A report on last week’s meeting between Mississippi legislators and a consultant hired to recommend changes in the state’s education funding formula included a remark that should merit the attention of property owners.
The Associated Press quoted Sen. Hob Bryan, D-Amory, as saying that school districts concerned about local tax contributions should be terrified. The implication is that the state is thinking about telling school districts — actually, their taxpayers — to provide a larger share of the “base student costs.”
Bryan’s warning may just be a scare tactic.
But if the Republican idea is to push more education spending down to the local level, that is nothing more than a property tax increase in disguise. Many cities and counties have already had to raise school taxes to make up for shortfalls in state allocations in recent years.
In areas with a limited tax base, such as the Delta, it’s not clear how much more of this they can take.
