Town hall warns of education-focused legislation, calls for support of public schools
SOUTH BEND — With several bills in this year's General Assembly that could have sweeping impacts on Indiana's schools, some St. Joseph County residents are calling for community collaboration and support for local public school corporations.
The South Bend Alumnae Chapter of the Delta Sigma Theta Sorority, Inc. hosted a town hall meeting on Tuesday, March 4, offering information about three of the education-related bills introduced in the General Assembly — Senate Bill 1, Senate Bill 518 and House Bill 1136.
Presenters included Portage Township Trustee Jason Critchlow, Executive Director of Exceptional Learners for the South Bend Community School Corp. Tonia Brewer, Educational Consultant Karla Lee and SBCSC alumna Amaani Lee. In addition to providing details of the three bills and how they'd affect St. Joseph County, the presenters also encouraged attendees to take action by talking to their representatives and maintaining support for the county's public school districts.
Critchlow gave an overview of SB 1, which is currently making its way through the House.
Senate Bill 1 impact: How much may St. Joseph County schools, libraries, public safety, etc. lose in tax cuts?
As it was originally written, Senate Bill 1 would cut property taxes by capping tax increases at 2% to 3% each year. That version would also increase the homestead standard deduction. And it would require referendums that increase tax revenues to be placed on the ballot during general elections on even-numbered years as a way to boost transparency and voter input.
Since its initial introduction, the bill has seen some significant amendments, including changes to the homestead exemption and tax caps. But that doesn't mean that SB 1 wouldn't have a huge impact on local governments and, more poignant to Tuesday's town hall, institutions like schools.
"The possibility exists that Senate Bill 1 will lead to your local school system having to come in and cut 20% of the budget," Critchlow said. "… Those are not small things that are coming up. Those are big things that are no longer going to be happening as we have to reprioritize what it is we're going to be doing."
He said if the bill goes through, South Bend schools will lose $800,000 the first year, $1.6 million the second and $2.4 million the third.
Critchlow also talked about SB 518, which is also making its way though the House. The bill would require all traditional public school districts to share property tax revenue with charter schools in their attendance boundaries, if 100 or more kids leave the traditional district for charter schools, starting in 2028.
Details of Senate Bill 518: Charter schools, DEI, transgender athletes. These bills are still moving through the legislature
This includes referendum money, he said.
"Unfortunately, public schools find themselves in a situation where they're losing this funding from the state, so they're having to increase what they get from your property taxes in the referendum," Critchlow said, "and now the state comes in and says, 'Oh, by the way, you're going to share that money with charter schools.'"
He added that the bill is estimated to have an impact of $500 million over three years across the entire state.
SBCSC's Brewer spoke on HB 1136, which was introduced to the General Assembly by South Bend Republican state Rep. Jake Teshka.
More on House Bill 1136: South Bend's Teshka authors bill to dissolve low-enrolled schools, make them charters
The bill proposed that if over half of the students who "have legal settlement" in an Indiana school corporation's geographic district attend a non-corporation school, according to the 2024 fall average daily membership, the corporation would be dissolved and its schools reorganized as charter schools.
HB 1136 would have also created a new governing board that would be appointed rather than elected, as well as requirements and procedures for dissolving and reorganizing the affected school corporation.
Brewer said school corporation "takeovers" are nothing new; in fact, she said, the Gary Community School Corp. has been under state oversight for the last seven years and is just now reassuming control this school year.
Gary was $19 million in debt before the takeover, Brewer said, and now the district is in the black, but the schools are not doing better academically than they were seven years ago.
She added that a 2021 study from Rice University found that school takeovers are "highly disruptive to students" and were "focused on very specific communities that were communities of color (and) other communities that may have the same or similar financial or academic struggles."
HB 1136 is no longer making its way through the legislature this year, but state Rep. Maureen Bauer, who was in attendance on Tuesday night, still encouraged attendees to keep an eye on the bill.
"Rest assured," Bauer said, "it didn't move forward but could always come back next year."
Karla Lee spoke on the literacy crisis across the country, saying that she sees a path forward in building collaboration among schools, parents and local public and private businesses.
She added that change can come about only when those separate groups work together.
"Oftentimes it is said in literacy that it is an achievement gap," Karla Lee said. "And I would like to argue with you all tonight that it's not necessarily an achievement gap, but it's an educational opportunity gap."
