By Evan Smith
The two candidates for an open position in the 1st Legislative District recently sent statements about how the legislature should provide full support for basic education to comply with the 2012 McCleary decision by the State Supreme Court.
Republican Jim Langston and Democrat Shelley Kloba are running on the Nov. 8 general-election ballot for the position in the state House of Representatives that State Rep. Luis Moscoso gave up to run unsuccessfully in the August primary for a position in the state senate.
Langston and Kloba finished ahead of three other candidates in the primary.
The two responded to a question about how the state should provide money for full support for schools as ordered by the court.
The 1st Legislative District includes most of Mountlake Terrace, all of Brier and Bothell, north Kirkland, unincorporated areas of King County between Bothell and Kirkland, and unincorporated areas of Snohomish County north and east of Bothell including the Maltby area.
Here are statements from the two candidates in the order their names will appear on the ballot and in the voters’ pamphlet:
Jim Langston (Prefers Republican Party) —
Led by the Senate, the state legislature made historic investments in education over the past two budgets. This turnaround came after 30 years of our state chronically underfunding K-12 education, resulting in the landmark McCleary lawsuit.
The remaining work toward fully funding education will be complicated and must address several politically difficult issues. Too many school districts use locally raised tax dollars to pay for basic education, especially teacher salaries. The legislature, working with local school districts and local governments, must develop a plan to ensure local dollars are used solely for enhancements, like technology or seventh period classes. Additionally, the legislature needs to pick up the tab for the bulk of teacher salaries.
Right now the legislature is collecting information to be better informed on this decision, because we don’t know what mix of local and/or state dollars are being spent on what.
We will need to keep every option on the table to help build consensus around a solution to finish the work of McCleary. I’m not yet convinced new revenue will be absolutely necessary, but I will keep an open mind. We must work together to ensure every student is prepared for college, career and life.
Shelley Kloba (Prefers Democratic Party) —
When my daughter started kindergarten, I joined the PTA and soon noticed that our schools were not meeting the needs of all of our kids. I began speaking up and advocating for the redefinition and full funding of basic education. Since 2011, the Legislature has made progress towards this goal by fully funding all-day kindergarten, decreasing class sizes for kindergarten through third grade, and providing funding for materials and supplies for classrooms. The problem still remains that local school districts use levy money for teachers and staff salaries that should be funded by the state.
This over-reliance on local levies is a key element of the McCleary lawsuit. The state must find new and sustainable revenue sources that do not raise taxes on our local families or decimate essential programs. We need to eliminate tax loopholes that are not providing clear and measurable public benefits, and review some of the many options on the table including: capturing the anticipated normal growth in tax revenue, reforming the business and occupation tax, and possibly examine a capital gains tax. I look forward to the upcoming recommendations of the Education Funding Task Force to provide additional guidance to the legislature.
Evan Smith can be reached at schsmith@frontier.com.
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