Proposed budget ups basic and special ed funding 30% in Luzerne County

Overall, Gov. Tom Wolf’s proposed budget would increase state funding for basic and special education in Luzerne County’s 11 school districts by 30%, though the impact varies district by district.

Wolf’s Basic Education Funding (BEF) budget has two components: The base amount and a “level-up” amount designed to target districts with the largest populations of at-risk students. This is in keeping with his long-held argument that more state money should go through the new state education funding formula adopted by the legislature years ago, but not fully implemented for all state dollars.

But four county districts get no level-up money in the proposal: Crestwood, Dallas, Lake-Lehman and Pittston Area. They do still get an increase in BEF base amounts, as all districts do.

The level-up money is a small part of overall basic education increases. The districts that are getting it would see total BEF dollars climb by anywhere from 2.3% in Northwest Area, the county’s smallest district by enrollment, to 10.8% in Wilkes-Barre Area, the county’s second largest by enrollment.

By comparison, the total increase for BEF base money and level-up money in the county would range from 7.7% ($539,750) at Lake-Lehman to 49.7% ($16.8 million) at Wilkes-Barre Area School District.

Special Education Funding, or SEF, also would get some substantial increases for all districts, ranging from 11.7% for Crestwood and Northwest Area ($185,645 and $108,677 respectively) to 28% ($1.12 million) for Wyoming Valley West.

While SEF dollars are a much smaller part of total state money than BEF, local school district officials have complained for years that the state money for special education has not kept up with the cost, and that the costs are required by state and federal law, essentially making the increase in local spending an unfunded mandate.