Schools budget hurts S. Florida. Start over.

Florida legislators are congratulating themselves for doing so much to help public education. Hold the applause. Yes, the Legislature did give schools $485 million more for next year. Yes, per-pupil spending will increase by an average of $101.50.

But legislators tied $400 million of that increase to school safety after the Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School massacre and told the schools how they must spend it. When you consider that earmarked money, the average of what’s left for academics is 47 cents more per student.

For South Florida, it’s even worse. In an interview with the Sun Sentinel Editorial Board, Broward County School District administrators explained that the Legislature shifted $56 million of the base student allocation from urban counties to rural counties.

That shift left Broward last among the 67 counties, with an increase of just $52.35 — including the earmarked money. That’s barely half the statewide average. In Miami-Dade, the increase is only about $65. Palm Beach County fared a little better, at roughly $84, but that’s still almost 20 percent below the statewide figure.

According to Broward officials, the district is already $4.4 million behind for next year’s budget, and the gap could more than double. Without the shift, Broward would be $1.2 million ahead. Palm Beach County is about $1 million short.

Teachers in both counties have had raises the last two years, after getting nothing during the last recession and then just intermittent bonuses. If nothing changes, there likely will be no raises in either county next year. Broward also could lose special education teachers.

The architect of this change to the Florida Education Finance Program is Sen. Rob Bradley, R-Orange Park. He chairs the Appropriations Committee, which is in charge of spending. Bradley represents a Northeast Florida district that includes several small, rural counties. Those counties got three times more in next year’s budget than Broward and more than twice as much as Palm Beach, according to Broward school finance officials.

Conspiracy theorists might note that many urban districts sued the state over last year’s education bill that required traditional public schools to share construction and maintenance money with charter schools. That cost Broward $11.7 million this year and Palm Beach $9 million. This year’s education bill eased that requirement, but did not eliminate it.

In that $400 million security allocation is nearly $100 million to hire more school police, also known as resource officers. The Legislature and Gov. Rick Scott required that districts place at least one officer at every school.

For many districts, however, the additional money won’t be enough to pay for the additional officers. Palm Beach County, which has a school police department, will need about 75 more. Broward contracts with the Sheriff ’s Office and police departments and won’t know the additional cost until budget discussions begin.

Districts could meet the requirement by arming school personnel. Legislators earmarked $67 million for what they call the “guardians” program. Broward and Palm Beach, though, are among the districts that refuse to participate, believing — correctly — that only trained law enforcement officers should have weapons on campus.

District officials acknowledge that the extra $69 million for mental health counseling will help. So will the $98 million to harden schools, though we wonder where the Legislature was before the massacre. Palm Beach County, for example, included $30 million for added security in the salestax surcharge plan that voters approved in 2016.

Overall, House Bill 7055 does more harm than good to school districts that educate nearly 3 million students. To twist the knife a little more, the bill requires decertification of teacher unions that don’t have at least 50 percent membership. That requirement applies to no other public employee union in Florida.

Sen. Bill Galvano, R-Bradenton, who will be the chamber’s president in 2019 and 2020, said safety became the “most important” education issue. “It put everything else we were working on, on a back burner,” he said. “I feel like we’ve done our best.”

Seriously? If students called such a lame effort their “best,” teachers would flunk them. The state budget will go up by $6.3 billion, yet the Legislature couldn’t find more money for school safety as well as education needs?

Scott laughably called it “an outstanding year for education.” Like Galvano, he cited the massacre saying, “It was important to listen to these parents, listen to these families and focus on school safety and that’s what we did.”

Obviously the killing of 17 students and staff justified a response. Tallahassee’s response, however, punishes students, teachers, parents and taxpayers.

Broward School Superintendent Robert Runcie and others want Scott to veto the education bill and call a special session. We agree. Stop the victory lap, Tallahassee, and get back to work.

Editorials are the opinion of the Sun Sentinel Editorial Board and written by one of its members or a designee. The Editorial Board consists of Editorial Page Editor Rosemary O’Hara, Elana Simms, Andy Reid and Editor-in-Chief Julie Anderson.