The majority leaders in the House and Senate are supporting an amendment to the school consolidation law that would give more control to local school committees by keeping the union form of governance – a move that likely will lead to a legislative floor fight with no clear winner in sight.

The amendment will be offered as an alternative to a bill that is designed to fix the school consolidation law passed last year. While both proposals presumably would allow consolidation partners to work out their own cost-sharing agreements – a change seen as vital to getting local voter support for the new districts – they differ markedly on how much control local school committees would have in a consolidated district.

The bill and the amendment were being discussed in caucuses Tuesday and could come up in the Senate on Thursday.

Senate Majority Leader Libby Mitchell, D-Kennebec, helped get the amendment drafted. She is handing it over to Sen. Dennis Damon, D-Hancock, to introduce in the Senate because his district, which includes Mount Desert Island, is pushing for it.

House Majority Leader Hannah Pingree, D-North Haven, said she’s backing Mitchell’s proposal in an effort to appease voters in her district on Mount Desert Island and nearby islands and others in the more than 120 communities currently represented by school unions.

“It’s a better transition for towns that currently are in unions or just feeling very uncomfortable,” about forming a consolidated district and giving up control over their local schools, Pingree said.

Mitchell said her amendment would create no more than 80 central office administrations and bring together unions of 2,500 students, where possible, but no less than 1,000 – the new minimum size being proposed for consolidated districts.

Regional school union committees, made up of members of the local school boards, would be required to find cost savings in administration, transportation, special education and facilities and maintenance without hurting education in the classroom – a key goal of the consolidation law passed last year.

“It allows more local control,” Mitchell said, but it “respects” the intent of current law.

Where the two proposals clearly differ, however, is Mitchell’s amendment would allow local school committees to operate kindergarten through Grade 12 schools unless they give up that power to the regional school union committee. Under the school consolidation law, only regional school boards have operational and budgetary power.

Education Commissioner Susan Gendron said Friday that while she hasn’t seen a copy of the amendment, she is concerned it would create more than the 80 school districts now allowed under law – a line she and Gov. John Baldacci have drawn in the sand.

“My concern would be as it has been, that unions create more school administrative units and allow the municipalities to maintain control over budgets,” Gendron said. “You’re really creating multiple layers of bureaucracies, which is what we’re trying to eliminate.”

If the number of units is over 80, “that would not be acceptable to the governor,” she said, although he hasn’t formally said he’d veto the plan.

“He’s been very clear we need to stay the course. We need to have a structure that’s sustainable,” Gendron said, and not encourage stand-alone districts with dwindling enrollments that cannot maintain quality education programming given the state’s limited resources.

Pingree said the key is there would be no more than 80 central offices, with no more than 80 superintendents.

“There would be completely consolidated administrations,” Pingree said. “How is that not one unit?”

The nuances of the proposed amendment will have to be figured out by legislators, who will be asked to choose among at least three proposals.

All three would presumably remove financial barriers to consolidation, most notably a cost-sharing formula in the current law that allows cost shifts onto the most property-rich communities in a new regional school district. Other changes would eliminate a requirement that a community has to contribute at least 2 mils on its property tax toward K-12 education, regardless of the number of students in town, and, allow property-rich communities, currently receiving special education funding, to continue to receive that aid in a consolidated district.

Where the proposals differ is in school governance.

The Mitchell amendment and one supported by a minority on the Education Committee allow for school unions, although the language creating them is different.

The main bill, supported by Gendron and a majority of the Education Committee, would allow local school committees to propose additions to the budget to support local school programs above those recommended in the regional school budget, but they would not have control over the budget.

That language was drafted by Sen. Peter Mills, R-Somerset, a member of the Education Committee, to appease those who want full-blown unions to continue to exist.

Mills said Mitchell’s amendment was “insidiously designed to create the appearance of only minor change” to the one approved by the majority on the Education Committee, but the differences are profound. Mitchell is a member of the Education Committee and formerly its chairman.

“It clearly permits the municipalities to frame up their own budget, hire and fire their own teachers and set policy,” he said. “In other words, it preserves what we’ve already got, which is chaos.”

The administration is hoping the Mills plan will get two-thirds support so changes, including the flexibility on cost sharing, can go into effect immediately. If not, districts will have to wait until mid-to-late July to formalize their consolidation plans, since laws passed with only a majority vote don’t go into effect until 90 days after the Legislature adjourns. Adjournment this year is April 16.

Another unwelcome outcome of a majority versus two-thirds vote deals with mandatory budget validation votes. The law as currently written requires all school budgets to be approved at the ballot box, starting with budgets for this upcoming school year. The department’s bill and the amendments would delay those mandatory votes until 2009, but that will be moot if the law doesn’t go into effect until July or August, because votes are required much earlier in the year to allow cities and towns to set their mil rates.