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Brian T. Hamel
Locally-elected school boards have wide discretion over allocating money among
the schools in their district, yet we know relatively little about how they decide
“which schools get what.” I argue that electoral incentives are one factor that can
influence the distribution of resources: board members will direct spending toward
schools located in neighborhoods of their district where spending will be most electorally
beneficial in the next election. I test this argument using data from a discretionary
school modernization program in the Los Angeles Unified School District,
and find that board members distribute resources primarily to schools in competitive
and moderately supportive neighborhoods, especially when running in an on-cycle
election where parents make-up a larger share of the electorate and where student
performance affects election outcomes. By comparison, schools in overwhelmingly
opposed and supportive areas are excluded. These results suggest that local democratic
control of school boards can hinder educational equality.