Should cities be able to create their own school system? (Marietta: home, neighborhoods)

[demonta4]

One of the issues of the metro area today is the poor handling of schools. This is one reason unincorporated areas are becoming cities. But sould cities be able to create their own school system?

[noah]

Yes, New methods need to be tried to improve schools, plus some of the best metro schools are charter/city districts

Originally Posted by demonta4

One of the issues of the metro area today is the poor handling of schools. This is one reason unincorporated areas are becoming cities. But sould cities be able to create their own school system?

[Born 2 Roll]

Originally Posted by demonta4

Should cities be able to create their own school system?

YES, cities (and even individual parts of counties and coalitions of neighborhoods) should be able to create their own independent school systems, particularly if those areas that desire to create their own school system are currently trapped in highly-dysfunctional county school districts.

[ElleKaye]

Originally Posted by demonta4

One of the issues of the metro area today is the poor handling of schools. This is one reason unincorporated areas are becoming cities. But sould cities be able to create their own school system?

As long as the city has the funds, I don't see why not. I don't see the advantage of a county (which is I guess what happens in most cases) setting up the system. Also, home schooling and private schools are thriving entities so why should cities not be able to create their own school systems?

[Humanista]

Originally Posted by demonta4

One of the issues of the metro area today is the poor handling of schools. This is one reason unincorporated areas are becoming cities. But sould cities be able to create their own school system?

I wonder what happens to the county based school system if all the richer cities create their own and therefore direct what used to be county level funds to their new school systems. I come from CT where for the most part each city had its own school system. Property taxes are much higher than here to support each city having its own system. Will county taxes rise in general to support the remaining areas that have to rely on county based systems and are not as wealthy?

[cwkimbro]

Well I see two problems that can brew and would have to be addressed first.

If these new cities take control of large amount of industrial and commercial areas, get access to the school side of the property tax revenues, but have less population and leave certain areas of unincorporated areas alone... I can see it being problematic.

Some cities (like N. Fulton) have distributed the whole area across different cities, while other cities (like Peachtree Corners) were designed to maximize commercial and industrial land within their borders before other nearby cities could annex valuable land.

This could become a huge issue on the equitable distribution of funds for the county and city school systems.

This relates to other threads on the possible creation of new cities in North Dekalb and control over places, like Northlake and Century Center. They would be a huge property tax bonus for one city's schools, but not the city next door equally close by and it would take money away from the county disproportionately from how many students are there.

[PKCorey]

I hope, we don't go the route of NJ and CT with a new district every couple miles .

I need to look into the taxes for Buford and Marietta City schools and see how the compare to county school taxes.

[red92s]

Originally Posted by demonta4

One of the issues of the metro area today is the poor handling of schools. This is one reason unincorporated areas are becoming cities. But sould cities be able to create their own school system?

All of the proposed cityhoods (Lakeside, Tucker, etc) for unincorporated Dekalb don't do anything to the existing school structure. I don't believe Brookhaven becoming a city had any impact on the school configuration. The capital investments required to start a new school system from the ground up would make it extremely difficult for a fledgling city to do. People balk at the City of Decatur's high taxes, which are frequently quoted as being the highest in the state. That's a good indicator of the funding levels required to have a really good, really small, school system. I guess going towards a charter system could help to reduce the immediate financial burden though.

[lastminutemom]

Yes.

There should be.

When the law was changed in 1945, GA had a complicated system that allowed basically an entity to start a school system and there were all kinds of issues. The authors of the law change at that time could not have envisioned a time when 1 in 15 GA children in public school would be in one system (Gwinnett).

As to taxes, Decatur system is very small and provides very high services. The residents of the community have made that choice by continuing to elect board members who support that model. DeKalb residents pay nearly the highest (outside of Decatur) school tax rate, get poor services and worse outcomes and have very little say except for the two board members they elect. Decatur's system is far more representative because each board member represents a far smaller area.

And if you don't believe that Lakeside etc has anything to do with school systems, and that at least a certain percentage of votes for Dunwoody and Brookhaven cityhood had to do with this issue, I have a bridge to sell you.

[red92s]

I never said it does not have anything to do with school systems. I said it currently has zero impact on school zoning. If these new municipalities have eyes on forming their own school systems, they are banking on a reversal of current Georgia law preventing newly created municipalities from forming independent school systems. HR 486 aims to change that, and will likely be a hotly debated topic in the next sessions.

I understand why places lake Lakeside and Tucker and Dunwoody want to escape association with Dekalb County Schools. It's been an unmitigated dumpster fire in recent years. Allowing the higher income pockets of the county to branch off will likely increase per-student costs at the schools left serving the primarily lower income unincorporated areas. It's not unreasonable to assume many residents have more or less "quit" on the current configuration, even with new leadership in place, and I suppose that's understandable. For them, anything short of a new system will be seen as an investment in failure and won't garner their support. It'd be interesting to see what Dekalb could actually achieve with their new board of education in place, and the support of all the local communities, rather than charging into a divisive and messy legal fight.

I don't have a dog in the fight. I could make reasonable arguments for each scenario as it pertains to all the Dekalbvilles. If I had to wager a guess, I'd say HR486 passes, because the interest of the populations it harms the most will be underrepresented.