BILL ANALYSIS
Senate Appropriations Committee Fiscal Summary
Senator Christine Kehoe, Chair
193 (Lowenthal)
Hearing Date: 05/18/2009 Amended: 05/06/2009
Consultant: Dan Troy Policy Vote: ED 9-0
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BILL SUMMARY: SB 193, an urgency measure, would allow the Long
Beach Unified School District to claim funding for K-3 Class
Size Reduction for the 2008-09 through the 2011-12 fiscal years
based upon the enrollment counts taken prior to the closure of
schools forced by fires in the fall of 2007 and subsequent
mudslides on Catalina Island.
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Fiscal Impact (in thousands)
Major Provisions 2008-09 2009-10 20101-11 Fund
CSR exemption $470 $470 $470
General*
*Counts toward meeting the Proposition 98 minimum funding
guarantee
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STAFF COMMENTS: This bill meets the criteria for referral to the
Suspense File.
Current law authorizes the K-3 Class Size Reduction Program
(CSR) in which school districts may receive funding of $1,071
per pupil for maintaining class sizes of no greater than 20
pupils per teacher in grades K through 3. Current law protects
school district general purpose funding from temporary losses in
average daily attendance (ADA) that were caused by certain
emergency conditions, including fires. This protection for
emergency situations does not extend to CSR, so districts that
experience are forced to load classrooms with displaced pupils
risk losing CSR funding.
SBX3 4 (Ducheny, Chapter 12, Statutes of 2009) establishes a CSR
reduction schedule for districts that fail to maintain 20 to 1
class sizes for the 2008-09 through 2011-12 school years. This
legislation provides that participating districts can be
penalized no more than 30 percent of program funding.
Catalina Island is part of the Long Beach Unified School
District (LBUSD) and the Avalon School on Catalina is subject to
closure whenever rains threaten to cause earth on the hills
surrounding the school to slide. The hills are vulnerable to
these mudslides because vegetation was burned off the hills by
the fires on the island in October 2007. LBUSD is compelled to
relocate pupils from the school due this risk. It is projected
that the vegetation will have sufficiently re-grown by 2013 to
end the danger of mudslides threatening the school.
By allowing LBUSD to claim CSR funding based on prior year
enrollment, the Department of Education anticipates that this
bill would allow LBUSD to retain $470,000 it would otherwise
lose due to CSR penalties.
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SB 193 (Lowenthal)
Related legislation, Chapter 30 (AB 1893, Garrick) of 2008, also
insulated districts in counties affected by fires in the fall of
2007 from CSR penalties for the 2007-08 fiscal year.