The new state budget has an additional $10 million for Pittsburgh Public Schools and apparently $2 million for whichever district helps to manage the struggling Duquesne City School District.

		Chart: Estimated basic education subsides based on the $26.1 billion state budget passed July 2, 2006.

State officials have been encouraging Pittsburgh to help Duquesne, and the $2 million allotment will get that process moving, said Mark Roosevelt, superintendent of Pittsburgh Public Schools.

The Pittsburgh and Duquesne boards still have to vote on establishing a relationship between the districts. Initially, state officials suggested allowing Duquesne students to attend city schools, but Duquesne residents balked at that approach.

Besides covering the cost of helping Duquesne, state officials had talked about giving the Pittsburgh district a financial incentive to be a good neighbor. But the extra $10 million in the budget for the Pittsburgh district is unrelated to the Duquesne negotiations, according to Mr. Roosevelt.

Mr. Roosevelt said that money is to help the Pittsburgh district with its turnaround agenda, ease the district's financial woes and compensate, in part, for $20.4 million the Legislature decided two years ago to take from the district to help the financially ailing city of Pittsburgh.

At the time, the district appeared to be on solid financial ground. But it took money from its reserve fund to balance the 2006 budget and faces a potential $40 million deficit for 2007.

"Even with this $10 million, that still leaves us $30 million in the hole. We still have a lot of work to do," Mr. Roosevelt said last night.

Still, he called the $10 million a "significant commitment on the state's part" and said he hoped it would become part of the district's annual base funding. He said the money was a sign of the state's confidence in Pittsburgh's determination to right its academic and financial problems.