CSBA formula for reimbursing BIP costs OK’d
LEAs could recoup $1.2 billion for cost of intervention plans
Published: April 24, 2013
Two decades of resistance to woefully inadequate compensation for the cost of preparing Behavioral Intervention Plans paid off last week, when the Commission on State Mandates formally adopted parameters and guidelines including a reimbursement formula developed by CSBA.
Local educational agencies will be able to recover as much as $1.2 billion for the cost of preparing and providing services under the intervention plans, which are required under state law for certain students in special education programs. The standardized formula—developed from a survey of CSBA’s membership on the actual costs—awards a flat payment of $10.64 per ADA for every school year between 1993-94 and 2010-11 for costs associated with the plans.
CSBA and its Education Legal Alliance backed members who challenged the reimbursement structure starting in 1994. Keith J. Bray, CSBA’s general counsel and director of the ELA, said on CSBA’s YouTube channel that those efforts “have now paid off in getting the Commission on State Mandates to support the educational services provided by the school districts and county offices of education in our state.”
The commission initially voted to accept the cost formula at its previous meeting in January, and formally adopted it April 19.
Actual reimbursement will take additional time, however, CSBA Assistant Executive Director for Governmental Relations Dennis Meyers cautioned. Once the state determines the full amount owed to LEAs for all the plans developed from the 1993-94 school year to 2010-11, it will be added to an existing backlog of $3.8 billion for other unfunded mandates imposed on schools. Meyers said CSBA continues to advocate in the Legislature, before state panels and in the courts for full funding of mandated programs and services.