NASHVILLE, Tenn. -- School boards submit budgets to local commissioners, who ultimately decide whether or not to raise property taxes or force the district to make cuts.

Video: School Boards' Property Tax Plan Meets Resistance

But now, school boards members said if they are held responsible for the success of students, they should be able to control their funding.

"We're seeing more and more contention between the funding bodies and the school boards," said Steve Doremus, communications director of the Tennessee School Board Association. "The school boards try to get the funds that they need to meet the stringent requirements of No Child Left Behind, for example. School boards are held accountable for that, and yet they have no say in their funding level."

This fall has seen some pretty extreme examples of county commissions and school boards fighting over funding: Cumberland County postponed the start of school and Wilson County threatened cuts to athletics, while boards begged county commissioners for a property increase so they could pay the bills.

Now, state school boards want the authority to be able to raise property taxes if they need to.

"We think if they're going to be held accountable for results, they should also be able to set the funding level and be accountable for that as well," Doremus said.

This is not a new idea: 38 states currently give school boards the power to do this. In turn, those members are held accountable at the ballot box if they don't act responsibly with taxpayer dollars.

But lawmakers said this idea is not going to make everyone happy.

"There'll be resistance because it is change and that fear of the unknown and what they could possibly do to your tax rate," said state Sen. Bill Ketron.

Still, Ketron said it's worth looking into, but he wants to make sure there are some limits, such as a cap on how much they can raise taxes without a vote of the people.

"I think by having that trigger of accountability back to the school boards, I think that's the only way that this type of piece of legislation would have the possibility of passing," Ketron said.

While this will come up in the legislature this year, it won't actually change until 2015, at the earliest.

That's because constitutional amendments must pass two different legislative terms and then can only be put for a vote of the people on a ballot with a gubernatorial race.

The School Board Association voted to push this issue in the legislature earlier this week.

No legislation has been drafted yet.