Coalition Communities 2.0
MEETING NOTICE
JOINT BOARD
IN-PERSON MEETING OF COALITION COMMUNITIES 2.0
A. Meeting Time and Location
Date: February 17, 2022
Time: 2 P.M.
Location: Holiday Inn, State Room, 172 North Main Street, Concord, NH
B. Virtual Attendee Registration
Virtual attendees unable to attend in person can register in advance
for this meeting by using the link below:
https://bernsteinshur.zoom.us/webinar/register/WN__RguWuEBRHGHxIfPeEOxoA
After registering, virtual attendees will receive a confirmation email containing
information about joining the meeting.
C. Meeting Agenda
1. Greetings
2. Minutes Review and Approval
3. Legislative Update
4. Coalition Communications
5. Other Business
6. Adjournment
Board Meeting November 18, 2021
1. Of note this week was discussion on HB 607-FN, establishing local education savings accounts for students, which was amended and voted out of committee “Ought to Pass with Amendment,” on a partisan 10-9 vote. The amendment is attached and resulted in a rousing response from House Democrats
First, the amendment establishes a method of adopting a local EFA as well as legal proceedings, if any, challenging the application of this chapter (page 9).
The amendment provides wording of the question to be placed on the ballot and requires a 3/5 majority vote (page 10).
2. The next meeting of the Division II Work Group to discuss Education Funding is Thursday, December 2nd at 1:00 pm. We will be in the room monitoring.
3. The House will convene on January 5th and January 6th to take up the Governor’s vetoes and begin dealing with bills retained from the 2021 session. As of now, the Senate envisions only January 5th as convening day.
Background
For approximately ten years prior to 2006, the state funded education formula created what were commonly called "donor" and "receiver" towns. Those towns like Newbury which raised more in Statewide Education Property Tax ("SWEPT") than the state's calculation of that community's total cost of an adequate education for its students were donor towns. Their donor town "excess" SWEPT was then distributed by the state to those receiver communities which had not raised enough to cover their town's cost.
The former donor towns worked together to challenge the donor/receiver education funding formula through the formation of a group known as the "Coalition Communities." In part, due to the advocacy of this group's lobbying efforts and litigation, the Legislature eventually abolished the donor/receiver education funding formula. These collective efforts were funded by contributions from participating donor communities. These communities now retain their "excess" SWEPT they raise.
The Commission to Study School Funding created by the Legislature in 2019 studied the problems of educating all the children in NH. On December 1, 2020, the Commission issued its final report which recommended, in part, the return of a donor/receiver education funding model by recommending that communities that generate excess SWEPT remit the "excess" SWEPT to the state for redistribution to towns whose cost of an adequate education is more than the SWEPT the town generates.
A number of impacted communities desired to resurrect the Coalition. This new group of donor towns came together to advocate and lobby in opposition to a donor town funding formula. These towns are now known as Coalition Communites 2.0.