Dunwell’s vision to rework school spending shot down as regressive

Iowa House Rep. Jon Dunwell’s idea for an up to three-year funding package that could have allowed school districts to better plan out budgets and give state lawmakers time to rework the system was ultimately shut down. Party members saw the idea as regressive since multi-year funding was provided in the past.

However, it was clear in Dunwell’s rough proposal — which he mentioned briefly at legislative gathering events in Newton — that the main idea was to buy the legislature time to come up with a different funding model for public schools. He noted at a legislative update on March 24 that his idea was shot down hard.

“They were afraid of setting old patterns in committee,” Dunwell said. “My reason for doing it was not to set a pattern. My reason was … let’s get us some breathing room. Let’s pass a 2.5 percent or a 2.25 percent per year for the next two to three years, and that will give us the space.”

Within those two to three years, lawmakers would be forced to dive head first into the school funding model and figure out what needs fixed or adjusted. Dunwell had never intended for the idea to be permanent, but rather create more time to truly rework school funding and solve some of the challenges districts face.

“The biggest problem we have is — even in Jasper County — the challenges you face here are still different than Baxter, they’re different than Lynnville-Sully and they’re different from Colfax-Mingo,” Dunwell said. “Those are unique districts … Every dollar we spend affects you differently in terms of what’s an advantage.”

When Dunwell teased the idea at a February legislative gathering hosted by the League of Women Voters of Jasper County, he noted his intentions were to figure out how the state is allocating dollars to schools. It is a complicated formula, he said, and it is not the same for every district.

“Rework the formula, rework the spending,” Dunwell had said.

Systems in government can be inefficient, he added, but giving schools a set expectancy of funding could help. Dunwell said when he spoke to officials at the Baxter school district, they told him if they knew a 2.5 increase in SSA was coming every year, for example, they would be fine.

“We have a lot of what’s called categorical dollars that the school can’t access, categorical dollars they can’t spend,” Dunwell said, noting some districts have their hands tied. “So when you look at our penny sales tax, Newton here has primarily chosen to use that in the past couple years more for sporting facilities.”

Dunwell noted at the legislative gathering if Newton schools had greater freedom in spending its money it might help them out. However, he also said there is a reason why categorical funding exists. But he ultimately believes lawmakers need to create time and space to rework a system that matches Iowa.

“That’s not an easy process,” he said. “Not sure you can do that in a session. I say let’s approve of a multi-year increase and then let’s work on the system and see if we can’t come out with a better, more efficient system, and get some of that money that’s hung up in the system back into students and education.”