Tucson Region

State funding for new schools poor deal for Pima taxpayers

Vail public school students would still be taking their vacations on a rotating schedule if Arizona hadn't changed the way it pays for new school construction six years ago. The rotation allowed the small Southeast Side district exploding with home development to cycle 800 students through a school built for just 600 by always having 200 on vacation. Then along came Students First - a law passed in 1998 to base school construction on enrollment growth instead of on district property wealth. Now Vail has four new schools with two more on the way. But the money didn't trickle down to everyone. Pima County taxpayers are paying to alleviate overcrowded classrooms in the Phoenix metro area, leaving local school districts to ask voters for more money this fall. Arizona has spent $3 out of every $4 since 1999 to build new schools in Maricopa County under Students First. A square-foot-per-student formula benefiting small, fast-growing districts like Vail has left mammoth school districts like Tucson Unified behind and having to shuffle portables in exchange for money to build new schools at or over capacity within one year of opening. "Bottom line: The formula for new schools is aimed at districts with rapid growth and we do not have that at TUSD," said Marcus Jones, director of engineering and planning services. "That doesn't mean we don't need space at certain times." Of the nearly $1.7 billion Arizona distributed to build new schools over the last five years, Pima County schools got roughly $95 million - less than 6 percent. Of that, rapidly growing Vail Unified School District got $60 million. Of the 10 districts to get the most state money since 1999, Vail is the only one outside of Maricopa County. In Pima County, Sunnyside Unified School District qualified for $12.7 million this year to build an elementary school and a middle school in anticipation of housing developments planned for the district's southwest corner. Sahuarita qualified for about $9 million to build a new wing at its high school and a new middle school. While growing on the Southwest Side, TUSD has not qualified for any new school construction money because of stagnant enrollments in its core. The uneven enrollments cancel each other out, leaving TUSD unable to prove a need for more classrooms. Vail Superintendent Calvin Baker said his district's enrollments have increased 10 percent each year on average. State taxpayer money has built Cottonwood and Sycamore elementary schools, Desert Sky Middle School and Cienega High School in the Vail district since 1999. Fast-growing Phoenix suburbs have kept about $1.3 billion in Maricopa County for new school construction. Of that, Deer Valley, Chandler, Peoria and Gilbert districts - on the north and southeast edges of the Phoenix metro area - have pulled in close to $500 million combined since 1999. Out of every 50 Arizona students, 30 are enrolled in schools in Maricopa County and seven are enrolled in Pima County, according to the Arizona Department of Education. Of the 104,596 more students in traditional district schools statewide since 1999, about 80 out of 100 are in Maricopa County and three out of 100 are in Pima County. Arizona school districts used to rely on issuing bonds to pay for new school construction. How much a district could bond for depended on the assessed value of the property in the school district. So property-wealthy school districts could afford to build bigger and better schools. The method was deemed unconstitutional and in 1996 the Arizona Supreme Court told the state to come up with a new way of paying for new school construction. The governor appointed a nine-member board in 1999 to dole out state money for school construction on an as-needed basis, based on formulas of square feet per student. Since then, 138 new schools - 9.3 million square feet - have been built at a cost of $929 million. Thirty-one schools are under construction at a cost of $241 million, and another 70 were approved just this year at a cost of $519 million. "Our analysis is done on a districtwide basis," said Amber Peterson, school finance specialist for the Arizona Department of Education. So if a district shows growth in one area and declining enrollments in another, "the district comes out in a wash." "It will not qualify for a new school," Peterson said, which is what happened in TUSD. With about 62,000 students, TUSD is the largest in Pima County - the second largest in the state behind Mesa Unified. To serve housing developments popping up in its Southwest Side, TUSD opened two new elementary schools during the 2002-03 school year, Banks and Oyama. The schools opened with 365 and 400 students respectively. Both were built to handle about 525 students. Last year, Oyama enrolled 539 students. Banks enrolled 429. Nearby schools also are at or near capacity. Rising enrollments bring increased class sizes providing a more difficult learning environment for students, teachers said. "Smaller classes would allow us more individualized attention with the students," said Brenda Dorey, a fifth-grade teacher at Vesey Elementary School on TUSD's Southwest Side. Vesey had 512 students enrolled last year. "It affects the child who needs more individualized attention, needs an adapted program," she said. "Those who are below grade level, they're the ones affected the most. "Sometimes a child, if their needs are not met, they react by becoming discipline problems simply because that's their coping mechanism. In other ways, they struggle with the materials." While Banks and Oyama have helped alleviate overcrowding at surrounding elementary schools including Vesey, they were not built with new school construction money from the state. Low inner-city enrollments canceled out the Southwest Side growth. "There's a need on the edges of the district," Baker said, "but when you look at the number of all the square footage of all the schools, there's an excess of square footage." TUSD applied for "replacement" money - funding the state sets aside to replace old school facilities. TUSD gave up some portables - thereby decreasing its total square footage - to get replacement money to create new space in high-growth areas. The district is asking voters to approve bonds in November that would enable it to build another new elementary school and middle school on the Southwest Side for about $21 million. School districts may still sell bonds to pay for new facilities, but for less money than under the old bonding system. While Baker said Vail could not have kept up with growth under the old way of funding new school construction, Students First can't escape some criticism. "One difficulty is that Students First has not covered many of the features that people expect schools to have, such as baseball fields," Baker said. "We've had to find the resources to add those features." To build Cienega High School in 2002, Vail sought money from the state via the facilities board, the voters via a bond election and private contributions via home builders and developers. The board has also been reluctant to purchase school sites inside large developments. As a result, Vail has been unable to get the state money needed to buy a school site within a 3,000-home development. And the developer is not offering to donate land for a school. "We anticipate somewhere around 1,200 to 1,400 students will eventually live in that development," Baker said. "All of those students will likely have to be bused out of that neighborhood."

Baker said he's also concerned about the state formula's inability to keep up with rising construction costs. As a result, Vail is having to scale back on flooring, outdoor fields and other niceties considered staples of school construction. "If we are to rely strictly on School Facilities Board funding," Baker said, "schools being built today are of a lower quality and have less features than . . . schools built four years ago." But Baker remains optimistic the new system will work - provided the opportunity to make exceptions in a just manner remains accessible. "If the alternative is to return to what it used to be in 1998, there's no way," Baker said. "We'd still be on a multi-track calendar."