Hughes Defends Small School Districts.
Sen. Carlene Walker's SB30 passed the full House yesterday but it was a battle the whole way. Fortunately Greg Hughes, who was the House sponsor, championed it through.
The bill passed through the Senate and the House Gov't Operations Committee with only one amendment to require an interim committee to study some of the questions raised. Several attempts had been made to amend the bill to allow the entire school district vote on the split or to delay the public vote until 2008. Allowing the entire district to vote would have essentially prevented Draper and neighboring communities from splitting from Jordan School District as is currently under consideration since the majority of district voters are outside those communities and are likely to oppose to the split.
On Monday the Mayors of Taylorsville and Herriman asked the Utah League of Cities and Towns to oppose this bill in our legislative policy committee meeting but I and others spoke out against the league taking a position since there are several communities on both sides of the issue. As a result the league voted to remain neutral.
Greg and other supporters of the bill worked hard to gather support for the measure before it came up for a vote on the House floor. After Greg introduced the bill Rep. Harper (R-West Jordan) proposed a hostile amendment and several representatives from west Salt Lake County spoke in favor of it. It was neck and neck as the votes came in until it was 33 for and 31 against with 11 absent. Rather than let the amendment pass, Greg requested a Call of the House which is a call out to all absent representatives to come in and vote. This was the first time this session that a Call of the House had been used. As the representatives trickled in, the no votes gradually went up and the amendment failed 32-38. After that the opponents of the bill lost momentum and the bill passed 45-21.
SB30 was really just about the mechanics of how to split a school district in terms of dividing assets, holding elections and so forth. These clarifications were found to be necessary after the legislature passed the bill allowing cities to initiate splits from school districts last year. Of particular importance to Draper is that this bill allows a city which spans two counties, as does Draper, to participate in the split. The original legislation did not allow that.
Draper City is currently participating with Sandy, Cottonwood Heights, Alta, and Midvale to conduct a detailed feasibility study to determine if it would be beneficial to split from Jordan School District. The split could be put to a public vote as early as this November. SB30 clears the way for us to move forward.
Senator Walker and Representative Hughes deserve a lot of credit for their hard work to run this through the legislative gauntlet. Tough issues like this are where voter support is earned the hard way.
See articles in the Salt Lake Tribune and Deseret News.
The bill passed through the Senate and the House Gov't Operations Committee with only one amendment to require an interim committee to study some of the questions raised. Several attempts had been made to amend the bill to allow the entire school district vote on the split or to delay the public vote until 2008. Allowing the entire district to vote would have essentially prevented Draper and neighboring communities from splitting from Jordan School District as is currently under consideration since the majority of district voters are outside those communities and are likely to oppose to the split.
On Monday the Mayors of Taylorsville and Herriman asked the Utah League of Cities and Towns to oppose this bill in our legislative policy committee meeting but I and others spoke out against the league taking a position since there are several communities on both sides of the issue. As a result the league voted to remain neutral.
Greg and other supporters of the bill worked hard to gather support for the measure before it came up for a vote on the House floor. After Greg introduced the bill Rep. Harper (R-West Jordan) proposed a hostile amendment and several representatives from west Salt Lake County spoke in favor of it. It was neck and neck as the votes came in until it was 33 for and 31 against with 11 absent. Rather than let the amendment pass, Greg requested a Call of the House which is a call out to all absent representatives to come in and vote. This was the first time this session that a Call of the House had been used. As the representatives trickled in, the no votes gradually went up and the amendment failed 32-38. After that the opponents of the bill lost momentum and the bill passed 45-21.
SB30 was really just about the mechanics of how to split a school district in terms of dividing assets, holding elections and so forth. These clarifications were found to be necessary after the legislature passed the bill allowing cities to initiate splits from school districts last year. Of particular importance to Draper is that this bill allows a city which spans two counties, as does Draper, to participate in the split. The original legislation did not allow that.
Draper City is currently participating with Sandy, Cottonwood Heights, Alta, and Midvale to conduct a detailed feasibility study to determine if it would be beneficial to split from Jordan School District. The split could be put to a public vote as early as this November. SB30 clears the way for us to move forward.
Senator Walker and Representative Hughes deserve a lot of credit for their hard work to run this through the legislative gauntlet. Tough issues like this are where voter support is earned the hard way.
See articles in the Salt Lake Tribune and Deseret News.
posted by Jeff Stenquist at 2/15/2007 06:42:00 AM
0 Comments:
Post a Comment
Links to this post:
Create a Link
<< Home