Tumult Over Education Tax Credits
If the Education Investment Tax Credit (EITC) or, as it is now known, the Parental Choice in Education Act, fails to pass during the current legislative session it will be for several reasons and everyone will be looking for cover with no one specific person to blame.
The battle over the EITC has become a true test of wills between proponents who believe parents sending their children to private and parochial schools are paying twice for education and deserve financial relief and opponents who believe public taxpayer dollars should go only to fund public schools.
To further complicate matters, Governor Andrew Cuomo recently put forth his own $150 million proposal calling it the Parental Choice in Education Act, which Assembly sponsor Michael Cusick (D – Todt Hill, Staten Island) says is very close to the measure he already has on the table with a few extra provisions. Cusick’s plan is valued at $100 million.
Then there’s the plan put forth by former Assembly speaker Sheldon Silver (D – Lower East Side, Manhattan).
“The people who make less than $60,000 are usually able to attend the [private] school on scholarship [while] middle class families that make $150,000 or $200,000 and have three or four children and are paying $15,000 or $20,000 in tuition per child are the ones that are really choking and need the help,” Silver told The Jewish Press.
“My bill provides that help to all parents who pay tuition for their children. I can’t support the governor’s bill because it has a provision in it that is just a funnel. We don’t need a middle person and that’s basically what the governor creates – a middle person scholarship fund.”
Each side maintains the other side is spreading untruths about the other side.
For example, proponents, such as Assemblyman Dov Hikind (D – Boro Park, Brooklyn) maintain none of this money will go for charter schools. Opponents maintain there is nothing in the plan to prevent the tax credit from being used for donations to charter schools because charter schools are defined in state law as public schools, siphoning off additional money from public schools that is being directed to fund charter schools. Proponents counter by contending that there is no provision in the tax credit bill for money to go to charter schools and that opponents are making up issues that don’t exist to further confuse the matter.
“Someone said the governor included charter schools as part of his bill and it’s not true because that would have killed it so if that’s someone’s problem, let’s work it out,” said Hikind. “I’m not against charter schools. I have no trouble with charter schools. Anything that works for the children is what I am for but I don’t want this to get in the way of what we’re trying to do. If charter schools have to be completely out, completely excluded, then so be it.”
The main sponsor of the measure in the Assembly confirmed for The Jewish Press that charter schools will be part of the mix to receive funding from the donations included in the tax credit plan.
“Charter schools are in the governor’s bill but not in the Assembly bill at this point,” said Cusick. “Money could go to the charter schools under the governor’s bill. For the last three or four years the opponents were against the Assembly proposal even without a provision for charter schools.”
“I don’t think the charter school issue is a major issue,” said Assemblyman David Weprin (D – Holliswood, Queens). “You have to keep in mind that it’s only $150 million out of a $24 billion education budget so it’s a very small percentage of the overall education budget, and we increased aid to public schools this year by $1.6 billion alone.”