This bill, titled the Fairness in Education Funding Act (House Bill 2026, H-1239.3), amends multiple existing school finance statutes, adds a new section to chapter 28A.150 RCW, reenacts and amends RCW 28A.320.330, creates new fund and reporting requirements, and repeals a list of specified RCWs. It is a substantive statutory restructuring of K-12 funding allocations rather than a criminal or penalty statute; it changes funding formulas, definitions, allowable uses of certain revenues, accounting procedures, and administrative rulemaking and reporting duties. The act’s full operation is expressly made contingent on voter approval of a proposed constitutional amendment abolishing school district excess levies; if the amendment is not approved the act is void, and its conditional effective date is January 1, 2026. Major finance and allocation changes in the text provided include interim and permanent statewide minimum salary allocations and a move to uniform statewide salary allocations. Through the 2025-26 school year there are inflation-adjusted minimum statewide average salary allocations of $64,000 for certificated instructional staff, $95,000 for certificated administrative staff, and $45,912 for classified staff, with regional hiring-cost adjustments specified in the omnibus appropriations act through at least the 2022-23 school year. Beginning in the 2026-27 school year, regional adjustments are eliminated and uniform minimum statewide average salary allocations (adjusted for inflation from 2026-27) are specified as $100,033 for certificated instructional staff, $179,857 for certificated administrative staff, and $71,082 for classified staff. The bill defines “inflation” by reference to the inflationary adjustment index in RCW 28A.400.205 and treats certain staff allocations as allocations for certificated instructional staff. The bill creates two new statewide per-student allocations beginning in the 2026 calendar year that are not part of the state’s statutory program of basic education: $1,550 per average annual FTE for enrichment funding and $1,000 per FTE for construction/modernization/remodeling of facilities. Districts are not eligible to receive the enrichment per-FTE allocation in any calendar year they collect enrichment levies, and are not eligible to receive the facilities per-FTE allocation in any calendar year they collect excess levies to support those purposes. The bill amends the definition and permitted uses of “enrichment funding,” limits the portion of administrator salaries attributable to enrichment administration to no more than 25% of total district administrator salary expenditures, and requires districts to establish an enrichment revenue subfund (to track those revenues separately) and a capital projects fund with specified deposit sources and allowable uses. OSPI must require a supplemental expenditure schedule by revenue source (beginning in 2019-20) and adopt rules to implement the section; OSPI is also directed, where practicable, to prepare district fiscal notes for legislation that uniquely affects district revenues or expenditures. The act also specifies permissible capital projects fund uses (including major renovation/replacement, energy audits and capital improvements, technology modernization, moving and storage costs tied to construction, certain equipment and furniture purchases, and limits on using capital funds to supplant routine maintenance), authorizes certain fund transfers and accounting treatments, allows second-class districts to establish a depreciation subfund (up to 2% of general fund per year), and lists numerous RCWs to be repealed while permitting levies authorized by voters before March 1, 2025 to be collected for their existing durations. Several sections of the bill text are incomplete or omitted in the provided material (including portions of RCW 28A.150.276, the full text of amendments to RCW 28A.300.0401 and RCW 28A.320.330, the detailed repeal and effective date language, and the text of the referenced constitutional amendment), so some implementation details and cross-references are uncertain from the extracted facts alone.

If enacted, the state would take over and standardize major portions of school staffing and capital funding: by 2026-27 all districts would get the same higher statewide salary allocations for certificated and classified staff, and beginning in calendar year 2026 the state would provide per-student payments of $1,550 for enrichment and $1,000 for facilities. A district that continues to collect local enrichment levies or excess levies for facilities would not be eligible for the corresponding state per-student allocation, districts must create and separately track an enrichment revenue subfund and meet new reporting and administrative rules, and OSPI must adopt rules and prepare fiscal notes where practicable. The people most affected are school districts, educators, and district administrators: districts would lose the option to concurrently raise local levies for enrichment or facilities if they want the new state per-student money, face added administrative and reporting duties, and must operate under a 25% cap on administrator salary charges tied to enrichment administration; certificated and classified staff would see higher minimum state salary allocations in theory, though regional adjustments apply through the interim period. Planning and financial impact remain uncertain because several referenced statutory changes and the text of the related constitutional amendment are not provided here, and the act only takes effect January 1, 2026 if voters approve abolishing excess levies, otherwise the bill is void.