Stars, Stripes and Tuition Bills

Schools threaten to charge for children of federal employees

Thousands of children who live in or near military bases across the nation routinely attend nearby public schools. However, their parents, as federal employees, may be exempt from paying the local taxes that support the school districts. For over a century, the U.S. Government has at least partially reimbursed the districts for the cost of educating the children by providing what is called Impact Aid. Now, that is dwindling sharply. In the past two years, the Reagan Administration's domestic spending cuts have included about a 40% reduction in federal Impact Aid, from $762 million in fiscal 1980 to $437 million in 1982. The result in more and more communities: the once easy relationship between town and base is becoming strained.

Some school districts have sought relief from the courts or state legislatures. Last year a number of state legislatures, including those in Virginia, Texas, New Hampshire, North Carolina and South Carolina, passed laws designed to permit school districts to charge tuition to replace lost aid. New Jersey has such a bill awaiting the Governor's signature, and New York is considering similar legislation. In the summer of 1981, Fairfax County, Va., became the first district to levy a tuition charge (starting at $3,000 per student) on federally connected dependents living at the Army's Fort Belvoir. The Justice Department filed suit to block the move, but the crisis was defused when Congress passed a continuing budget allocation. That same allocation also made a suit in York County, Va., moot. But many observers believe that if the Reagan Administration continues to cut the Impact Aid budget, some definitive resolution of the issue, perhaps in a precedent-setting court case, should not be put off indefinitely. A Justice Department official glumly predicts, "This problem is going to get worse before it gets better."

Last month it did. In Jacksonville, N.C., the Onslow County school board mailed 3,000 tuition bills for $245 per child to parents of children attending its schools. The invoices were sent on the grounds that the parents were nonresidents of North Carolina paying no state income tax and employed at Camp Lejeune, one of the largest Marine bases in the U.S. Though nearly four of every five residents of the county depend on the Marine Corps for their livelihood, Impact Aid funds there decreased 77% in five years from $1.2 million in 1976 to $267,000 in 1981. Says Onslow County Superintendent of Schools Everett Waters: "A lot of people think this money is gravy, icing on the cake. In reality it is not, because we suffered a big loss--we lost the property from our tax rolls."

General Donald Fulham, commander of Camp Lejeune, instructed parents not to pay. They were further advised to forward the tuition invoices to designated unit officers, who in turn would present them to the Defense Department in Washington. Not long after the bills were sent to parents, the Department of Justice joined eight servicemen stationed at Camp Lejeune in a suit filed in U.S. district court in Raleigh, N.C., to ask a judge to declare the tuition plan unconstitutional. A ruling is expected by the end of next month.

A growing number of school districts around the nation are likely to follow Jacksonville's example unless the Government comes to the rescue. Explains Edward Brickell, superintendent of schools at Virginia Beach, Va., which is considering charging tuition for children of parents living at nearby bases: "There is an element of fairness here. The Federal Government has an obligation it is not living up to. If it sent these people to Germany, it would pay for their education. The people in the service and their children are the ones caught in the middle." And though on opposite sides of the issue, the Onslow County school board and the Marine base agree in deploring the extent of the Administration's Impact Aid cuts. Says Superintendent Waters: "We're not sore at the military. We like the military. I don't necessarily think the parents ought to pay tuition. I think the Federal Government has a responsibility to impacted school districts." For his part, General Fulham says that the school board only did what it had to do: "The local jurisdiction needs money to support its school system and sees tuition as a source of it, and really, they don't have too much choice."

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