Leader Chippendale: 2025 House Bill No. 5399 - House Finance (42925) (B)

Um I am happy to take any questions and as I as I said earlier if I am not able to answer them I will ensure that they all are answered uh very very quickly. Okay. Thank you very much for that presentation and I'm happy that you're taking all of the questions. So I know you're going to do very well at this point. Are there any questions of the uh sponsor or presenting of that bill? Uh yes, no problem. I don't you can go first. Okay. Um leader, um I didn't have to talk a chance to talk to Rep. Hopkins. Uh you said Coventry School Committee has uh put some support in for this. I know I've spoken to them and they are in great support of this and Warwick was another one. Is any other she collaborated with any other school uh committees that you know have So I I am aware of conversations with other school committees. Yes. Uh, I know that um Johnston reached out and I I sus I I believe Cranston did as well. Um, I suspect there are others. Rep. Nadon, I just um off the top of my head, I don't know, um, exactly how many have already reached out to her. And I I think um, what you'll see in in the folder is these letters of support coming in from the various school committees over the next several days. Right. And I'm not sure how much you collaborated with her on this. Um, I should have grabbed her early. um this the parochial the school the bus funding is that I I don't know did you talk there? Yeah. So um I did and um as as we're all aware here uh school transportation is is very much a conversation right now and we know that there are changes coming. So no this will not in any way impact that. It won't impact what our current uh model is at all. Uh whether or not we do as a legislative body at some point that remains to be seen. Uh however this bill will not. Okay. Thanks. Thanks. Uh I think R Corin was next to you. Thank you, chairman. Uh leader, um can you may have said this, but does this encompass all regulations right now underride or just new things going forward? No, it it would apply to any existing uh regulation that is not funded at all. Right. So if it were partially funded, if it got 50% of it funding from the state, it would not apply to that. But if it and if it's a law, it right if it's in the statute, you know, again, I I used fire fire drills because it's probably the most obvious. We don't want to get rid of something vital like that. Uh and so that's not what's on the chopping block, nor should it be. Okay. Thank you. Okay, Rev. Roberts. Thank you, Chair. May I please be recorded as present firstly, please? Thank you. And I wanted to ask uh does this bill uh protect the funding for CTE education even though it isn't fully funded? It does. Yeah. Um you know there are districts who would like to sort of change how CTE works and I suspect that um to one extent or the other maybe the transport whatever the transportation uh decisions are being made may do that. But no that was intentionally left out of this bill. um we couldn't go all in on um every every single uh aspect of of mandates because it would have been monumental. There would have been a need if we went down that road also to start to uh get fiscal notes and things of that nature. But furthermore, we recognize and we hold true that um the pathway programs in the state, our local um disagreements, notwithstanding um they offer really the only true form of school choice in the state of Rhode Island. And we we also acknowledge that each pupil learns differently and we need to preserve those programs so that a pupil who is getting great benefit from a program outside of their district is still able to do that. So, no, it will not apply at all to CTE. Okay. Also, uh could this generate cost savings? Oh, well, certainly. Yeah. So, um obviously money is not spent on on things that don't add value is where we're where we're looking to to see this um have its biggest impact. And if you are if a district's not uh compelled to spend money on something that adds no value, they are then freed up to use that money for core educational issues that uh may be lacking or areas that from time to time need to be addressed, massaged or or in some way um supported with funding. So uh it will absolutely reduce uh expenditures but it will more importantly free up existing uh allocations to be used in a more efficacious way. Okay. Thank you.