June 6, 2025
Ms. Harmony Quiroz
Chair, Tax Supervising Conservation Commission
808 SW Third Avenue
Portland, OR 97204
Re: Comments on the PPS operating budget for 2025-26
Dear Chair Quiroz,
I am writing to submit the following comments in advance of the June 10, TSCC public hearing on the PPS budget.
The PPS budget does not comply with state or federal civil rights laws
I call your attention to Volume II, pages 4-5 of the draft budget attached. These charts rank order funding for all PPS schools on the basis of: (1) dollars per student; and (2) students per FTE.
Note the disparity between the highest and lowest-funded schools. At Rosa Parks elementary, the ratio of students to FTE is 4.4:1. At Richmond, the ratio is 14.4:1. The District also plans to allocate $16,560 per student to Rosa Parks versus $8,504 at Richmond.
These differences are the result of the District’s “Equity Funding” policy that uses both poverty and race as factors for weighting of resources at K-8 schools. This is enumerated on page 2 of the budget (attached), which discusses how the District distributes more money to schools with high percentages of “Combined Historically Underserved” students. Those in this category have at least one of the following attributes:
- Special education eligibility
- Limited English proficiency
- Free meal eligibility by Direct Certification
- Identification as any of the following races:
- African-American
- Latino
- Native American
- Pacific Islander
- Multiracial, which includes any of the races listed above
While it is lawful to skew funding on the basis of poverty, limited-English skills or cognitive deficiencies, race cannot be a factor. Discrimination is prohibited in any public elementary, secondary or community college education program “where the program, service, school or activity is financed in whole or in part by moneys appropriated by the Legislative Assembly.” ORS 659.850(2)
Discrimination includes any act that “unreasonably differentiates treatment, intended or unintended, or any act that is fair in form but discriminatory in operation, either of which is based on race, color, religion, sex, sexual orientation, national origin, marital status, age, gender identity, or disability.” ORS 659.850(1)(a)(A)
Racial discrimination is also prohibited under Title VI of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, and several U.S. Supreme Court decisions have upheld this in the past several years, most notably in Students for Fair Admissions, Inc. v. President & Fellows of Harvard Coll. {2023}. As the majority wrote in that case, “Eliminating racial discrimination means eliminating all of it.”
I understand that the TSCC is neither a judicial body nor a regulatory agency, but it does have the power to withhold certification of a taxing district’s budget. I urge you to do so until PPS changes its funding policy to comply with all applicable civil rights laws.
Sincerely,
John A. Charles, Jr.
President & CEO
