KSD%20WSSDA%20Priorities.pdf

Parent document: Board Meeting-09-23-2024.pdf

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Kalama School District WSSDA Legislative Priorities 2025

1. Support for Special Education Programs
WSSDA shall initiate and/or support legislation that requires full, ample, and
sustainable funding for special education programs and services. Such
programs and services should maximize assistance to children rather than to
their various categorizations and assessments.

2. MSOC Funding
WSSDA supports enhanced MSOC funding. These enhancements may come
via regular increases recognizing inflationary costs, with a required review by
OSPI every four years of actual costs, as submitted by school districts or
through the state becoming the responsible payee for operating costs such as,
but not limited to, utility and insurance costs. Additionally, WSSDA supports a

sales tax break for MSOC costs of school districts.

3. Transportation Funding
WSSDA shall initiate and/or support legislation to modify the Student
Transportation Allocation formula. Legislation should provide sufficient
transportation resources to create equity in student access to a basic
education, covering all costs related to student transportation.

4. Full Funding of Basic Education

5. Amply Funded Staffing Levels

6. Fiscal Notes and Unfunded Mandates
WSSDA shall initiate and/or support requiring all legislation mandating K-12
programs or services provide full funding for all costs, including incidental,
administrative and non-employee and other related costs of the programs or
services. WSSDA supports requiring that the legislature only progress K-12
legislation out of committee for which an estimated fiscal impact has been
determined, including an estimate of representative local cost of compliance
(fiscal notes), from representative districts around the state, for any proposed
state laws or administrative rules, that would impact educational programs or
services.

7. State Required Assessments
WSSDA shall initiate and/or support legislation and policy that limits the
impact of state-required testing on students' instructional time and
experiences. Legislation should expand options for meeting mandated
assessments by adding other assessment options beyond Smarter Balanced,
and allow districts to minimize instructional days disrupted by mandated
testing and reduce total seat time required to administer mandated
assessments. Legislation should retain district and local control over formative
assessment selection.