Senate bill means additional funding for school district

The passage of Senate Bill 175 is expected to bring some relief to the Whitefish School District budgets.

The bill, singed by Gov. Steve Bullock last month, is set to bring an additional $50 million into state education funding over the next biennium.

District Clerk Danelle Reisch told the school board June 11 that the passage of the bill is a good thing.

“The bigger schools like Kalispell will be getting three times as much money for a building,” she said. “We’re in a spot where it helped us, but it didn’t help as much as it helped the big schools.”

One of the biggest changes from Senate Bill 175 comes to basic entitlement funding. The base level of funding has increased and now there is an additional allowance available for district’s that meet certain enrollment levels.

Under the previous basic entitlement formula, the district received $23,000 for Muldown and now it will get $40,000. The middle school funding will rise from $65,000 to $80,000 and the high school funding increases from $260,000 to $290,000.

Schools are now eligible to receive additional funding for more students. In Whitefish, Muldown is the only school that qualifies for the allowance. At the elementary level, districts receive $2,000 for every 25 students beyond 250.

The school district also receives funding based solely on enrollment numbers. That funding has been increased by less than 1 percent in fiscal year 2014 and 2 percent in 2015.

The funding per elementary student will increase $192 over the next two years. The funding for high school students will increase $247.

Also included in the changes, is the New Data for Achievement payment. This is intended to provide districts with funding to offset the costs associated with data collection and reporting to the state for standardized testes. The payment is $10 per student.