to site and from district to district. In response to the LAO report, the Office of Public School Construction (OPSC) developed grant amounts based on a cost per student, similar to the grants for other new construction projects. The grants were in two classifications -- severe and non-severe -- and did not differentiate between grade levels. It was soon understood that all the grant amounts were inadequate. From 2000 through 2006, both the Coalition for Adequate School Housing (CASH) and the OPSC conducted independent studies on the grants amounts. Both these studies concentrated on the new construction program and did not address special education grants. As a result of these studies, AB 127 (chaptered in 2006) provided a seven percent increase in the elementary and middle school grant amounts and a four percent increase in high school grants. However, special education grants, again, were not addressed. AB 127 allowed for an increase in the levels for new construction and modernization grants of up to six percent per year in addition to the yearly Construction Cost Index (CCI). The increase was to be “by amounts it deemed necessary to cause the grants to correspond to the cost of new construction”. This provision also neglected to include the special education grants. SB 334 directs the SAB, after January 1, 2010, to apply any increase to the grants, based on the six percent rule above, to the grants for exceptional needs students. It also directs the OPSC to develop a system to differentiate the grants for elementary, middle and high school students. There is still work to be done in getting all the grant levels to an adequate level. However, the passage of SB 334 is a step in the right direction. Editor's Note: Dennis L. Dunston, AIA, REFP, LEED AP is the Director of Facilities Planning and Program Management at the educational consulting firm Total School Solutions (TSS). |
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