New Hampshire HB 1799: relative to required state funding for providing an opportunity for an adequate education.

Bill Text

HB 1799-FN - AS INTRODUCED

2026 SESSION

 26-3078

 07/08

HOUSE BILL 1799-FN

AN ACT relative to required state funding for providing an opportunity for an adequate education.

SPONSORS: Rep. Ames, Ches. 13; Rep. Luneau, Merr. 9; Rep. Damon, Sull. 8; Rep. Preece, Hills. 17; Rep. Cornell, Hills. 22; Rep. Oppel, Graf. 9; Rep. Almy, Graf. 17; Sen. Altschiller, Dist 24; Sen. Fenton, Dist 10; Sen. Rosenwald, Dist 13

COMMITTEE: Education Funding

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ANALYSIS

This bill:

 I. Creates a new set of standards for what the legislature determines as the meaning of a constitutionally adequate education.

 II. Includes a variety of staffing and personnel roles as pieces of an adequate education that should be funded appropriately. 

 III. Increases the costs associated with funding an adequate education.

 IV. Requires the state and school districts to establish means and goals of addressing educational outcome disparities.

 V. Creates a commission to study alternative methods of funding public schools besides property taxes.

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Explanation: Matter added to current law appears in bold italics.

 Matter removed from current law appears [in brackets and struckthrough.]

 Matter which is either (a) all new or (b) repealed and reenacted appears in regular type.

 26-3078

 07/08

STATE OF NEW HAMPSHIRE

In the Year of Our Lord Two Thousand Twenty-Six

AN ACT relative to required state funding for providing an opportunity for an adequate education.

Be it Enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives in General Court convened:

 1 Taxation; Apportionment, Assessment and Abatement of Taxes; Commissioner's Warrant. Amend RSA 76:8, II to read as follows: 

 II. The commissioner shall issue a warrant under the commissioner's hand and official seal for the amount computed in paragraph I to the selectmen or assessors of each municipality by December 15 directing them to assess such sum and pay [it to the municipality for the use of the school district or districts] all revenue received to the department of revenue administration for deposit in the education trust fund established in RSA 198:39 for use by the state for making education grants pursuant to RSA 198:41 and property tax homeowner relief payments pursuant to RSA 198:57. Such payments by municipalities shall be made in 4 quarterly installments in accordance with schedules, standards, and procedures established by rules adopted by the department of revenue administration, after consultation with the commissioner of the department of education, in accordance with RSA 541-A. Such sums shall be assessed at such times as may be prescribed for other taxes assessed by such selectmen or assessors of the municipality. 

 2 Education; Adequate Public Education; Policy and Purpose. RSA 193-E:1 is repealed and reenacted to read as follows: 

 193-E:1 Policy, Findings, and Purpose. The legislature makes the following declarations: 

 I. It is the duty and policy of the state of New Hampshire that public elementary and secondary education shall provide all students with the opportunity to acquire the knowledge and skills necessary to prepare them for successful participation in the social, economic, scientific, technological, and political systems of a free government, now and in the years to come, regardless of where the students live. 

 II. New Hampshire's long history of authorizing local governments, in the form of local school districts, to develop and administer public schools pursuant to a set of minimum standards established by the state, including authorizing school districts to raise funds using local property taxes to levels above minimum levels established by the state for adequacy funding, has successfully achieved, on average across the state, high-quality educational outcomes and high levels of total statewide spending in support of public schools. 

 III. Data and academic research demonstrate an unacceptably wide range of achievements, student outcomes, educational programming, and per pupil spending in schools across the state, both within school districts and from one district to another. These differences are a direct consequence of the state's excessive reliance for public school funding on local property tax revenues, which are constrained and vary widely unrelated to student needs due to great disparities in the value of locally taxable property, in local student educational needs, and in proportions of local students living in poverty, needing special education, and needing English language services. The general court recognizes and concurs with a long line of state court decisions in which the constitutional infirmities of these differences and disparities have been identified and affirmed.

 IV. Respecting New Hampshire's long tradition of c