Legislative issues that affect children are one of the PTA’s main focuses.  On this page you will find information and links regarding legislative issues that affect River Eves Elementary and Fulton County Schools.

An update from Kathy Floyd, our PTA legislation chair…

Local School Funding At Risk

State legislators are discussing ways to change our Georgia tax system.  The Speaker of the House of Representatives has been making presentations to explain his plan, Getting Rid of Every Ad Valorem Tax.  The proposal would repeal most taxes, keeping the sales tax at a 4% rate with most sales tax exemptions repealed. These stated parameters are unofficial. No amended wording has been made public.

The local property tax is the primary funding source for county and city governments and local school systems.  How would local governments get money to run their activities? Local entities will get appropriations from the state to replace the revenue lost from the property tax. The amount they receive would be based on a formula that has not been determined.  The risk, of course, is that if needs change within the jurisdiction, the only way to get additional money is to petition state legislators.
 
If the state eliminated the property tax, restored many tax exemptions and taxed most services, the Fiscal Research Center of Georgia State University says the state would likely wind up at least $2 billion short of what the state currently takes in.  That $2 billion amounts to about 10% of the current state budget.  If other exemptions were added, the hole would get even bigger.  Where would the additional moneys come from?

The Georgia PTA opposes eliminating the property tax in this way.  They are joined in this position by the Georgia School Board Association, the Georgia Municipal Association, the Georgia Association of Educators, Georgia AARP, and the Georgia League of Women Voters.

Call or email Representative Wendell Willard at 404-656-5125 and Senator Dan Moody at 404-463-8055.

Tell them that local school districts need to keep their local sources of funding and the state needs to stay out of deciding for local entities how to finance their local issues.


PTA Advocates: The 2007 Georgia PTA Legislative Priorities Brochure is available now on the Georgia PTA web site!  (Visit www.georgiapta.org: under "Issues & Action" tab, select "Legislative Priorities" and click on download button on left).

2007 Georgia PTA Legislative Priorities

• Support public K-12 schools with adequate state funding, reflective of the actual costs of providing the state defined services. Support equitable distribution of state funding to K-12 schools, currently calculated on property tax wealth in each school system.

• Support using public funds for public schools only. Oppose any effort to use public funding for private or sectarian schools.

• Support efforts to increase the completion (graduation) rate in Georgia through early identification of potential dropouts, improved instructional programs for at-risk students, expanded counseling and guidance services, job placement and work experience programs, immediate follow-up of why individual students drop out, and mandatory attendance until graduation or age 18.

• Support using multiple criteria to determine promotion and retention, and not rely upon the results of a single test score.

• Support policies that increase meaningful parental involvement in decisions regarding school policies, curriculum, and academic growth for children, and increase opportunities for the development of parenting skills and school support.

• Support the right of local boards of education to manage and control local public schools as they seek to improve the quality of education for all students and are sensitive to differences in educational needs in their respective communities.

• Support a minimum increase in state funding from 10% to 20% for students who need additional instruction outside the school day (as measured by state testing) to more nearly ensure that every child who needs additional instruction to master grade level requirements will receive it.


Georgia PTA Legislative Links

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