Revised 2009-10 General Purpose Aid for Local Schools

Administrative Letter No. 30 and the revised 2009-10 ED279 subsidy printouts were mailed by U.S. Mail to Superintendents of Schools on February 5, 2009. The ED279 subsidy printouts are not available electronically however a hard copy should be available from the Superintendent of Schools office.

ADMINISTRATIVE LETTER: 30
POLICY CODE: DB

TO:                  Superintendents of Schools
FROM:            Susan A. Gendron, Commissioner
DATE:             February 5, 2010
RE:                   Revised 2009-10 General Purpose Aid for Local Schools

The enclosed is a revised 2009-10 subsidy printout (ED279) for your school administrative unit(s). These printouts reflect the reduction based on the Governor’s proposed curtailment in the supplement budget (LD 1671 Part E) and does not represent final action by the 124th Legislature. This revised 2009-10 subsidy printout represents a decrease of $38,098,223 from the amount that was previously enacted into law by Public Law 2009 Chapter 213, Part C for the “2009-10 General Purpose Aid for Local Schools”.

It is important to understand that in calculating the reductions to each school administrative unit, we have not changed the total Essential Programs and Services allocation for individual units or the statewide total. We have re-run the ED279 printout with the same calculations in the funding law (with minor adjustments as shown below), only with $38 million less in state share. In other words, we calculated SAU-level subsidies for the year as if there had been $38 million less in state share when initially calculated last spring.

The proposed curtailment includes the following changes:

Mill expectation – there is no expectation or requirement for an increase in local taxes as a result of the reduction in state funding. While the state funding reduction translates through the formula into an increase in the local mill expectation increase (from 6.37 mills to 6.69 mills), SAUs will be exempt from the requirement to raise those funds, similar to last year’s waiver.
Minimum special education adjustment – the minimum special education adjustment pursuant to 20-A MRSA Section 15689 subsection 1, as amended by LD 1671 PartE, has been reduced from 50% to 40% of the EPS Special Education Allocation.
Minimum state allocation adjustment – the minimum state allocation adjustment pursuant to 20-A MRSA Section 15689 subsection 1, as amended by LD 1671 Part E, has been reduced from 5% to 4% of the EPS Per-Pupil rates.

These reductions will be reflected in the monthly subsidy checks to local schools starting with the February 2010 check.

For additional questions regarding this information, please contact Jim Rier, Suzan Beaudoin, Joanne Allen or Karla Miller of the Department of Education’s School Finance and Operations by email to jim.rier@maine.gov , suzan.beaudoin@maine.gov , joanne.allen@maine.gov , or karla.miller@maine.gov