PLAN FOR THE PLUNGE IN SCHOOL ENROLLMENT

Demographers long believed that California, the nation’s most populous state, would just keep growing and growing and growing. The Golden State’s great weather, alluring lifestyle, diverse population and economy, and relative roominess were seen as gigantic magnets. In 2007, a state report projected population to go from what was then 36 million people to 60 million by 2050 — a 67 percent increase.

Fifteen years later, the picture is different. In March, the U.S. Census Bureau reported that California had lost 262,000 residents between July 1, 2020, and July 1, 2021, and that its population was closer to 39 million than 40 million. With soaring housing costs having turned the state into the epicenter of American poverty and now spikes in homelessness and crime, California’s appeal is waning.

The implications of this are huge on many fronts. But they are particularly massive for public education, in which funding for districts is firmly tied to student attendance. Between population growth stalling out and the state’s birth rate hitting an alltime low in 2021, the declines in student enrollment seen over each of the last five years will only accelerate. Enrollment dropped 1.8 percent from fall 2020 to fall 2021, and for the first time since 2000, the state’s K-12 system had fewer than 6 million students.

The effects are already apparent. A report last week in The San Diego Union-tribune noted that 17 of the county’s 42 school districts — including San Diego Unified — project they will spend more than the funds they receive for the current school year and for 2022-23 and 2023-24 as well. Thirty-six of the 42 districts are on track for deficit spending over that time frame, according to the San Diego County Office of Education. Declining enrollment is far from the only factor. Inflation and the growing costs of special education and retirement benefits are also taking a toll. The cumulative picture is grim.

Unfortunately, little in the state’s history supports the expectation that school districts will handle the new era well. This may be human nature. The most obvious response to declining enrollment and funding shortfalls is to close schools and reduce the work force. But closures are inevitably unpopular with the public. And attempts to reduce district jobs put school boards in conflict with the local teachers unions that are often the most powerful stakeholders. For a stark example of this power imbalance, consider the Sacramento City Unified School District. Even after being warned the district faced severe long-term funding issues, board members approved major pay hikes and huge increases in benefits, according to a 2019 state audit. Closer to home, the Sweetwater Union High School District approved a staff-wide 3.75 percent raise despite huge deficits, according to a 2020 report by the state Fiscal Crisis and Management Assistance Team. And Friday, hundreds of teachers, students and parents picketed at Oakland’s public schools in a one-day strike to protest proposed school closures.

To avert a chaotic era of constant financial crises in public schools, the state should look to the federal government and how it downsized the military when the Cold War began winding down in the late 1980s. A federal commission oversaw the Base Realignment and Closure (BRAC) process that led to the closing of more than 350 installations, mostly from 1988 to 1995. To avoid pork-barrel politics, Congress was given a list of recommended closures that were considered on an all-or-nothing basis. A state commission that mandated the closure of schools that no longer met specific criteria on enrollment and neighborhood demographics would insulate local trustees from demonstrations and discord.

Given a desire for local control and the influence of teachers unions, this sort of methodical approach at a state level may seem like a long shot. But the alternative is constant small education funding wars statewide. Either way, California public school districts must grapple with a plunge in enrollment.