Deregionalization bill stalls in committee

Posted 5/7/15

A controversial plan to break up the Bristol Warren Regional School District is on hold until further notice, after it was reviewed for the first time Wednesday by a state House of Representatives committee.

Members of the House Committee on …

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Deregionalization bill stalls in committee

Posted

A controversial plan to break up the Bristol Warren Regional School District is on hold until further notice, after it was reviewed for the first time Wednesday by a state House of Representatives committee.

Members of the House Committee on Housing, Education and Welfare recommended that Bill 6151 be held for further study. There was no date set for further discussion.

The bill was introduced late last month by Bristol Warren Rep. Raymond E. Gallison, who said he proposed deregionalization after hearing from disgruntled constituents who wanted Bristol to back out of the regional district. Rep. Gallison could not be reached for comment Thursday, but Warren Town Council members have gone on record as saying they don’t support his legislation (see below).

If passed, the legislation would allow a special referendum in September 2016 at which voters in Bristol and Warren would decide whether or not to dissolve the district. While his bill is still alive, any effort to deregionalize faces a long road.

Under the enabling legislation that created the district and was approved by Bristol and Warren voters on Sept. 11, 1991, either town can petition to dissolve the district by giving the Bristol Warren Regional School Committee six months’ written notice. However, before that point voters in that town must agree to the dissolution via a special referendum called for that purpose.

In order for Rep. Gallison’s bill to become law and make a special referendum possible, the bill must be discussed by a House committee and then sent back to the full House for a vote. That first step failed Wednesday, when members of the subcommittee ordered the legislation held for further study.

Even if the bill is revived, faces further discussion and then goes back to the House for a vote, that House-approved legislation would then have to go to the Senate, which would then send it to committee for review, then back to the full Senate for a vote.

If the Senate orders changes to the legislation, it must go back to the House for review and another vote. Only after both chambers of the legislature have approved identical versions of the bill can it go to the governor, who would then have the option to sign it into law or not. If Gov. Gina Raimondo signs it into law, voters would head to the polls next September.

Read the law

What does the enabling act that created the BRisto lWarren Regional School District say about deregionalization? The pertinent part of state enabling law which established the regional district in 1991, reads as follows:

CHAPTER X

“Any member city or town of the regional school district may petition to withdraw from the district at any meeting of the district committee upon six (6) months written notice, provided that the petition for withdrawal shall have been approved by a majority of the electors of the city or town qualified to vote at a referendum called for that purpose. Such petition shall not be approved except upon payment to the treasurer of the regional school district of any costs which have been apportioned and certified during the year in which the withdrawal is to take place. Such city or town shall remain liable to the district for its share of the indebtedness of the district outstanding, including bonds, if any, at the time of such withdrawal, and for interest thereon, to the same extent and in the same manner as if the city or town had not withdrawn from the regional school district, except as such liability shall be reduced by any amount with the town has paid over at the time of withdrawal and which has been applied to the payment of such indebtedness and interest. Any money received by the Regional School District from a withdrawing city or town for the payment of indebtedness or interest thereon shall be used only for such purpose, and until so used, shall be deposited in a trust in the name of the district with a Rhode Island company insured with a federally guaranteed program.”

Warren lawmakers react

Rep. Gallison’s plan has been received reluctantly by members of the Warren Town Council. Councilor Dave Frerichs has been in town for 43 years, and he said Wednesday that the local education funding situation is as bad as he’s ever seen. But he does not support Rep. Gallison’s legislation.“I don’t think that’s the answer,” he said. “I’m not in favor of deregionalization. I’m in favor of finding a fair solution where one town isn’t taking it on the chin all the time.”

Mr. Frerichs said two of the main problems in Bristol Warren are the economic disparity between the two towns and the difference in tax base, which determines how wide the taxing burden is spread.

“You need to put towns together that are compatible in terms of the tax base,” he said. “The ones that are working are the ones where the towns are equal or almost equal” in terms of their bases. That’s not the case here, as it’s not the case in the Chariho district, he said, which also has economic imbalance among its towns.

“There you have two towns that are similar but a third that can’t compete,” he said. “That’s where it becomes a problem.”

Mr. Frerichs said that even with Warren’s recent school funding victory in Rhode Island Superior Court, the district’s funding situation remains “untenable” for Warren. He suggested that the only thing that might make it fairer, long-term, would be to establish some form of taxing district for the purposes of raising local education aid; meanwhile, state aid would continue under the formula upheld by Judge Luis Matos in that recent court ruling.

The taxing district, in which the tax bases of each town would be added together to determine a local aid amount for the entire district, is an idea that was proposed before the Joint Finance Committee nearly two years ago by former Warren Town Council member Chris Stanley. It did not receive much consideration before the JFC before the council changed last November, but Mr. Frerichs said it holds validity:

“With a taxing district it would be fairer to everyone in each town,” he said. “I think that is something that should be looked into.”

Meanwhile, he said, the two towns should be working to sort out their issues with respect to the recent court decision, and not wasting time discussing deregionalization.

“It’s really sad, actually. I would hate to see deregionalization,” he said. “We need to sit down and discuss these other options.”

Warren Town Council president Joseph DePasquale agrees, but said Warren isn’t having much luck getting the school district or Town of Bristol to come to the table.

In his decision last month, Judge Matos ordered the heads of each town council to meet together with attorneys to discuss his decision, and what to do next. Though the attorneys did meet several weeks ago, Mr. DePasquale said there has been no response to the three invitations to meet that he said he has sent out to Bristol and the school district. Rep. Gallison’s legislation is a distraction and goes against the spirit of cooperation he said the judge was trying to foster by telling the parties to meet.

“Right now I’m disappointed,” Mr. DePasquale said. Rep. Gallison’s bill “goes against the judge’s recommendation that the parties get together and cooperate. At this time (deregionalization) is nothing that Warren is interested in pursuing. We are trying to deal with the business at hand.”

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