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Senate Co-Sponsorship Memoranda
Senate of Pennsylvania
Session of 2015 - 2016
Regular Session
MEMORANDUM
| Posted: | April 21, 2015 12:44 PM |
|---|---|
| From: | Senator Andrew E. Dinniman |
| To: | All Senate members |
| Subject: | Charter and Cyber Charter Limits on Unassigned Fund Balances |
| I plan to introduce legislation that will amend the Public School Code of 1949 to impose limits on charter and cyber charter schools for the amount of funds that it may hold as an unassigned fund balance. Currently, school districts are limited in the amount of monies that can accrue in its ending unreserved and undesignated fund balance, but charter and cyber charter schools do not have the same limitation on its unassigned fund balance. This provides an opportunity for a charter or cyber charter to horde large sums of monies while continuing annually to collect from school districts monies for upcoming budgets without a need to expend the excess unreserved and undesignated monies to help mitigate the cost. My bill will add language to the provisions of the school code governing charter schools and cyber charter schools similar to language already in effect for school districts that caps their surplus funds. The legislature viewed it wise to limit the excess monies that school districts could accumulate so that taxpayers wouldn’t be required to continually experience an increase in taxes while a school district had at its disposal excess monies it chose to let sit while asking the taxpayers to provide more funds for its upcoming cost. Not imposing a similar limitation on charter and cyber charter schools creates a situation that erodes this protection that the legislature deemed necessary for taxpayers. I hope you will join me in co-sponsoring this important legislation. |
Introduced as SB832