Districts may share the wealth

"There's no way you can't say it won't raise property taxes," said Salt Lake District Superintendent McKell Withers, who was blindsided by the change. "There was a commitment, we thought, made to the public and those participating through the task force process that no equalization plan would be forwarded that wasn't a statewide plan. So here's a statewide plan, but (it) only has a provision for counties of the first class, of which there's only one."

The Legislature has promised to address building equalization. But will it be SB48?

"Saying it's going to get funded, especially at the $28 million level, I think that's going out on a limb," Curtis said. "I'm going to wait until I get the numbers," he said, referring to new money estimates, expected in a week.

That new money is in high demand. A $2,500 teacher raise being bantered about would cost about $100 million; paying for new students would add $70 million to it, Curtis said. Last week, the public schools' budget committee was told to keep its wish list around $60 million; Eastman's bill was far from making the cut among committee members.

"Is it realistic to think half the money is going to go for equalization? I think not," Tilton said.

"There's a lot of wrangling left to be done," he said. "I support Sen. Eastman's plan — I'm the House sponsor ... but if it appears there is not enough money to appropriate, there needs to be an alternative."

Tilton's HB383 would require school districts in counties of the first- through third-class pool property-tax revenues for equalization purposes. Those districts would be: Tooele, South Summit, Park City, North Summit, Logan, Iron, Cache, Box Elder, Weber, Washington, Provo, Ogden, Nebo, Davis, Alpine, Salt Lake City, Murray, east-Jordan, west-Jordan and Granite, Tilton said. About half would pull out more money than they put in, he said.

It's similar to the other proposed special session bill, Tilton said, which sought to pool $223.4 million in local property tax.

Curtis says SB48's price tag may be slashed if funding isn't there. He also said bringing out Tilton's bill is "more of a long shot at this point."

But there's still three and a half weeks left in the legislative session. And as Tilton puts it, "Equalizing property taxes is the whole point of the task force — to equalize it, not subsidize it."

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