Education funding has been passed by the Iowa Legislature for the 2019-2020 school year, with new funding amounting to just over $89 million, with $7.8 million of that new funding for transportation. State Senator Julian Garrett tells KNIA News the new transportation funding was to help out rural districts with rising costs.

“We are trying to equalize the money available. School districts obviously vary a lot, and rural districts will end up spending more on bringing kids to school than an urban district where they don’t have so far to go. We are appropriating money to equalize that cost for school districts, which has become a burden for rural districts to try and keep up.”

Garrett also said the legislature has been making a concerted effort to get the education funding passed in the first 30 days of the session to make sure school districts know how much supplemental aid they are going to receive.