(Radio Iowa) – Governor Reynolds and her fellow Republicans in the House and Senate have agreed to raise general state support of public schools by 160 dollars per student. Republican Representative Dan Gelbach of Urbandale says it will amount to nearly 82-hundred dollars per student. “The state is now going to allocate…almost $4 billion in funding to our public schools,” Gelbach said. “…Factor in local property taxes…and you add on all federal funds and the SAVE penny, which is the Local Option Sales Tax for school infrastructure, our schools are operating with total resources exceeding $11 billion annually.”

The plan is slightly more than Senate Republicans originally suggested and slightly less than House Republicans proposed. It will provide the two percent per pupil spending increase Governor Reynolds called for in January. House Democrats say this is the 9th year out of 10 that state funding for public schools fails to keep pace with inflation. Representative Heather Matson of Ankeny says a two percent increase won’t provide enough to cover schools’ operating costs — including the state-required minimum salaries for teachers.

“This bill is survival mode funding. In some cases, it’s not even that,” Matson said. “…Iowans should no longer accept this irresponsibility.” Representative Mary Lee Madison, a Democrat from Des Moines, says this level of funding won’t lead to world class results in classrooms. “Underfunding our schools is not fiscal responsibility. It is civic neglect,” Madison said. “We must invest in schools as if the future depended on it, because it does.”

Gehlbach was the only Republican to speak during Thursday’s House debate. He says the demographic reality is there’s been a more than five percent decline in public school enrollment in the past decade, while the number of school staff has grown by 11 percent. “With schools losing students in their buildings and adding so much to administrative costs, I would suggest they do what Iowa has done and take a hard look at spending and budgeting,” Gehlbach said.

Gehlbach and 57 other House Republicans approved the plan, while five other Republicans joined Democrats in voting against it. The two percent per pupil spending increase will apply to state-funded Education Savings Accounts for private school students, too.