Maricopa County Superior Court Judge Katherine Cooper ordered that the state must immediately increase its funding for public schools by about $317 million. The judge found that the state should have paid inflation costs on the entire school funding formula in accordance with a voter-approved initiative.
The ruling stems from a lawsuit over school funding and the $317 million is the amount that schools are owed for state fiscal year 2015 based on a calculation that includes the entire school funding formula, according to Superintendent of Public Instruction John Huppenthal. The court has set a hearing for October to determine the amount of any potential back payments from the 2009-2010 through 2013-2014 school years.
Superintendent Huppenthal, who is facing a tough primary challenge, through the state’s legislators under the bus and said that he looked “forward to working with the new Governor and the Legislature to implement this decision. The recession hit schools especially hard and school budgets are still bare bone. I hope our school boards and superintendents will take a deliberate approach to invest the funding on items that will best benefit Arizona’s students.”
Huppenthal, who has supported the corrupt school board in the Sunnyside Unified School District said, “Local school boards know best the needs of their schools and teachers. However, I encourage school boards, superintendents and school business officials to take a close look at increasing starting teacher salaries, ensuring that classrooms are well supplied and where possible, restoring funding to Career and Technical Education programs.”
Legislators are expected to appeal the ruling. However, they essentially balanced the budget on the backs of the schools, without passing any legislation that would have required districts and charter schools to increase transparency.