As you can see from the image (click to enlarge) in this post, what’s being proposed for the next biennium is flat funding for GPA (General Purpose Aid) to Education.
In the current fiscal year, GPA has been $983.5 million, and what’s proposed is $986 million.
But wait! Isn’t it a fiction to say that the current GPA is $983.5 million? Our readers will recall the November curtailment of $27 million (Commissioner’s Letter, spreadsheet) that reduced actual GPA to $956 million.
So our chart should actually read thus:
07-08 actual $972 million
08-09 actual $957 million
09-10 proposed $986 million
10-11 proposed $986 million
Soon enough we’ll be treated to a variety of rhetoric about all this. The truth is that it’s going to be hard to continue with business as usual. What we’ll have to see is exactly where the axe falls.