The Kalamazoo Regional Educational Service Agency says a millage on the May 5 ballot would close the gap in its special-education budget.
Voters in KRESA’s nine districts will decide whether to approve a six-year, 1.5 mill increase on the current 2.8 mill rate. That works out to an extra $75 a year on a property whose taxable value is $100,000.
The KRESA districts’ special education programs include everything from speech therapy to services for students with autism. But $11 million of the cost is not covered by the state or federal government or the current millage.
Superintendent Dave Campbell says that’s because the district has more students than it used to. And property values haven’t recovered from the crash of 2008.
"When you have the forces of the increased numbers of students combined with a drop in the taxable value, it creates a pretty significant funding shortfall and that shortfall falls onto the local districts," he says.
Districts can’t just cut special education when money runs low. State and federal laws make those programs mandatory. The Kalamazoo Public Schools come up about $5 million short in their special education budget. Superintendent Michael Rice says the district ends up pulling that money from other needed programs.
"With respect to what happens if this fails, we continue to cut, we continue to chip away and adversely affect the education of young people, not simply in our district but across the county," says Rice.
Campbell says it’s a “concern” for KRESA that the special education millage will share a ballot with the statewide proposal on road funding and the sales tax. He says he doesn’t know whether the agency’s Board would seek to put the proposal forward again if it did not pass May 5.