SECOND REGULAR SESSION
[P E R F E C T E D]
SENATE BILL NO. 1087
92ND GENERAL ASSEMBLY
INTRODUCED BY SENATORS DAYS, FOSTER, KENNEDY, STOLL, JACOB,
SHIELDS, CHILDERS AND CASKEY. Read 1st time January 15, 2004, and ordered printed.
Read 2nd time January 26, 2004, and referred to the Committee on Education.
Reported from the Committee March 23, 2004, with recommendation that the bill do pass and be placed on the Consent Calendar.
Taken up March 16, 2004. Read 3rd time and placed upon its final passage; bill passed.
TERRY L. SPIELER, Secretary.
3730S.01P
AN ACT
To repeal section 162.700, RSMo, and to enact in lieu thereof one new section relating to the placement of certain special education pupils.
Section A. Section 162.700, RSMo, is repealed and one new section enacted in lieu thereof, to be known as section 162.700, to read as follows:
162.700. 1. The board of education of each school district in this state, except school districts which are part of a special school district, and the board of education of each special school district shall provide special educational services for handicapped children three years of age or more residing in the district as required by P.L. 99-457, as codified and as may be amended. Any child, determined to be handicapped, shall be eligible for such services upon reaching his or her third birthday and state school funds shall be apportioned accordingly. This subsection shall apply to each full school year beginning on or after July 1, 1991. In the event that federal funding fails to be appropriated at the authorized level as described in 20 U.S.C. 1419(b)(2), the implementation of this subsection relating to services for handicapped children three and four years of age may be delayed until such time as funds are appropriated to meet such level. Each local school district and each special school district shall be responsible to engage in a planning process to design the service delivery system necessary to provide special education and related services for children three and four years of age with handicaps. The planning process [may] shall include public, private and private not-for-profit agencies which have provided such services for this population. The school district, or school districts, or special school district, shall be responsible for designing an efficient service delivery system which uses the present resources of the local community which may be funded by the department of elementary and secondary education or the department of mental health. School districts may coordinate with public, private and private not-for-profit agencies presently in existence. The service delivery system shall be consistent with the requirements of the department of elementary and secondary education to provide appropriate special education services in the least restrictive environment.
2. Every local school district or, if a special district is in operation, every special school district shall obtain current appropriate diagnostic reports for each handicapped child prior to assignment in a special program. These records may be obtained with parental permission from previous medical or psychological evaluation, may be provided by competent personnel of such district or special district, or may be secured by such district from competent and qualified medical, psychological or other professional personnel.
3. Where special districts have been formed to serve handicapped children under the provisions of sections 162.670 to 162.995, such children shall be educated in programs of the special district, except that component districts may provide education programs for handicapped children ages three and four inclusive in accordance with regulations and standards adopted by the state board of education.
4. For the purposes of this act, remedial reading programs are not a special education service as defined by subdivision (4) of section 162.675 but shall be funded in accordance with the provisions of section 162.975.
5. Any and all state costs required to fund special education services for three- and four-year-old children pursuant to this section shall be provided for by a specific, separate appropriation and shall not be funded by a reallocation of money appropriated for the public school foundation program.
6. School districts providing early childhood special education shall give [preference] consideration to the value of continuing services with Part C providers for the remainder of the school year when developing an individualized education program for a student who [had] has received services pursuant to Part C of the Individuals With Disabilities Education Act[, to continue services with the student's Part C provider, unless this would result in a cost which exceeds the average cost per student in early childhood special education for the district responsible for educating the student] and reaches the age of three years during a regular school year. Services provided shall be only those permissible according to Section 619 of the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act.
7. Any rule or portion of a rule, as that term is defined in section 536.010, RSMo, that is created under the authority delegated in this section shall become effective only if it complies with and is subject to all of the provisions of chapter 536, RSMo, and, if applicable, section 536.028, RSMo. This section and chapter 536, RSMo, are nonseverable and if any of the powers vested with the general assembly pursuant to chapter 536, RSMo, to review, to delay the effective date or to disapprove and annul a rule are subsequently held unconstitutional, then the grant of rulemaking authority and any rule proposed or adopted after August 28, 2002, shall be invalid and void.