Georgia property tax relief must include increased public education investment

As the Georgia Legislature enters its final days of this year’s session, property tax cuts are high on the agenda. But what lawmakers call “relief” risks undermining schools already strained by years of stagnating state investment.

Property tax relief and school funding aren’t in opposition: Increasing state investment in education reduces dependence on local property taxes while also strengthening schools.

Lawmakers don’t have to choose between helping homeowners and supporting students. With the right moves, they can do both.

When the Legislature passed the Quality Basic Education formula in 1985, it was designed to share responsibility fairly between the state and local school districts, with the state covering the majority of costs. But a recent report from the Intercultural Development Research Association that I wrote shows that by falling behind on covering modern education expenses — such as student support services, transportation, technology and the state’s health benefit plan — the state has failed to uphold its share, forcing schools to rely increasingly on local revenue.

The state’s responsibility hasn’t disappeared: It’s been offloaded.

Mikayla Arciaga is the Georgia advocacy director for the Intercultural Development Research Association. (Courtesy)

In the last seven years alone, state funding for schools has stagnated relative to local funding, with the state’s allotment increasing by $115 million per year while local spending rose by nearly $420 million per year, the IDRA’s findings show.

This shift is reflected in the composition of school revenue: State funding fell from a prepandemic baseline of 52% in 2019 to 49% at the end of the COVID-19 federal relief period in 2025, while local funding rose from 42% to 45% over the same period, the research found.

Local communities have absorbed most of this cost through property taxes because, unlike the state and other municipalities, local school districts are almost exclusively limited to property taxes to support operations. Thus, cutting property taxes without increasing state education funding creates a fiscal shell game rather than delivering real relief.

This dynamic has real consequences.

Heavy reliance on local revenue to fund our schools creates substantial opportunity inequities between communities. Wealthier school districts with higher property values can raise more money at lower tax rates, while rural and lower-wealth districts must either levy higher rates to generate comparable funding or operate with fewer resources for their students.

Indeed, the IDRA report shows, the wealthiest 20% of Georgia’s school districts can raise nearly $5,000 more per student than the remaining 80%.

While the state provides property wealth equalization funding to mitigate these disparities, successive legislative revisions have narrowed eligibility, limiting its effectiveness and allowing the gap to persist.

For policymakers who are serious about cutting property taxes, the path forward is clear.

Cutting or capping property taxes without addressing state education funding would force schools to cut services, reduce staff or increase class sizes. These options are unsustainable and will hurt students and communities.

Instead, the state should change direction.

First, modernize the QBE formula.

Many of its programmatic and categorical assumptions reflect the educational landscape of the 1980s. Schools today face vastly different demands, including expanded mental health support needs, career pathway programs and rapidly evolving technology.

Updating the formula would enable the state to fund schools more accurately and reduce reliance on local community funds.

Second, take a cost-driven approach to education funding.

Current funding levels are shaped more by opaque budget negotiations than by evidence about what students need for learning. A cost-based framework would examine and make transparent actual school district expenses, student needs and differences in cost of living. This would root state spending in observable realities rather than politics.

Third, strengthen and expand equalization funding.

Theoretically, equalization is a funding mechanism that enables the state to balance opportunity gaps created by wealth disparities across districts. Georgia’s property wealth equalization mechanism has existed for decades, Georgia remains one of only six states without dedicated funding for districts serving students in poverty.

School districts where limited property wealth and high concentrations of poverty overlap face compounded constraints of elevated need and limited resources. Expanding equalization to account for community poverty would direct additional dollars where the actual cost of educating each child is highest.

Without these kinds of changes, tax-cut efforts will fall short of providing relief.

Georgia’s leaders are right to focus on reducing costs for everyday Georgians, but real, sustainable relief requires confronting the state’s central role in funding public education.

Without stronger state investment in our schools, property tax cuts are an empty promise. With it, Georgia can deliver the resources students need, strengthen public education and build a sustainable fiscal future for all Georgians.