WHEREAS, The Congress of the United States, acknowledging the fiscal burden placed on local educational agencies by the loss of revenue from traditional funding sources such as property, sales, and income taxes resulting from a federal presence, in 1950 enacted Public Law 81-815/874 authorizing the Impact Aid program that was reauthorized in 1994 as Section 8003 of Title VIII of Public Law 103-382 (20 U.S.C. Sec. 236 and following); and

WHEREAS, Federal impact aid is funding provided to a local school district in lieu of taxes not paid by the federal government and certain federal employees and to compensate for revenues the local community would collect if the land did not belong to the federal government; and

WHEREAS, Unlike other federally funded education programs, federal impact aid is not a program designed to respond to a social need or provide supplemental state and local funding but is a program designed to help cover basic education costs; and

WHEREAS, Federal impact aid is a program that imposes no federal requirements directing states or schools to develop performance standards or learning objectives; and

WHEREAS, Federal impact aid is funding that goes directly to the local agency for the general support of the education program for all students as determined by the local educational agency without burdensome bureaucratic costs; and

WHEREAS, There are 229 California school districts serving approximately 2,200,000 students located throughout the state from Del Norte County in the north, to San Diego County in the south, that educate 180,000 federally connected children who depend on the federal fair share financial contribution to the local educational system; and

WHEREAS, Withdrawal of federal impact aid funding would adversely impact the educational program of every school district that depends on federal impact aid to provide the federal government’s share of support for the education of the federally connected child and force districts to curtail services to all children; and

WHEREAS, The withdrawal of federal impact aid funding would result in state and local taxpayers subsidizing the education of the federally connected child; and

WHEREAS, California and its citizens are struggling to overcome a severe economic crisis; and

WHEREAS, The federal government’s financial support for California’s federally connected child and federal presence has declined below the 1981 level of funding although the numbers of children in the educational system has been increasing; now, therefore, be it