Well, I think this is the flip side of the local control coin. I know out here, the school district where I live wants to spend 40M to build a new middle school and renovate a 30 yr old high school. The the population is declining in all Beaver County school districts. My SD even has excess capacity in the current 50 yr old middle school, yet they want a new building. When the building plan was challenged, it turned out the SD superintendent was planning on a 10% population increase due to having a new building! This is why he was saying the SD needed more space.

I think you also have high property taxes in the wealthiest, and not coincidentally, better school districts in the state. People with K-12 children are choosing with their feet to move to those school districts. Good schools don’t come cheap when you want to attract and retain good teachers and have top notch extracurricular activies like sports and arts.

pd