Texas Schools Lack Katrina Aid Funds

3/5/2006 Houston -- Federal funding shortfalls and state government plans to use hurricane Katrina money to refill state coffers will leave Houston-area schools soon. Now area schools will have to foot much of the Hurricane Katrina evacuees bills.

The U.S. Department of Education cut in half the first installment of Hurricane Katrina relief to $750 per student because more than 158,000 displaced children were reported nationally - roughly 60,000 more than the $645 million federal appropriation can fully fund. Texas schools are being hit extra hard because the Texas Education Agency plans to keep about half the money to repay itself for funds it will pay this year to schools that took in evacuees. That could leave schools with as little as $1,500 per student this year.

Educators were told last fall that schools would receive $6,000 in federal funding for each displaced student they enrolled. Of the $1.1 billion in hurricane funding release nationally Thursday, only $35.2 million was sent to Texas to cover the cost of educating 46,000 students displaced by Hurricane Katrina in the first quarter of the school year.

On a side note, Texas received $28 million more to rebuild schools damaged by Hurricane Rita. U.S. Secretary Margaret Spellings said she was fine with Texas' plan to repay the state budget before sending money to local school districts. About 37,200 displaced children - including 5,500 in the Houston Independent School District - are still attending Texas schools.

District leaders said they should be getting more money for Katrina students, who require more emotional and academic support. Both federal and state education officials, meanwhile, are hoping payments will be increased as students return to New Orleans and that the federal government might allocate additional money to schools.