Greene County Board of Education Members have voted against the voucher bill proposed by Governor Bill Lee.
By a vote of 7-0, members voted to oppose the bill.
The board, after a motion by Mark Rothe
and second by Stacey Franklin, approved the resolution at the meeting of the Board of Education at the Central Office.
Governor Bill Lee has proposed to offer 20,000 private education vouchers of $7,075 each in the first year. Half of them, 10,000 vouchers, would be for students whose family income is below $173,000 for a family of four. The other half would be available to any student in the state, regardless of their family income.
Those restrictions would be lifted during the program’s second year, but past recipients, lower-income families, and students entering kindergarten would get priority. The number of available vouchers would grow by 5,000 each year.
As filed, the bill would also offer every public school teacher in the state a one-time bonus of $2,000, create a dedicated fund for school facilities maintenance and construction, and guarantee continued state funding for school districts at current levels in perpetuity, even if students disenroll to participate in the program.
