Bill Seeks to Shift Funds to Classrooms : Education: The measure would limit administrative spending to 5% of a district’s budget. It has bipartisan backing and strong teachers union support.

An unusual bipartisan coalition headed by a conservative Republican state senator and the state’s largest teachers union local is backing a bill to shrink school district spending on central office administrators and expand what is used for classroom basics such as teachers, books, computers and the like.

The Educational Accountability and Efficiency Act, written by Sen. Bill Leonard (R-San Bernardino) and promoted by United Teachers-Los Angeles, would require districts to spend 95 cents of every dollar directly in the schools. By 2001, no more than 5 cents of every dollar could be spent for central office expenses such as data-processing and administrators’ salaries.

It is the state equivalent of the Republican drive to seek efficiencies in federal social programs by replacing them with block grants sent directly to the states. According to Leonard, the bill would free up as much as $1.25 billion a year now spent by school districts on overhead.

“That’s a lot of new teachers, a lot of new bus drivers, a lot of new computers and a lot of new textbooks,” Leonard said. “That’s a meaningful difference for our school sites.”

Leonard’s 18 co-authors include liberal Democrats and other conservative Republicans, many of whom joined him at a news conference Tuesday in Sacramento to discuss the legislation.

It remains to be seen whether the bill, if it is approved, would cause districts to spend their money differently or merely change how they account for it. Experts say, in fact, that the average district already spends only about 5 to 6 cents of every dollar on central administration.

Some districts, however, spend far more. Backers of the proposed legislation said central office administrative spending ranges from 5% to 15% or even higher.

The state’s largest administrators group dismissed the legislation as “administrator bashing” and scapegoating.

“It’s an easy but misguided way to appear to give more money to schools without putting one new dollar into the system,” said Tom DeLapp, spokesman for the Assn. of California School Administrators.

He said the state’s school districts already comply with one of the toughest limits on administrative costs in the nation, which allows no more than one administrator for every 14 teachers. On that score, DeLapp said, “we are the envy of most industries.”

But teachers union President Helen Bernstein said the bill is necessary to address public concerns that administrative spending is cutting into campus budgets.

“Study after study . . . shows the public strongly believes that far too much of the school budget goes to bureaucrats who never step into a classroom or interact with students,” she said. “The public’s overwhelming sentiment is to put the power of the dollar in the hands of the providers of local education.”