Over the past seven years, New York's cap on local property tax levies has generated billions of dollars in savings for homeowners and businesses, compared to previous trends. The cap has been especially effective in restraining school property taxes, which have long been the largest and fastest-growing component of New York's tax burden. The cap…

This study analyzed the plausibility of merging school districts in New York State. The study considered how consolidation impacts finance, instruction, demographics, and enrollment for 56 public schools in Nassau County of the Long Island region of New York State. It also draws comparisons for county-, township-, and regionally-based school…

This article examines voting results for school district budgets in New York from 2003-2010. Despite annual local property tax increases, 91.9% of proposed school district budgets were approved by voters during the period examined. Using data from the New York State Education Department (NYSED) and the American Community Survey (ACS), several…

Examines Michigan's attempt to abolish the school property tax and implications for New York State policymakers. Michigan substantially reduced the local property tax for local school operations, adopted a permanent set of tax and revenue limits, and devised a problematic assessment cap. Totally eliminating the local school property tax may be…

Summarizes arguments for and against replacing the local school property tax by a local school income tax. Explores the empirical effects of such policies for New York State. Using a 3% income tax and refashioning state aid to a foundation level of $8,068 per pupil would not require substantial new state revenues. (38 footnotes) (MLH)

The partial financing of New York State's public schools with a state-mandated tax coupled with state aid based upon county or regional wealth rather than local district wealth would provide greater equalization of both revenues and expenditures of school districts than does the present law. A comparable increase in state aid appropriations under…

New York State's School Tax Relief Aid (STAR) heavily favors wealthier districts, partially reversing equalizing effects that state aid is designed to have. Normally state school aid helps bring less wealthy school districts closer to the standard of wealthier districts. It increases and makes up the lost revenue from taxpayers in the state as a…

This document contains eight articles that offer a nonpartisan evaluation of the pros and cons associated with tax reforms. They were written by members of the Technical Study Group, which was established by the New York State Department of Education in 1994 to examine the generation of revenue for public education. The work of the study group…

This paper critically examines some of the ways in which schools are currently financed and argues for State assumption of educational costs as a viable alternative. The document begins with a description of current school district revenue sources and discusses the official division of responsibility for school finance between the State and local…

This report is designed to help the average school district voter, the new school board member, the PTA participant, and the civic organization member understand the operation of State aid distribution to the school districts of New York State. The publication provides a simplified version of the Educational Finance Task Force Proposal that was…

This article examines a method of determining school aid, potential sources of abrupt changes arising from revaluation, an illustrative case, and policy options. It finds many problems caused by jurisdictional fragmentation and time lags inherent in the equalization process. Tables include full-value determinations and school district property…

Eight proposals for the use of tax-levy funds in the support of postsecondary education are examined. Tax-levy funds are the major source of revenue for the institutions of the State University of New York and the City University of New York. The eight proposals are as follows: Tuition Offset Grants Plan, Student Access Grants Plan, Cost of…

Detailed information is provided on each of eight states included in a study of selected education finance characteristics. The eight states are Delaware, North Carolina, and Washington (States with a high level of state funding relative to total state-local funds for education); New York, Michigan, and California (moderate state aid states); and…

Discusses alternative sources for school funding to replace the traditional heavy reliance on local property taxes and addresses the problem of financial inequity between school districts. Proposes complete state financing of all school districts and an increased state income tax as possible alternatives to local property tax-based school funding.…