Bradley, Payne support measure, Brannan does not vote
BY DAN HILDEBRAN
Telegraph Staff Writer
STARKE— Sen. Jennifer Bradley and Rep. Bobby Payne both voted for a new law signed by Gov. Ron DeSantis that makes the state’s school voucher program available to all Florida students.
Payne represents all of Putnam County and parts of Marion, St. Johns and Clay counties, including the Keystone Heights area.
Bradley represents Clay, Bradford, Union, Baker, Columbia, and Gilchrist Counties, in addition to northern Alachua County.
Rep. Chuck Brannan of MacClenny, who represents Bradford and Union counties in the state’s lower chamber, in addition to Baker, Columbia, and part of Alachua, did not vote on the bill.
DeSantis signed the legislation into law Monday.
“Florida is number one when it comes to education freedom and education choice, and today’s bill signing represents the largest expansion of education choice in the history of these United States,” said the governor. “When you combine private scholarships, charter schools, and district choice programs, Florida already has 1.3 million students attending a school of their choosing.”
The Sunshine State joins Arkansas, Arizona, Iowa, Utah, and West Virginia in offering school vouchers to all students.
Supporters of the bill said the measure would increase competition in education.
“Universal school choice means that every school has a chance to compete for students, and their parents can decide the best fit,” Senate President Kathleen Passidomo, R-Naples, said in a statement.
Price tag disagreements
The bill will allow any student in the state to spend up to $8,000 a year at the school of their family’s choice.
Currently, 177,000 students receive state aid at a cost of $1.3 billion a year to attend private schools. However, those students qualified for the assistance because of their families’ low-income status.
The state forecasts that an additional 80,000 students will take advantage of the program’s expansion, raising the cost of school vouchers by $646 million to a total of nearly $2 billion.
The nonprofit Florida Policy Institute estimates a much higher price tag, claiming that if all students currently enrolled in private schools take advantage of the program’s expansion, the cost would be an additional $1.9 billion, tripling the state’s forecast.
Democrats have also pointed to Arizona Gov. Katy Hobbs’s statement that she wants to repeal that state’s universal voucher system, citing unexpected higher costs. Originally estimated at $33 million annually, those estimates have grown by a factor of 10.
The sponsor of the House’s version of the bill, Kaylee Tuck, R- Lake Placid, said that currently, 70% of Florida students qualify for the vouchers and that the state does not expect an exponential jump in participation.
“We have not seen this money run out in past years,” Tuck said.
Retired teacher and former teacher’s union officer Constance Higginbotham told the Clay County School Board that now, only one percent of the county’s 42,000 students use state vouchers. She added, before DeSantis signed the bill, that if the new measure became law, it would deplete the school district’s annual budget by $3.36 million.
Giveaway to billionaires
During debate in both chambers, Democrats argued that the new measure is a giveaway to wealthy families who already have their children in private schools.
“The parents of these students will just get a rebate for the private-school tuition that they are already paying for,” said Rep. Tracie Davis, D-Jacksonville, “and that means the funds we have to pay for public schools will be reduced by the number of students accepting the voucher.”
Different rules for different schools
Higginbotham also repeated a theme expressed by other bill opponents, saying that public schools are at a competitive disadvantage because of the state regulations they must adhere to, while private schools do not have to comply with state rules.
“Private schools do not have to accept children with disabilities or children who are speakers of other languages…or those with discipline issues,” she said.
The new law contains a provision that the state’s Department of Education would be directed to develop recommendations to reduce regulations in public schools.
