Oak Park Unified School District is one of the lowest-funded school districts in the state of California.

Assistant Superintendent of Business and Administrative Services Martin Klauss wrote to the Talon that the nature of the California school district funding system is not favorable for OPUSD.

“I think it is important to note that California is the sixth largest economy in the world. In spite of that global presence, among all U.S. states, California ranks 46th in per pupil funding, the bottom 10 percent,” Klauss wrote. “Drilling further down, within California, Oak Park ranks 853rd out of a total of 953 public school districts in per student funding, once again in the bottom 10 percent.”

California public school funding is derived from two sources: the government –– both state and federal –– and taxes placed on the properties within the school district.

The district received an estimated $38 million in government funding for the 2017-18 school year. This money goes into the “General Fund,” which is used for the day-to-day operation of the districts. Funds in this category are used to pay for salaries, benefits, supplies and other services.

The amount of money the school receives is based on a number of circumstances, namely the type of programs the school runs, student demographics and student population. The final amount is calculated through the Local Control Funding Formula, which comprises three different categories of grants: base, supplemental and concentration. Of the $38 million in government funding provided for the 2017-18 school year, $36 million came from the LCFF.

The majority of available OPUSD LCFF funds are used to support staff, as well as hire outside evaluation on various projects and topics. Klauss wrote that with 100 percent of LCFF funds being used for those purposes, districts look to so called “Ad Valorem” funds to address other deficiencies and conduct upgrades.

This system means that funding weight is heavier for districts that have higher numbers of disadvantaged students. While OPUSD only earned $600,000 in supplemental grants, and none at all in concentration grants, school districts like Los Angeles Unified School District received almost $600 million in supplemental grants and $500 million in concentration grants. According to district superintendent Tony Knight, the nature of this program limits the funding to OPUSD schools.

“School districts get more money for students that are in three categories –– English learners, foster youth and students receiving the federal free and reduced price meal program,” Knight wrote to the Talon. “Oak Park has a small number of these students. Combined, they are only about 8 percent of our population. That means we get the ‘base’ funding, which isn’t much –– about $8,100 per student per year.”

One such way to compensate for under-funding are local bond measure ballot based funds, also known as Ad Valorem taxes. Property-tax measures are bonds borrowed from the state that are paid back with interest by the community of the school district via property taxes. Knight said that when community tax-measures fail, being forced to rely on state funding can have detrimental impacts on the school district.

“You can see [the impact] every day. Class sizes in California schools are some of the largest in the nation. We also have one of the worst counselor-to-student ratios in the nation in our state,” Knight wrote. “In Oak Park, we used to have the parcel tax, which was a local tax to help lower class sizes, but we lost that by 25 votes last May, so we don’t have those funds any longer.”

In previous years, the passage rate for these bond measures in the state of California have been high, measuring at a 90 percent passage rate in 2015 and a 92 percent passage rate in 2016. In 2017, however, the rate dipped to 33 percent.

The Oak Park Unified School District currently has three of these property-tax measures in place. Measures C6, R and S all fall under the bracket of community-voted bond measures.

“Measure C6 was approved for the purchase of technology and other instructional and operational equipment. Measure R was passed expressly to modernize and upgrade aging school facilities, while Measure S authorizes both facility improvement and technology acquisition,” Klauss wrote.

To the effect of Measure C6, the district, beginning in 2006, has received and will receive funds totaling to $17.5 million to complete these improvements. The tax is roughly evaluated at $24 per $100,000 of property value.

To make these Measure R improvements, the district has received and will receive a total of roughly $29 million. The bond was initially passed in 2008. Measure R was evaluated at $44.87 dollars per $100,000 property value.

Measure S was the most recent bond-measure, passed in 2016. It authorized the usage of $60 million in bonds over an extended period of time. The tax is equivalent to $60 per $100,000 evaluation for the homes.

Of these three bonds, Measures C6 and R have almost been depleted. Measure S funds, however, were just used to complete their first major project: the solar panels installed throughout the district.

In order to fix the issue of the district’s depleted funds, Knight said that numerous steps need to be taken.

“The state needs to figure out how to budget an increase of about 40 percent more for public school funding to put us in the top 10 percent nationally,” Knight wrote. “We absolutely cannot continue getting funding at the 47-49th ranking nationally out of the 50 states in one of the biggest economic engines in the world. This is a recipe for disaster.”

If funding were to be increased, Knight said that improvements would be seen across the board.

“If the state were to increase funding, we could use more funds to increase teacher and staff salaries, hire more teachers to reduce class sizes, hire more counselors and support staff, add programs such as music and art specialists in the elementary schools, give more support to teachers in technology and other areas where we are doing some pretty incredible things but where teachers need more support,” Knight wrote.