Tuesday's town hall focused on encouraging continued support for the area's public school corporations.
Amaani Lee, a graduate of South Bend's Washington High School, continued her education at the University of Notre Dame and is now working at South Bend Orthopaedics. She said her time in South Bend schools made her a better person and prepared her well for her time in college and beyond.
"I believe that the South Bend Community School Corporation has the propensity to breed great people," Amaani Lee said. "And so that's why meetings like this are so important, because we must fight to keep the South Bend Community School Corporation intact so that we can continue to educate and continue to foster great people that will, in turn, return to our community and make it a better place."
She said the goal of Tuesday's meeting was to inform attendees about what's going on and how they can take a stand.
"I think we're walking away with information that is going to allow us to get together in the future and continue to collaborate and … strategize on how we're going to maneuver in the next years and the next months so that we can move toward a common goal," Amaani Lee said. "And right now, our common goal is keeping our school corporation intact and educating all of South Bend."
Email South Bend Tribune education reporter Rayleigh Deaton at rdeaton@gannett.com.
This article originally appeared on South Bend Tribune: South Bend town hall shares details of General Assembly legislation
Hashtags
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
43 minutes ago
North Carolina GOP sends immigration-crackdown bills to Democratic Gov. Stein
RALEIGH, N.C. -- Republicans at the North Carolina legislature gave final approval Tuesday to two pieces of legislation that would compel state agencies to participate in President Donald Trump's immigration crackdown and would toughen a recent law that required sheriffs to help federal agents seeking criminal defendants. The series of House and Senate votes on the measures could mean an early showdown between the GOP-controlled General Assembly and new Democratic Gov. Josh Stein, who since taking office in January has tried to build rapport with lawmakers on consensus issues like Hurricane Helene aid. Stein has yet to a veto a bill, and pressure will build on him to use his stamp on one or both of the bills that were sent to him late Tuesday given the overwhelming Democratic opposition to the measures during floor votes. The GOP's legislative maneuvers happened as National Guard troops have been deployed by Trump to Los Angeles to confront protesters angry with federal conducting sweeps that led to immigrant arrests. Should Stein issue vetoes, Republicans in the ninth-largest state could face challenges in overriding them, since the GOP is currently one seat shy of a veto-proof majority. Republican leaders would need at least one Democrat for their side during an override vote or hope some Democrats are absent. Republicans say the measures are needed to assist the Trump administration's efforts to remove immigrants unlawfully in the country who are committing crimes and or accessing limited taxpayer resources that are needed for U.S. citizens or lawful immigrants. 'North Carolina is one step closer to increasing the safety of every citizen in the state,' said Senate Leader Phil Berger, a primary sponsor of one of the bills. 'The Republican-led General Assembly made it clear that harboring criminal illegal aliens will not be tolerated in our state." But Democrats and social justice advocates of immigrants say the bills vilify immigrants who work and pay taxes, leading residents to feel intimidated and fear law enforcement, which will ultimately make communities less safe. Demonstrators opposed to GOP action filled the Senate gallery during debate. Republicans are spending their time 'trying to sell a lie that immigrants are the source of our problems,' Democratic Sen. Sophia Chitlik of Durham County said, telling colleagues that their constituents 'didn't send us here to round up their neighbors. They sent us here to make their lives better.' Stein spokesperson Morgan Hopkins said late Tuesday that the governor "will continue to review the bills. He has made clear that if someone commits a crime and they are here illegally; they should be deported.' One measure receiving final approval in part would direct heads of several state law enforcement agencies, like the State Highway Patrol and State Bureau of Investigation, to cooperate with Immigration and Customs Enforcement. That would include having to officially participate in the 287(g) program, which trains officers to interrogate defendants and determine their immigration status. A Trump executive order urged his administration to maximize the use of 287(g) agreements. The measure also would direct state agencies to ensure noncitizens don't access state-funded benefits and publicly funded housing benefits to which they are otherwise ineligible. The same applies to unemployment benefits for those aren't legally authorized to live in the U.S. And the bill also prohibits University of North Carolina system campus policies that prevent law enforcement agencies from accessing school information about a students' citizenship or immigration status. Thousands of international students attending college in the U.S. had their study permissions canceled this spring, only for ICE to later reverse decisions and restore their legal status. The other approved bill Tuesday builds on the 2024 law that lawmakers enacted over then-Democratic Gov. Roy Cooper's veto that directed jails hold temporarily certain defendants whom ICE believe are in the country illegally, allowing time for immigration agents to pick them up. The law was a response by Republicans unhappy with Democratic sheriffs in several counties who declined to help immigration agents with offenders subject to federal immigration detainers and administrative warrants. The proposed changes expands the list of crimes that a defendant is charged with that would require the jail administrator — expanding in the bill to magistrates — to attempt to determine the defendant's legal residency or citizenship. A defendant with an apparent detainer or administrative warrant would still have to go before a judicial official before a defendant could be released to agents. A jail also would have to tell ICE promptly that they are holding someone and essentially extends the time agents have to pick up the person.
