Outdated state formula shouldn’t crowd Tri-Cities school kids | Editorial

State officials are using a 40-year-old formula to calculate state matching money for new schools, even though they know it’s inadequate.

An update is long overdue, and it needs to happen during this legislative session.

The outdated tool is partly to blame for the state’s recent refusal to provide matching money for planned school construction in Richland and Pasco.

And now an elementary school project in Pasco is on hold, and another in Richland likely will proceed without state help.

It is hard to understand how officials in Olympia can decide that the school districts have enough space for the next few years. Anyone walking the crowded halls in those school districts can tell that isn’t the case.

Part of the problem is that the state’s decision isn’t based on reality. Instead, it’s based on a three-part calculation that has two parts out of whack.

The formula includes outdated construction costs — which don’t reflect the actual costs of building a new school — as well as the Student Space Allocation (SSA), which assumes each elementary school student needs 90-square-feet of space.

The last time the SSA number was updated was 1980, said Randy Newman, School Facilities Director for the Office of the Superintendent of Public Instruction.

Needless to say, much has changed since then.

Now schools must have mandated, reduced class sizes for K-3 children, as well as all-day kindergarten. At the high school level, additional science requirements necessitate more classroom labs.

Extra space for special education programs also is needed, as are accommodations that address today’s school safety concerns.

Newman said he remembers former OSPI leader Randy Dorn, who served from 2009-16, asking the Legislature several times for an update to the school construction formula. He said current OSPI leader Chris Reykdal has done the same.

OSPI can change the formula, but without funding granted from the Legislature, it doesn’t do any good.

And legislators know this. They even created a Joint Legislative Task Force on Improving State Funding for School Construction a couple of years ago, which finished its report in December 2018.

Ironically, the group conducted site tours in four school districts across the state, and Pasco and Richland school districts were two of the four.

Among the findings, the task force recommended adjusting the square footage requirement, bumping it up to 130-square-feet per student.

Senate Bill 5853, sponsored by a number of Democrats and Republicans, would update OSPI’s Student Space Allocation. It made it part-way through last year’s legislative session, and has been re-introduced this year.

The bill would hit that 130-square-foot mark for elementary and middles schools by June 2024, and 140-square-feet for high schools by that year.

Of course, the concern is money. That’s why the formula has not been changed even though lawmakers know they should make it happen.

Sen. Sharon Brown, R-Kennewick, said she wants to get more information from OSPI regarding the specifics on why Richland and Pasco school districts were refused state matching money for their building projects.

Brown, who is not among the 39 Senators listed as sponsors and co-sponsors of SB 5853, said she found the situation in Pasco and Richland “alarming,” and wants to make sure she is certain about what it will take to fix it.

Without the state matching money, Pasco plans to hold off replacing the aging Edwin Markham Elementary School, which was built in 1962 and remodeled in 1984, and is ill-equipped to handle the demands of new technology.

Richland school officials have said they plan to go ahead with the construction of a new Badger Mountain Elementary School, but they are still figuring out how to make up the difference now that state matching money won’t be available.

While it is true enrollment growth slowed a bit in Pasco and Richland this past year, both school districts still need more room for their students — despite what the state says.

Using a 40-year-old formula to determine state matching money for school construction is ridiculous, and everyone knows it.

It’s past time for an update.

This story was originally published January 23, 2020 at 5:00 AM.