BILL NUMBER: AB 1946 AMENDED BILL TEXT AMENDED IN ASSEMBLY MAY 1, 2014 INTRODUCED BY Assembly Member Chesbro FEBRUARY 19, 2014 An act to amend Section 42285 of the Education Code, relating to school finance. LEGISLATIVE COUNSEL'S DIGEST AB 1946, as amended, Chesbro. School finance: necessary small high schools. Existing law establishes a public school financing system that requires state funding for county superintendents of schools, school districts, and charter schools to be calculated pursuant to a local control funding formula. As part of the local control funding formula, existing law requires a school district or charter school to receive state-aid funding of no less than the sum of certain amounts received in the 2012-13 fiscal year, including, among other amounts, the 2012-13 fiscal year funding allowance provided for qualifying necessary small elementary schools and necessary small high schools. Existing law defines a necessary small high school as either (1) a high school with an average daily attendance of less than 287 pupils that meets specified conditions, or (2) a high school maintained by a school district for the exclusive purpose of educating juvenile hall pupils or pupils with exceptional needs. This bill would add to the definition of a necessary small high school a high school maintained by a unified school district as the onlycomprehensivehigh school if the high school has an average daily attendance oflessfewer than300286 pupils and the school district has 50 or fewerpupilspupils, as measured by enrollment, per square mile of school district territory. Vote: majority. Appropriation: no. Fiscal committee: yes. State-mandated local program: no. THE PEOPLE OF THE STATE OF CALIFORNIA DO ENACT AS FOLLOWS: SECTION 1. Section 42285 of the Education Code is amended to read: 42285. (a) For purposes of Section 42284, a necessary small high school is a high school with an average daily attendance oflessfewer than 287 pupils that comes within any of the following conditions: (1) The projection of its future enrollment on the basis of the enrollment of the elementary schools in the school district shows that within eight years the enrollment in high school in grades 9 to 12, inclusive, will exceed 286 pupils. (2) Any one of the following combinations of distance and units of average daily attendance applies: (A) The high school had an average daily attendance oflessfewer than 96 pupils in grades 9 to 12, inclusive, during the preceding fiscal year and is more than 15 miles by well-traveled road from the nearest other public high school and either 90 percent of the pupils would be required to travel 20 miles or 25 percent of the pupils would be required to travel 30 miles one way from a point on a well-traveled road nearest their homes to the nearest other public high school. (B) The high school had an average daily attendance of 96 pupils or more andlessfewer than 144 pupils in grades 9 to 12, inclusive, during the preceding fiscal year and is more than 10 miles by well-traveled road from the nearest other public high school and either 90 percent of the pupils would be required to travel 18 miles or 25 percent of the pupils would be required to travel 25 miles one way from a point on a well-traveled road nearest their homes to the nearest other public high school. (C) The high school had an average daily attendance of 144 pupils or more andlessfewer than 192 pupils in grades 9 to 12, inclusive, during the preceding fiscal year and is more than 71/2 miles by well-traveled road from the nearest other public high school and either 90 percent of the pupils would be required to travel 15 miles or 25 percent of the pupils would be required to travel 20 miles one way from a point on a well-traveled road nearest their homes to the nearest other public high school. (D) The high school had an average daily attendance of 192 pupils or more andlessfewer than 287 pupils in grades 9 to 12, inclusive, during the preceding fiscal year and is more than 5 miles by well-traveled road from the nearest other public high school and either 90 percent of the pupils would be required to travel 10 miles or 25 percent of the pupils would be required to travel 15 miles to the nearest other public high school. (3) Topographical or other conditions exist in the school district which would impose unusual hardships on the pupils if the number of miles specified in paragraph (2) were required to be traveled. In these cases, the Superintendent may, when requested, and after investigation, grant exceptions from the distance requirements. (4) The Superintendent has approved the recommendation of a county committee on school district organization designating one of two or more schools as necessary isolated schools in a situation where the schools are operated by two or more school districts and the average daily attendance of each of the schools islessfewer than 287 pupils in grades 9 to 12, inclusive. (b) For purposes of Section 42284, a necessary small high school also includes either of the following: (1) A high school maintained by a school district for the exclusive purpose of educating juvenile hall pupils or pupils with exceptional needs. (2) A high school maintained by a unified school district as the onlycomprehensivehigh school if the high school has an average daily attendance oflessfewer than300286 pupils and the school district has 50 or fewerpupilspupils, as measured by enrollment, per square mile of school district territory. (c) For purposes of Section 42284, a necessary small high school does not include a continuation school. (d) For purposes of this section, "other public high school" is a public school, including a charter school, that serves any of grades 9 to 12, inclusive.