Michigan wrangles with school debts

But the Coalition for the Future of Detroit Schoolchildren has requested the state assume at least $350 million in DPS debt and relieve Detroit schools of other legacy costs. It is one of several vexing issues involving money-losing public schools that loom large this spring in Lansing.

Legislators also are facing requests for $725,000 to cover unpaid debts of the former Buena Vista school district they dissolved two years ago, a $1 million study of education funding adequacy and a doubling of a $50 million emergency loan fund for cash-strapped school districts that is nearly tapped out.

“Something definitely has to be done,” said state Sen. Ken Horn, R-Frankenmuth. “We have a lot of different problems to solve.”

Fifty-five other school districts and charter schools across Michigan began this school year in deficit, though 14 school districts and five charters are projecting they will be back in the black by July 1.

Rep. Al Pscholka, the GOP chairman of the House Appropriations Committee, said the Detroit Public Schools debt relief request makes the state’s $195 million contribution last year to Detroit’s grand bargain bankruptcy settlement “look like a used car note.”

“These are some pretty big numbers that are being thrown around,” Pscholka told The Detroit News.

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