ALBANY – New York state must to boost school funding by $2 billion next year to begin to comply with a court order, according to the group that successfully sued over inadequate education funding.
Michael Rebell, executive director of the Campaign for Fiscal Equity, said the 13.7 percent increase in state education funding would serve as a “down payment” toward meeting the requirements of a Court of Appeals ruling that the state better fund schools to provide New York’s students a basic, sound education.
The Board of Regents has requested $880 million for the next fiscal year, which begins April 1.
Rebell said he expects that over the next three or four years, the state, which is facing multibillion-dollar deficits, will have to spend more than $6 billion to satisfy the court order.
Gov. Pataki said in response, “We were looking in the neighborhood of $6 billion deficit for the upcoming fiscal year. So it’s going to be very difficult.”