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Legislative Alert: Your Response Needed

By Wisconsin School Administrators Alliance staff | February 15, 2016

This Is A Priority Legislative Alert!

The State Assembly has scheduled a floor vote for tomorrow, Tuesday, February 16th, on Assembly Bill 751  as modified by Assembly Amendment 3.  The SAA is issuing this legislative alert because it is extremely important to our efforts at stopping this bill that Assembly Representatives feel very uncomfortable over this vote.  Therefore, I’m asking you to contact your Assembly Representatives one more time on this issue.

Once again, here is the bottom line on AB 751 as amended: if your district has resident students in the statewide or Racine voucher programs, under this amendment, you will lose revenue limit authority and you will likely have to pay for your voucher students by reducing educational opportunities for the children that remain in your district.

As we reported earlier, the Legislative Fiscal Bureau (LFB) issued a memo detailing the fiscal impact of Assembly Amendment 3 to AB 751 on the 142 school districts impacted by the Racine and Wisconsin Parental Choice Programs.  The LFB estimates the loss under the amendment to be $14.2 million spread across the 142 districts.

And this penalty is being imposed at a time when school revenue limits have been frozen for both years of the current budget cycle and when 57% of the respondents to the Marquette University Law School Poll say local schools are receiving too little funding from the state!

You have probably heard Assembly Republicans making the argument that Assembly Bill 751 as amended makes school districts whole on the revenue cap 3 years after new voucher students enroll in the voucher program.  I would like to make three points in response:

  1. By making this argument, proponents are acknowledging that there is a significant first-year problem for affected school districts. Again, the Legislative Fiscal Bureau (LFB) pegs the first-year loss in revenue cap authority under AA 3 at $14.2 million spread across the 142 affected school districts.
  2. Their argument is based on the LFB analysis of one cohort of voucher students. But, a new and likely larger cohort of voucher students enrolls in the voucher program in 2016-17; another and likely larger group in 2017-18; and so on.  The bottom line is affected school districts will likely face a significant first-year problem year after year.
  3. Finally, during the 2015-17 state budget process, Republican leaders pledged that they would dramatically increase the use of private school vouchers without adversely impacting educational opportunities for public school children. Given the on-going first year impact of AB 751 as amended by AA 3, you have to ask, “Are they planning to break their word?”

I get the sense that some legislators are trying to mislead taxpayers into believing you can add thousands of private school students to a publicly-funded system (with vouchers) without having to pay for them.  There are only three ways you can pay for the additional voucher students: 1) additional state resources; 2) local tax increases; or 3) cuts to educational opportunities for public school students.  Clearly, the latter is the preferred option for some in the Legislature.

Please use the information above and your own arguments in your communications with your Assembly Representative. Also, please copy your State Senator on your communication as well.  For your convenience in doing so, we have provided links to the Assembly Directory, the Senate Directory and to Who Are My Legislators.

Remember, the Assembly floor vote is scheduled for tomorrow (Tuesday), so we have no time to waste.  Let’s keep the pressure on . . . once more with feeling!

Thank you and stay tuned.

Topics: Legislative Action, SAA Capitol Reports, SAA Capitol Reports with Email Notifications, SAA Latest Update | No Comments »

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