Congress considers funding cuts, vouchers

NSBA is fighting any cuts in education funding while urging Congress to reject any bills that would provide hurricane relief funding in the form of vouchers for private school tuition -- or any measure that would channel federal cash payments directly to private schools that are not required to comply with federal measures of accountability, such as the No Child Left Behind Act (NCLB).

President Bush proposed vouchers for displaced students in September, and some members of Congress have introduced voucher legislation -- and more bills are expected. Rep. John Boehner (R-Ohio), chair of the Education and the Workforce Committee, proposed a bill to provide “family education reimbursement accounts,” a voucher-like concept, to public and private schools that have enrolled displaced students.

The U.S. Education Department estimates that more than 370,000 students have been displaced.

Preliminary estimates of the cost to repair and reconstruct damaged schools are about $2 billion in Louisiana, $842 million in Mississippi, and $54 million in Alabama. 

While many Katrina relief measures have been proposed, the Boehner bill and a bipartisan bill introduced by Sen. Michael Enzi (R-Wyo.), chair of the Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee, and Sen. Edward M. Kennedy (D-Mass.), the ranking minority member of that committee, are expected to get the most attention.

With the urgency of the need to help families and schools affected by Katrina, it’s likely that a bill could be approved by the time Congress adjourns for Thanksgiving.

Meanwhile, it’s not clear what will happen with the pending education appropriations legislation for fiscal year 2006. As School Board News went to press Oct. 20, the Senate was expected to begin floor debate on the FY 2006 appropriations bill for the departments of Labor, Education, and Health and Human Services. A continuing resolution to maintain the federal programs administered by those departments at 2005 funding levels was passed in October and expires Nov. 18.

Congress could approve another continuing resolution to cover the entire fiscal year or for a shorter period or incorporate education into an omnibus funding bill covering many departments. Whichever legislative vehicle is used, it’s likely that education funding for 2006 would be kept at 2005 levels or reduced even further.

NSBA is urging school board members to contact their senators and representatives to oppose any budget cuts in education programs, especially Title I and special education, which are already underfunded.

To pay for Katrina relief measures, House Speaker J. Dennis Hastert (R-Ill.) has proposed a $50 billion cut in mandatory spending programs, including food stamps, Medicaid, and other programs for the poor. He also announced his support for an across-the-board 2 percent cut in all discretionary spending, which would include education programs.  

Boehner introduced legislation calling for the termination of 14 relatively small education programs, such as arts in education, parent resource centers, and community technology centers.

Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) lashed out against spending cuts and instead called for Congress to eliminate the $70 billion in tax cuts that have already been approved.  

“It appears that the more assistance approved for Katrina relief efforts, the less money could be available for regular education programs,” says Deborah Rigsby, director of federal legislation at NSBA.

NSBA is urging Congress to provide funding to help school districts that have damaged schools and districts that have enrolled displaced students. But, Rigsby says, “some members of Congress appear to be using Katrina relief as an excuse to cut other programs. The FEMA budget had been decimated in recent years, and it shouldn’t be up to the education community to make up for that.”

NSBA also urged Congress not to use the national tragedy of Hurricane Katrina as an excuse to enact a voucher program. In the past, Congress has repeatedly rejected national voucher programs.

While some members of Congress insist that any voucher plans would be enacted as a temporary measure to deal with extraordinary circumstances, “history has shown that once a voucher program is created, no matter how small or for what original reason, proponents return with new reasons to expand the program or create new ones,” says Marc Egan, director of federal affairs at NSBA. “Voucher advocates have already said this could be their opportunity to create a long-term program. And promises by Congress don’t always work out well for public schools -- look at IDEA funding.”

Boehner announced his intention Oct. 18 to introduce legislation to create “family education reimbursement accounts” to provide funding to public, private, and charter K-12 schools and preschools that have enrolled displaced students.

The accounts would be up to $6,700 per child for one year. Boehner says the funds could be used for such educational services as books, supplies, uniforms, transportation, and teachers, but could not be used for school construction or renovation.

Eligible parents would be given an 800 number to call to set up an account for each child. When the child is enrolled in a school, the school would use the account information to seek quarterly reimbursement.

If a child relocates during the year, the new school could request reimbursement based on the same account.

NSBA views the proposed accounts as vouchers.

In a letter sent to Boehner Oct. 19, NSBA Associate Executive Director Michael A. Resnick wrote, “Sending hundreds of millions of taxpayer dollars to publicly unaccountable private schools that do not have to accept and educate all students is the wrong solution for this urgent need.”