an hour ago
Arizona governor vetoes bill banning teaching antisemitism, calls it an attack on educators
PHOENIX -- Arizona Gov. Katie Hobbs has vetoed a proposal that would have banned teaching antisemitism at the state's public K-12 schools, universities and colleges and exposed educators who violate the new rules to discipline and lawsuits. The proposal would have prohibited teachers and administrators from teaching or promoting antisemitism or antisemitic actions that create a hostile environment, calling for the genocide of any group or requiring students to advocate for an antisemitic point of view. It also would have barred public schools from using public money to support the teaching of antisemitism. Educators would have personally been responsible for covering the costs of damages in lawsuits for violating the rules. Hobbs, a Democrat, said Tuesday that the bill was not about antisemitism but rather about attacking teachers. 'It puts an unacceptable level of personal liability in place for our public school, community college, and university educators and staff, opening them up to threats of personally costly lawsuits," she said in a statement. "Additionally, it sets a dangerous precedent that unfairly targets public school teachers while shielding private school staff." Hobbs described antisemitism as a very troubling issue in the U.S., but said students and parents can go through the state's Board of Education to report antisemitism. The measure cleared the Legislature last week on a 33-20 vote by the House, including a few Democrats who crossed party lines to support it. It's one of a few proposals to combat antisemitism across the country. Democrats tried but failed to remove the lawsuit provision and swap out references to antisemitism within the bill with 'unlawful discrimination' to reflect other discrimination. The bill's chief sponsor, Republican Rep. Michael Way, of Queen Creek, called the veto 'disgraceful,' saying on the social media platform X that the legislation was meant to keep 'egregious and blatant antisemitic content' out of the classroom. 'To suggest that it threatened the speech of most Arizona teachers is disingenuous at best,' he added. Opponents said the bill aimed to silence people who want to speak out on the oppression of Palestinians and opened up educators to personal legal liability in lawsuits students could file. Students over the age of 18 and the parents of younger pupils would have been able to file lawsuits over violations that create a hostile education environment, leaving teachers responsible for paying any damages that may be awarded, denying them immunity and prohibiting the state from paying any judgments arising from any such lawsuits. Last week, Lori Shepherd, executive director of Tucson Jewish Museum & Holocaust Center, wrote in a letter to Hobbs that if the bill were approved it would threaten teachers' ability to provide students with a full account of the holocaust. Under the bill, 'those discussions could be deemed 'antisemitic' depending on how a single phrase is interpreted, regardless of intent or context,' she said. The bill would have created a process for punishing those who break the rules. At K-12 schools, a first-offense violation would lead to a reprimand, a second offense to a suspension of a teacher or principal's certificate and a third offense to a revocation of the certificate. At colleges and universities, violators would have faced a reprimand on first offense, a suspension without pay for a second offense and termination for a third offense. The proposal also would have required colleges and universities to consider violations by employees to be a negative factor when making employment or tenure decisions. Under the proposal, universities and colleges couldn't recognize any student organization that invites a guest speaker who incites antisemitism, encourages its members to engage in antisemitism or calls for the genocide of any group. Elsewhere in the U.S., a Louisiana lawmaker is pushing a resolution that asks universities to adopt policies to combat antisemitism on campuses and collect data on antisemitism-related reports and complaints. And a Michigan lawmaker has proposed putting a definition of antisemitism into the state's civil rights law.
