(a) As an alternative to the lease financing pursuant to Section 41329.52, a school district may receive an emergency apportionment from the General Fund designed to provide an advance of apportionments owed to the district from the State School Fund and the Education Protection Account. The emergency apportionment shall be repaid within 20 years. The calculation of the amount of the apportionment, including implied costs, and the interest rate shall be calculated pursuant to subdivision (b). Each year the Superintendent shall withhold from the apportionments to be made to the school district from the State School Fund and the Education Protection Account an amount equal to the emergency apportionment repayment that becomes due in the year.

(b) The determination by statute as to whether the emergency apportionment shall take the form of lease financing pursuant to Section 41329.52 or an emergency apportionment from the General Fund pursuant to this section shall be based upon the availability of funds within the General Fund and not on any cost differential between the two financing mechanisms. To ensure that the two alternatives are cost neutral, if the statute does not authorize a lease financing, the bank shall commission a cost study from financial advisers under contract with the bank to determine the interest rate, costs of issuance, and if it is more cost effective, credit enhancement costs likely if the financing was a lease financing rather than an emergency apportionment from the General Fund. These implied lease costs shall be included as the fixed interest rate on the repayment of the emergency apportionment to the General Fund, repayable over 20 years.

(Amended by Stats. 2013, Ch. 48, Sec. 29. (AB 86) Effective July 1, 2013.)