A moral duty for the schools you’ve already paid for

Washington has the only Constitution nationwide that makes educating kids a “preeminent” state duty. For decades, the state has shirked its duty prioritizing anything but K-12 – the state has lost lawsuits since 1978 for relying on local levies for K-12 instead of reliable state funds. It took years after losing McCleary in 2012 for our legislature to finally fund a “levy swap”: your tax bill in 2018 included a new “State School Part 2” to supplant county OM levies – precisely because county levies are erratic and inherently unfair to poorer districts. It’s a moral duty to our kids, a state duty, and you’re already paying it. It’s no coincidence that the initial $20-plus million bump to CKSD in 2018 aligns with the OM levy collected from you in 2017.

The kicker is per pupil expenditure – CKSD PPE routinely exceeds PPE at high Cost-of-Living Fairfax County (Virginia) Public Schools, which serves more than 10 times the students and routinely achieves significantly better learning outcomes.

Funding schools, motherhood, and apple pie; I feel it too. But CKSD budget has gone up exponentially, positions too. CKSD has only 645 teachers, losing 25 despite adding 300 other positions between 2021 and 2022. We’re all stretching dollars (the state to cover inflation for schools – including special ed, gifted, needs and wants). Priorities in Olympia are upside down, and CKSD needs to refocus on stretching dollars on things that matter: teaching. Reliance on local levies to fund K12 was unconstitutional in 1978 and remains so now. Vote “no.”