- IN THIS REPORT
This issue of the Report covers major political developments on the road to educational choice without financial penalty, and significant stirrings in the labor and business communities.
California
On November
2, California voters will determine whether their state will become the
first in the nation to adopt a comprehensive educational choice proposal.
The initiative, proposition 174, will, if passed, provide vouchers worth
about $2,600 per student to families who choose to enroll their children
in independent schools. The $2,600 figure represents roughly one
half the average amount spent per student in California's public schools.
Opponents of
the voucher initiative have focused on the cost of making vouchers available
to families whose children are currently enrolled in private schools.
On July 22, however, the Los Angeles Times printed an analysis of the initiative's
substantial ultimate cost-saving potential. The Times reported that
"the school choice initiative has a twist that might make it unique among
government programs: The more people use it, the less it would cost
taxpayers." The report noted that "every time a child left a public
school for a private one, the government would save money. If enough
children left, sufficient money would be generated to recoup the start-up
costs and possibly bolster per-pupil spending on the students who stayed
in public schools."
Michigan
In July of this
year the Michigan legislature passed a measure repealing all property taxes
for support of local schools, and Governor John Engler signed the measure.
The property tax repeal, while creating a $6.5 billion gap in the education
budget for the '94-'95 school year, presents Michigan lawmakers with a
unique opportunity to restructure public education in their state.
Governor Engler has promised to do just that.
The education
funding shortfall will likely be compensated for not only by increased
state aid (probably including higher sales and income taxes) but also by
a variety of cost-saving measures, such as school district consolidation,
tenure reform, reducing or limiting administrators' salaries as well as
implementing state-wide public school choice.
The Michigan
constitution contains unusually severe restrictions that prohibit parental
choice plans involving private schools; but Governor Engler is determined
to seize the occasion to introduce as much public school choice as
possible. Companion efforts to remove the constitutional obstruction
to comprehensive choice are underway.
New York
New York state
Senator Serphin Maltese has introduced a comprehensive educational choice
bill (SB 5955) in the state legislature. The bill would provide education
vouchers to all New York families on a three-year phased-in basis.
In the first year, families with income among the lowest 33% will qualify
for the vouchers, each worth about $1,700. By the third year, all
families will be eligible and the voucher's value will increase to at least
$3,400. Additionally, the bill contains provisions for a 50% voucher
supplement for poor families as well as funding support for home schoolers.
Pennsylvania
In 1991 Pennsylvania
came quite close to enacting comprehensive educational choice legislation.
In December, 1991, the Pennsylvania House of Representatives defeated choice
legislation that had earlier been passed by the Senate.
Now the Pennsylvania
General Assembly is again considering a comprehensive choice proposal.
On May 11, 1993, companion bills (HB 1655 and SB 1090) were introduced
in the two houses of the state legislature by Reps. William Keller and
William Adolph and Senators Michael Dawida and Frank Salvatore. The
proposal has the backing of Pennsylvania's REACH Alliance. (717-238-1378)
The legislation includes provisions for charter schools, post-secondary
enrollment options, intra- and inter-district public school choice as well
as education certificate grants to families who choose to send their children
to independent schools. The dollar value of the certificate grants
would be phased-in over two years, while student eligibility for the certificates
would phase-in according to grade over a three-year period.
Virginia
The state of
Virginia is the site of another major development in the movement toward
educational choice without financial penalty. Mr. Michael Farris
is the Republican candidate for Lieutenant Governor in the November election,
and is espousing comprehensive educational choice for Virginia's parents.
(See August 5, 1993, Washington Post and August 18 New York Times stories.)
Mr. Farris comes to educational choice from long involvement in home schooling
and profound concern for the difficulty of maintaining ethical standards
in curriculum and conduct in public schools operating under the protection
of educational finance monopoly. He thus represents one of the major
"natural constituencies" which will support educational choice when it
is seen clearly. Victory would provide an important "bully pulpit"
for this strong choice advocate.
Wisconsin
On May 25, 1993,
a bill known as the Parental Choice in Educational Act (SB 310/HB 627)
was introduced in the Wisconsin legislature. The bill's principal
sponsors are Sen. John Plewa and Rep. Rosemary Hinkfuss, both Democrats.
The bill would
provide Wisconsin families with refundable tax credits worth up to $1,000
per child for a wide variety of educational expenses, including tuition
at any accredited private school. Corporations will also be eligible
for tax credits (to a maximum of $15,000) if they provide additional financial
help with education expenses to low-income families.
On August 8
the Joint Survey Committee on Tax Exemptions conducted a public hearing
in Madison for the tax credit proposal. An additional hearing in
Milwaukee may be scheduled sometime in September.
It is expected
that later this autumn the Committee on Tax Exemptions will release a report
on the bill and send the bill to Senate and Assembly leaders for further
committee assignments.
The Labor
Community and Educational Freedom
As reported
in the August 3 Milwaukee Sentinel and subsequent stories, a new and interesting
front was opened in the struggle for educational choice without financial
penalty.
Public Employees
Union Local 61 asked that the City of Milwaukee provide its members an
extra $200.00 if their children attended private schools, to help offset
the cost of so doing. As with many beginning educational choice efforts,
the amount of original funding is of secondary importance compared to the
principle at stake: will social policy encourage or discourage parental
involvement in and decision on the choice of school? This union proposal
would be a small but real step in the direction of expanding family capacity.
The case also
reflects a profound reality: the interest of educational unions to
sustain educational finance monopoly can run head on into the larger interests
of other union memberships in advancing the welfare of their children.
Stay tuned.
A
Business Step
Careful study
of the destructive characteristics of the current educational finance monopoly
obtaining in fifty states and the therapeutic capacities of educational
choice make it obvious that the business communities of the several states
and the nation should support choice. Their concerns for a skilled
work force, for rational cost restraints, and against burgeoning monopolistic
structures could be expected to lead to affirmation of educational choice.
However, for
the most part, such business groups have not been leading forces in this
effort. Very often, business leadership interest in education has
simply resulted in their being co-opted by the very monopolistic structure
which most needs reform.
An important
exception to this pattern has occurred in the case of the Metropolitan
Milwaukee Association of Commerce. The MMAC, in adopting its 1993-94
Legislative Agenda, has endorsed comprehensive educational choice.
Their judgment is that
"Competition
through school choice will force improvements in all our schools, including
MPS [Milwaukee Public Schools], and encourage parents and families to share
the responsibility for their children's education/goals."
It may be that
this bold step by a major business leadership group would be of interest
to comparable organizations in other locales.
Mayors
Get Behind School Choice
Two big city
majors, one a Republican from Jersey City and one a Democrat from Milwaukee,
are making waves on behalf of school choice. Bret Schundler, Mayor
of Jersey City, NJ, claims he just wants to apply the tried and true principle
of American success stories in the marketplace to education: i.e.,
competition. "I want to save inner-city public schools by forcing
them to improve," he says. "They may have a monopoly now, but
no one enjoys working in them." (Wall Street Journal, July 13, 1993)
Mayor John Norquist
of Milwaukee, Wisconsin, shares Schundler's views. Describing the
failure of Milwaukee's public schools, Norquist says, "What we have is
a school-finance monopoly that is not helping public school children, is
suppressing quality, is not customer-oriented, and is overly bureaucratic."
(Policy Review, Summer, 1993, 71) For Norquist, as for his Republican
counterpart in Jersey City, competition is key.
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