There appears to be no incentive for parents of displaced public school children to set up one of these accounts. Since public schools are free, parents have no individual need to seek reimbursement.

This program “would fail to guarantee needed assistance to public school districts that have enrolled displaced students by forcing their parents to go through an unnecessarily burdensome and bureaucratic process of creating a special federal account,” Resnick says.

The original Enzi-Kennedy bill (S.1715) has stalled but a new bill is expected to be introduced shortly, possibly with the addition of a voucher-like program. If a voucher provision is not included, vouchers could be added later as an amendment on the floor.

Under a possible compromise that has not yet been announced, school districts that have enrolled displaced students would receive funding up to a maximum annual payment of $6,000 per student and $7,500 for each student with disabilities. The bill authorizes $2.4 billion for this purpose.

Although NSBA.supports many aspects of the original Enzi-Kennedy bill, it is concerned with a provision that would provide funding for private schools via states and local districts through special accounts. NSBA believes relief assistance for private schools can be accomplished through a system modeled after existing law, such as the Title I approach in which districts provide services (not dollars) on an equitable basis to eligible private schools.

The Enzi-Kennedy bill would authorize $900 million to help school districts in the paths of the hurricanes reopen schools. These funds could be used to replace instructional materials and equipment, recover data, and establish temporary facilities -- but could not be used for construction or renovation.  

The bill also would:

• authorize $100 million for supplemental education services and after-school services to districts enrolling displaced students;

• grant temporary reciprocity for NCLB purposes in recognizing highly qualified teachers and paraprofessionals displaced by Katrina;

• authorize a competitive grant program to fund alternative education programs, including instruction, tutoring, counseling, test preparation, and job readiness activities for displaced students.

• authorize an additional $50 million for homeless education programs for displaced students; and

• encourage the secretary of education to approve waivers for various aspects of NCLB, including provisions related to assessments, reporting requirements, and school improvement/corrective action.

NSBA generally supports legislation introduced by Rep. George Miller (D-Calif.), the senior Democrat on the Education and Workforce Committee, providing $8.2 billion in Katrina relief. The Gulf Coast Hurricanes Student and School Relief Act (H.R.4048) is co-sponsored by Reps. Lynn Woolsey (D-Calif.), Eddie Bernice Johnson (D-Texas), and Ruben Hinojosa (D-Texas).

This bill would provide direct aid to school districts enrolling displaced students in the amount of $8,314 per student. It also would provide additional direct aid to districts affected by the hurricanes, so they could pay teachers and staff, restart administrative operations, find new classroom space, and replace instructional materials.

And it would provide additional funding to repair and rebuild damaged schools, to assist students with disabilities, and create after-school programs.

Resnick wrote to Miller stating that NSBA urges “full adoption of the proposed funding structure that would allocate grants directly to local school districts.”

Miller and his Democratic colleagues criticized the Bush Administration for failing to draw up adequate plans for assisting Gulf Coast schools and for proposing “to drain much-needed resources out of public schools to create a complicated, inefficient, divisive private school voucher system.”

NSBA also is concerned that funding from FEMA for school construction and renovation in school districts with hurricane damage would be limited to just “bricks and mortar,” Rigsby says.

Meanwhile, school officials in areas hard hit by the hurricanes are have trouble getting any aid from FEMA.

Diana Dysart, a member of the school board of St. Bernard Parish, La., says “it’s extremely difficult dealing with FEMA with all the red tape and bureaucracy.”

She says: “Twenty-two FEMA representatives came here, but we can’t get a straight story on what we can do. We haven’t gotten any money from FEMA yet. FEMA promised to send trailers, but we haven’t gotten them.”

All 14 schools in St. Bernard Parish “have been completely inundated with water,” Dysart says, and books, computers, and furniture need to be replaced. All 25,000 homes in the community are uninhabitable -- many buildings are flooded with eight to 10 feet of water, some of it contaminated by an oil spill. There is no water or sewer service, and electricity has been restored to only a small area.

Before Katrina, the district had 8,500 students, and they are now scattered across Louisiana and other states.

The district’s 1,000 employees also have left the area, and the district would like to at least extend health benefits to them, Dysart says. With no businesses open in St. Bernard Parish, there is no tax base, and since the bulk of the district’s budget comes from per-pupil state funding, district officials are seeking other funding from the state and federal government.

Dysart’s home has two feet of mud in it, and she is staying with friends in Baton Rouge. Another board member has temporarily relocated to Alabama, the superintendent is in Lafayette, and other board members are in various communities in Louisiana, but they all come to Baton Rouge for school board meetings.