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November 23, 2005
Texas Supremes Shut Robin Hood Down
Well, big news out of Austin yesterday.
The Texas Supreme Court, not surprisingly, ruled in the West Orange Cove case that the state is using an unconstitutional property tax to fund public education, though it fell short of ruling the "Robin Hood" plan itself, which redistributes funding from school districts across the state, unconstitutional. Robin Hood, is, however, more or less finished.
As the Chronicle reports, the all-Republican court ruled 7-1 that "the state's reliance on local property taxes for more than half of education funding has left local school districts with no control over their tax rates."
The court has given the Legislature, which has failed in two regular, and four special sessions to do anything about this enormous issue until June 1st of next year to come up with a solution, or schools will not open next fall.
Unsurprisingly, Governor Perry, who has presided over the utter lack of accomplishment on this and all other substantive issues, and who regularly displays a curious disconnect from reality, quickly claimed victory for property taxpayers.
Trouble is, condemning the existing system was the easy part. Perry has put together a commission to address the issue headed by John Sharp (think he's trying to pin this on you, Mr. Sharp?), which is supposed to make its recommendations by next spring. (All these efforts are scheduled to be completed plenty of time ahead of next year's fall elections -- those Supreme Court justices are elected, remember.)
But any real solution to public school finance will require significantly more money, not less. So while it may be fun to crow about property taxes coming down (not a bad thing), that money and then some has to replaced somewhere else. And whether it's consumers or businesses, or likely some combination of both, significant numbers of folks will have to pay a lot more money, and they won't be happy about it.
You notice in the article that Lt. Governor Dewhurst and Speaker Craddick were decidedly more muted in their reactions than the good Governor. That's because think what you will of them, they actually understand the game here, and that there is a big "no-win" element of this situation politically, no matter what is done.
Whatever happens, it will happen on the Republicans' watch, and while that may offer some political opportunity, it carries a helluva lot more risk. Maybe by June 1st there will be a glittering new public school finance system with tax relief, more money for districts and everybody happy. Maybe not.
Given what's gone on in Austin over the last several years, what do you think?
Posted by houtopia at November 23, 2005 03:07 PM