But there are a couple of reasons why we think this should be the year that the Legislature should support House Joint Resolution 1, a constitutional amendment that would take an additional 1 percent distribution for early childhood education, increasing the overall annual payout from the fund to 6 percent.
First, there is the healthy condition of the fund itself. This has been a very good year for the stock market, and state investments have gone up along with all others. The fund has climbed from $15.2 billion last year to $17.29 billion now. Simply put, we are much better situated this year to make this investment in our future.