By REP. PHYLLIS KENNEY

Picture this: 28 third-graders and their teacher are crowded into a trailer practicing the multiplication tables. The trailer is over-warmed by a noisy contraption in the corner, and a minimal amount of natural light filters in from windows way above the eye-level of the four-feet-tall inhabitants.

Where is this place, you might ask. Bosnia? Rural Mississippi?

Keep guessing.

Believe it or not, this scenario is a fact of life in school districts all over Washington state. Portable classrooms in the form of trailers or plywood structures are housing nearly 20,000 students this school year. Over 1500 of these portables are in use in King and Snohomish counties alone. And many more children attend class every day in dangerous old school houses.

Why is this? The reasons are many.

A record number of students were enrolled in Washington State's public schools in 1998 - approximately 1 million. An estimated 89,000 more are expected by 2007. Washington's classrooms are the fourth-most crowded in the nation.

At the same time, state spending for school construction has plummeted. In 1985, the state paid roughly two-thirds of total school construction costs. By 1997, the share had plunged to less than 33%. As a consequence, school districts are having to ask voters for larger and larger bonds to build and repair classrooms. Local taxpayers are forced to chose between decent schools and higher property taxes.

Make no mistake, this is no small shift - and no small change. In dollar terms, local levies paid $297 million in school construction costs in 1997, while the state only paid $141 million.

Last year, a bi-partisan School Construction Task Force studied this issue. In order for the state to resume its fair share of the burden for school construction and help reduce the load on local property taxpayers, the Task Force recommended moving some of the state's emergency reserve fund.

This "rainy day" fund currently stands at $370 million. Under current state law, when the rainy day fund reaches 5% of the biennial budget, any amount over that 5% trigger will be put into the Education Construction Fund. The trouble is, the rainy day fund has never reached the 5% mark, and so the education construction fund has never contained any money at all.

The School Construction Task Force recommended lowering the trigger to 3% which would essentially create $90 million that would be available for school construction matching funds. In the 2001-2003 biennial budget, that amount would be $213 million.

Think about that - $213 million to repair old schools and build new ones while giving some property tax relief. And at the same time, we would maintain a nice cushion in the emergency reserve fund.

It's the right thing to do.

When Washington's constitution says it is the paramount duty of state government to make ample provision for the education of children, no exception is made for the cost of ensuring that schools are safe, decent places to learn.