An amendment introduced on the House floor would have allowed all residents in a large school district to vote whether a smaller faction could splinter off. Such a provision would effectively thwart any attempt to form smaller districts, according to Sen. Carlene Walker, R-Cottonwood Heights, who sponsored the bill. The amendment failed on a 32-38 vote.

Walker's bill clarifies the process and time lines a group hoping to form a smaller school district would have to follow before voting on the split. Such details were left out of last year's law.

The legislation, however, does little to mollify concerns about possible harm and disenfranchisement for the residents remaining in a district from which a smaller district has been formed. Debate on SB30 has turned to the fact that residents who aren't part of the split don't get to vote on a matter that would saddle them with a larger tax burden.

Jordan School District, where many east-side residents want to form their own district, has often been a focus of that debate. Such a split likely would increase the tax burden for citizens on the rapidly growing west side, which is having trouble building new schools fast enough. Under the current law and the bill's time lines, east-side residents could vote to split off in November and could have a new district operating by July 2009.

Senators made two attempts to slow that process during last week's Senate debate. They passed an amendment that would have prevented a vote before 2008, but reversed the move the next day.

Another amendment compelled an interim committee to study the impact on and voting rights of residents left behind. That amendment passed, but was altered to put the work in the hands of the Government Operations Committee favored by Walker rather than the Education Committee as originally proposed.