As Maine towns balk at rising education costs, some call for sheltering the property tax

Contributing sentiments towards policy:

56% : Copy the Story Link Send questions/comments to the editors. filed under: education funding, lewiston public schools, property tax, university of maine Related Stories Latest Articles
53% : Daryn Slover/Sun Journal Lewiston Public Schools Superintendent Jake Langlais said recently he thinks placing so much funding responsibility for public education on local communities' property tax is "cumbersome."
49% : Given the median household income in Lewiston is $54,317, according to the U.S. Census Bureau, overall 4.65% of the average median household income in Lewiston goes toward funding education.
48% : Traditionally public schools in Maine have been funded through a combination of state subsidies and local property taxes.
48% : For the 2020-21 school year, local property taxes made up 61% of funding for public schools in New Hampshire, 57% in Connecticut and 52% in Massachusetts, according to the data.
47% : "To fund (public education less burdensome to local taxpayers), you'd have to get to a place where you remove the property value piece, or if the property value is a component, it should be a qualifier, in that if you know that there's lower property value or higher densities of disadvantaged (people) economically, that that becomes a factor in larger federal funding.
44% : There are few popular funding models in the United States that move away from funding public schools by local or state taxes, according to Kimball.

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