Lawmakers intended to address the problem this legislative session. But after a month of debate in committee rooms and on the floor, neither chamber could come to an agreement. No changes were made this year to how Wyoming pays for education. No cuts were passed, nor any mechanisms to generate revenue.

With no solution from the Legislature, Gordon announced Thursday he was launching his own effort to tackle Wyoming’s unsustainable education funding model.

“I have to say I was disappointed that we were not able to come to some sort of an agreement on school funding, it wasn’t necessarily a surprise,” Gordon told reporters in a news conference Thursday. “We have not addressed that fiscal cliff … I believe it’s time I start to take a role in that discussion.”

Gordon said the conversation has revolved around spending, and the two answers have been to raise taxes or cut funding.

“I believe there is a third, perhaps more profitable approach,” Gordon said. “Sort of taking a customer service approach. What is it that our customers really want?”

He hopes to form a working group that will survey communities on what they want the state’s education funding model to include. He mentioned parents, students, industry, small businesses and communities as being among the stakeholders he hopes to hear from.

The timeline to launch that group, and costs associated with the work, are still under development, Gordon spokesperson Michael Pearlman said via email after the briefing. The governor did say he anticipates it being a “long endeavor.”

The Thursday announcement offers more details of a promise Gordon made lawmakers Wednesday in a speech before the session adjourned.

“We know that we have more work to do, and I commit to you as governor that I will participate in this discussion and try to lead us to a good conversation about a resolution on that issue,” he said. “It is, after all, one of the most important ones we have to wrestle with.”

For decades, Wyoming has boasted one of the best-funded school systems in the nation, with mineral revenue largely paying the bills. But a declining fossil fuel industry has made that system unsustainable — to the tune of a $300 million deficit this year, and potential record shortfalls in bienniums to come.

Lawmakers had hoped to rectify at least part of the problem this session. Initially, members of the Legislature’s School Finance Recalibration Committee advanced a bill to cut $100 million from the school foundation program — the block grant that supports nearly every district in the state.

Anticipating those cuts, several school districts planned for cuts to programs and staff. At one point, the Natrona County School District was anticipating an $18 million budget cut under one legislative proposal.

Legislative disagreements

But bills change quickly in the Wyoming Legislature. Both chambers made their own suggestions for how to address the deficit. Federal pandemic aid further complicated the discussion, as how those dollars could be used became a point of conflict as well.

House members eventually passed a bill making about $80 million in administrative cuts over three years, and imposing a conditional 0.5% sales tax if the state’s education account fell below a certain point.

The Senate balked at the proposal and countered by stripping the tax and attempting to insulate teachers from impending cuts by moving those salaries out of the block grant model.

Ultimately, neither proposal won out.

In a heated testimony Wednesday, Senate Education Committee Chair Charles Scott, R-Casper, lamented resistance encountered in the conference committee appointed to find a compromise on the bill.

Members of that committee worked the bill for two days, but could not find common ground on whether to divert state funds into education, and how to utilize federal aid. Before the committee adjourned, House members said they would be willing to reconvene.

But feeling no agreement would be found, legislative leaders threw in the towel, killing the education bill.

“It is a great disappointment to me to inform the Senate that our attempts to come to an agreement with the House have ended in failure,” Scott said.

He called the majority Republican House “tax-and-spend liberals,” and warned school districts that “a disaster was coming.”

“They better take that federal stimulus money ... and put it in reserves, because you’re going to need it,” Scott said of school districts.

The tense remarks stood in contrast to those made by Speaker of the House, Rep. Eric Barlow, R-Gillette.

“We thought we left the door open, and our colleagues down the hall thought it was closed,” he said Wednesday. “We sent down what we thought was a balanced approach.”

But he attempted to quell any tension by telling lawmakers they would have another opportunity to pass a solution.

“Sometimes we just don’t get to that right place all at the same time,” he said, concluding by promising those affected a solution would come. “To the citizens of Wyoming, we value education, we value our educators, we value our schools and the things they bring to our communities.”

Looking ahead

What happens next is up to lawmakers, as they prepare for a special session meant to parse out more than $1 billion in federal pandemic relief dollars. At least $120 million of those dollars are set aside for K-12 schools.

“What’s unclear is will that (session) be simply the appropriation of these federal funds,” or will lawmakers attempt to address the larger deficit, said Brian Farmer, director of the Wyoming School Board Association.

If lawmakers don’t take up that challenge during the special session, which is tentatively scheduled for July, the next opportunity for them to discuss the problem is in interim committee meetings.

Gordon said he believes that session should focus solely on partitioning the federal relief money.

“Any solution on education funding is going to take time,” he said. “I think there are a number of aspects to the way we fund education in Wyoming which are frankly misaligned and difficult to navigate, and so I think part of this discussion, as I said, is starting from the ground up.”

With no changes to the state’s existing funding model, the cuts districts have been told to brace for won’t come in the next year. But many believe cuts will come eventually.

Farmer said the lack of a bill doesn’t create an imminent crisis. Education funding will simply remain unchanged until a law is passed that alters the model.

The problem, he said, is several fold. First, the current statutory funding source isn’t making enough money, and it’s difficult to predict how much, if at all, that could change in the future. Farmer said this could leave the state vulnerable to legal action if the funding model doesn’t change and eventually is unable to support the level of education mandated by the state Supreme Court.

Simply put, no one knows when the state will truly no longer be able to pay for the constitutionally-mandated level of education currently provided. But estimates say the day will come.

“At today’s point, it’s time for a deep breath, it’s time for a cooling off,” Farmer said, adding the solution, whatever it may be, won’t be just one thing.