My Name is Kyle Fairbairn, and I represent the Greater Nebraska Schools Association (GNSA) which is an organization that represents 25 of the largest school districts in the state of Nebraska. These 25 districts represent over 70% of all the children in the state attending public school, and 88% of all the minority children in the state that attend public schools.
By lowering the agricultural value of all land in the state you would cause a financial issue for many of the school districts that survive on the property values in their districts. Many of the districts that would be harmed are not near their levy limit in tax asking. This bill would cause those districts to raise their rates on all property in the district to be able to survive this dramatic decrease in valuation. The agricultural property owner would see a drop in value to save taxes and then the taxing asking would have to be increased in order to keep a school district whole as there would be no additional state aid if a district had room on their levy limit. In school districts that do receive state aid through TEEOSA with the valuation going down this would put a large burden on the state to increase the funding for school districts to cover the loss in the property tax valuation. The state is currently fighting to stay out of a current budget deficit of over 400 million dollars so asking for additional funding through TEEOSA would be very difficult ask.