Michelle DellaVita

At first glance, HB 1815 looks technical. It does not raise or lower funding levels. It does not propose a new tax. But it does something more foundational: it rewrites how the state defines its responsibility for providing an adequate education, at the same moment the Courts have ruled the current system unconstitutional. Rather than responding to the funding gap identified in the ConVal decision, HB 1815 (and the identical SB 659) revise the statutory framework itself. Specifically, this bill would: - Redefine public education as an “integrated system of shared responsibility” between the state and local governments - Remove long-standing language tying adequacy to minimum school approval standards - Eliminate statutory language guaranteeing students the opportunity for an adequate education - Change cost language so state aid is only “computed toward” the cost of adequacy, rather than constituting that cost - Assert that decisions about how education is funded are political questions reserved to the Legislature and Governor None of these changes reduce the real-world obligations schools must meet. Standards still apply. Students still need services. Transportation, staffing, and instructional needs do not disappear. When the legal definition of adequacy is narrowed or blurred while obligations remain, the pressure does not go away. It shifts, most often onto local property taxpayers, increasing inequities between communities with very different tax bases.