In a report that could transform New York City's public schools, a court-appointed panel has found that an additional $5.6 billion must be spent on the city's schoolchildren every year to provide the opportunity for a sound, basic education that they are guaranteed by the State Constitution.
Beyond that, the panel found that $9.2 billion worth of new classrooms, laboratories, libraries and other facilities were needed to relieve overcrowding, reduce class sizes and give the city's 1.1 million public school students adequate places to learn.
The report is a major turning point in a lawsuit that could reshape the way education is financed in the state, and is being watched closely by politicians and educators around the nation. Nearly every state has battled over school spending in court, but the case in New York is one of the country's biggest, both in terms of the money at stake and the number of children affected.
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In its report, the panel called for an unusually aggressive timetable, giving the state no more than 90 days to devise and begin enacting a plan that would eventually put an extra $5.6 billion every year toward running the city's schools. It gave the state four years to reach the full amount, starting with $1.4 billion in the first year, $2.8 billion in the second, and $4.2 billion in the third. The governor has said that the state can eventually raise as much as $2 billion a year from video lottery terminals. How the rest - which would have amounted to an average of an extra $339 on every state income tax return in 2001 - would be raised remains an open question.
http://nytimes.com/2004/12/01/nyregion/01school.html?hp&ex=1101877200&en=deadb3f447333ca3&ei=5094&partner=homepage
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