EMBARGOED UNTIL: 12:01 A.M. EDT, JUNE 14, 1999 (MONDAY)
Public Information Office CB99-111
301-457-3030/301-457-3670 (fax)
301-457-1037 (TDD)
e-mail: pio@census.gov
Sharon Meade
301-457-1574
School Construction Expenditures Top $18 Billion; Texas, New York
and Florida Spend the Most, Census Bureau Reports
Nationwide, school districts invested $18.7 billion in school
construction in 1996, with Texas, New York and Florida spending the most
among the states, according to data released today on the Internet by the
Commerce Department's Census Bureau.
Texas spent $2 billion for school construction, followed by New York and
Florida at $1.6 billion each. California, at $1.2 billion and
Pennsylvania, at $1 billion, were next.
While public school enrollment was increasing 1.7 percent to 44.8
million from 1995 to 1996, school district debt was growing to $110
billion from $97.7 billion in 1995, the Census Bureau said. School systems
in five states borrowed more than $1 billion each for building
construction, reconstruction and refinancing -- Texas ($2.7 billion),
Pennsylvania ($2.5 billion), New York ($1.9 billion), Illinois ($1.5
billion) and Florida ($1.2 billion).
Other findings include:
-- The average amount spent on education by the 50 states and the
District of Columbia was $5,656 per pupil. New Jersey spent the most
($9,208), followed by the District of Columbia ($8,510), New York
($8,374), Alaska ($8,169) and Connecticut ($7,970).
-- State governments continued to contribute the greatest share of
public school system funding, at $139.2 billion (48 percent),
closely followed by local governments, at $131.5 billion
(46 percent), and the federal government, at $18.6 billion
(6 percent).
-- State governments contributing the largest percentage of education
revenues were Hawaii, which, unlike other states, has a single,
state-run school system (90 percent), New Mexico (73 percent) and
Delaware, Michigan and Washington (68 percent each).
The tabulations from the 1996 Annual Survey of Local Government Finances
provide financial statistics for public elementary and secondary
education. They contain data on revenues, expenditures and indebtedness
for individual public elementary and secondary school systems with
enrollments of 15,000 students or more.
The tables also include state rankings of elementary-secondary school
revenues and expenditures per pupil as well as rankings based on the ratio
of elementary-secondary school revenues and expenditures to state personal
income.
The data are in current dollars and have not been adjusted for price and
wage changes occurring throughout the years.
Since the data come from all elementary and secondary schools, they are
not subject to sampling error. Quality assurance procedures were applied
to all phases of collection, processing and tabulation to minimize errors.
However, the data are subject to coding and reporting errors, as well as
difficulties in identifying every unit that should be included in the
tables.
-X-
The U.S. Census Bureau, pre-eminent collector and disseminator of timely,
relevant and quality data about the people and the economy of the United
States, conducts a population and housing census every 10 years, an
economic census every five years and more than 100 demographic and
economic surveys every year, all of them evolving from the first census in
1790.
