Preliminary State subsidy information for school administrative units will be available this afternoon at 1 p.m. on the Maine DOE website. These subsidy amounts for FY 2012-13 are only preliminary and do not represent final action of the 125th Legislature and therefore should only be used as “initial” guidance for your budget preparations. Some calculations included in these amounts are dependent upon enactment of statutory changes.
(Note: You may recall that in September 2011, at the request of superintendents, we provided an early estimate of subsidy information for FY 2012-13. Today’s release is in line with our traditional “preliminary” release and contains more up-to-date data and assumptions. It should still be viewed as initial guidance, not as a prediction of final subsidy amounts.)
The spreadsheet to be posted on the Essential Programs and Services (EPS) web pages indicates the estimated local and State share. This document provides unit-by-unit amounts including a comparison to FY 2011-12 funding as currently enacted.
You can find the spreadsheet on the Maine DOE Essential Programs and Services web pages today after 1 pm. Click on the Preliminary FY 2012-13 Funding link.
Key changes include the following:
- PL 2011 Chapter 419 (LD 1274) – implementation of this chapter’s statutory changes resulted in (1) 10% lower student-to-staff ratios for school administrative units under 1,200 students; (2) benefits are no longer included in the regional adjustment; and (3) the implementation of the minimum economically disadvantaged student adjustment. In order to qualify for the minimum economically disadvantaged student adjustment, the school administrative unit must operate a school, must qualify for minimum special education or minimum subsidy adjustment and must have a resident elementary free and reduced lunch percentage greater than the state average (FY 13 state average is 46.90%).
- Mill expectation – the mill expectation is 7.69 mills.
- Adult Education course counts – the adult education course counts are estimated and will be replaced at a later date with actual counts from the EF-M-39A (January to June 2011) and the EF-M-39B (July to December 2011).
- Minimum special education adjustment – the minimum special education adjustment pursuant to 20-A MRSA Section 15689, subsection 1, as amended, is 35% of the EPS Special Education Allocation.
- Minimum state allocation adjustment – the minimum state allocation adjustment pursuant to 20-A MRSA Section 15689, subsection 1, as amended, is 4% of the EPS per-pupil rates.
- Miscellaneous adjustments – miscellaneous adjustments such as audit adjustments and educating students in long-term drug treatment centers adjustments have NOT been included in these estimates.
- Adjustment for Un-appropriated Required Local Contributions – A school administrative unit’s subsidy may be reduced as a result of not raising the full amount of the required local contribution of the cost for funding public education from kindergarten to grade 12 for FY 2012-13 pursuant to 20-A MRSA Section 15690, subsection 1, paragraph C. However, proposed legislation will be submitted to change the repeal date for 20-A MRSA Section 15690, subsection 1, paragraph D to June 30, 2013. Under this proposed revision a unit’s state subsidy will not be reduced for 2012-13, if the school administrative unit raises at least 83.14% (preliminary percentage) of the required local contribution. The 83.14% represents the percentage that the proposed state share percent of 45.73% falls below the state’s target of 55% (proposed 45.73% / 55% = 83.14%).
For additional questions regarding these estimates, please contact Jim Rier, Suzan Beaudoin, Joanne Allen or Paula Gravelle of the Department of Education’s School Finance and Operations at 207-624-6790 or by email to jim.rier@maine.gov, suzan.beaudoin@maine.gov, joanne.allen@maine.gov, or paula.b.gravelle@maine.gov.