Yahoo
3 hours ago
- Yahoo
Taxes, fees going up in $14.3 billion RI budget as federal money dries up
PROVIDENCE, R.I. (WPRI) — Rhode Island lawmakers on Tuesday night unveiled a $14.3 billion proposed state budget for the 2025-26 fiscal year that raises a variety of taxes and fees but rejects calls for an income tax hike on the wealthy. House Speaker Joe Shekarchi said lawmakers agreed to raise the state's gasoline tax by 2 cents, with the funding directed to RIPTA. There will also be a new statewide property tax on non-owner-occupied homes valued above $1 million — often dubbed 'the Taylor Swift tax' due to her house in Westerly — of roughly 50 cents per $1,000 of value. The bill will direct additional money to health care and education, particularly special education, according to Shekarchi and Majority Leader Chris Blazejewski. They estimated $45 million will go to primary care, $38 million will go to hospitals and $12 million will go to nursing homes once federal matching funds are added to the totals. 'We had to make choices,' Shekarchi said. The budget bill is a revised version of the tax-and-spending plan that Gov. Dan McKee put forward in January. It follows months of public hearings as well as private horse-trading between the House, the Senate and the governor's office. The final budget plan is about $119 million larger than McKee's original proposal. State leaders have been warning for the last year that the next budget cycle would be challenging, after years when huge influxes of federal money tied to the pandemic made it easier to increase spending. Estimates of the deficit for the current year have ranged from $200 million to $400 million. The 2-cent gas tax increase is expected to generate roughly $15 million to help RIPTA close its sizable operating deficit. As conditions, the agency is required to maintain the RIde Anywhere program for passengers with disabilities, and also to complete an efficiency study examining cost savings. The new statewide property tax on second homes is one of multiple efforts to raise revenue from real estate. Money from taxing Airbnb and other so-called 'whole-home rentals' will be split between municipalities, tourism districts and homelessness programs. Progressive groups expressed immediate dismay that House leaders refused to increase the income tax rate for high-earners. Shekarchi said the possibility could be reexamined, potentially as soon as a special session this fall, depending on how the state is affected by the final version of Washington Republicans' proposed One Big Beautiful Bill Act. Another tax left on the cutting-room floor was the governor's proposal to levy a tax on digital advertising. Shekarchi described the concept as 'too speculative,' noting that Maryland is the only state in the country that has tried to impose one and that effort is currently tied up in litigation. Shekarchi said the serious problems affecting Rhode Island health care, from a shortage of primary care doctors to the precarious finances of some hospitals, was top of mind for lawmakers as they decided what made the final cut. 'We wanted to tackle that issue,' he said. In exchange for the new funding for nursing homes, they will also be subject to revised staffing requirements, after a previous legislative effort to mandate employment levels was halted amid an industry outcry. A review of reimbursement rates paid to primary care providers has been advanced a year, from 2027 to 2026. Lawmakers expressed frustration on the issue of education funding. Shekarchi said they were notified on Tuesday, as the budget was nearly completed, that the R.I. Department of Education needed $2 million to address an unexpected legal issue. RIDE had already had to warn lawmakers earlier in the budget process that they had significantly underestimated how much money would be needed to cover K-12 funding formula requirements. The budget sets aside an additional $22 million to put toward replacing the westbound Washington Bridge following last week's announcement that the all-in cost of the project has risen to an estimated $571 million. The budget also relies on $10 million in expected revenue once the R.I. Department of Transportation restarts the state's truck toll program, which was paused amid litigation but got the green light from a court late last year. It remains unclear when RIDOT will actually start collecting tolls again, amid continued pushback from the trucking industry. While no direct money is allocated in the budget for redevelopment of the so-called Superman building in downtown Providence, the state's tallest skyscraper, it does include language championed by the Senate that would make the project eligible for a break on sales taxes. 'It's my understanding that the Superman building is still waiting for a very substantial grant or award from the federal government,' Shekarchi said. 'I have no idea the likelihood of that or the timing of that. But if that trigger doesn't happen, there are no state dollars that go into that.' For the second year in a row, the House nixed McKee's proposal to acquire a building in East Providence from Citizens Bank to serve as a new state office. The House Finance Committee gave immediate approval to the budget bill Tuesday evening on a 11-3 vote, sending it to the full House for a floor debate and a vote next Tuesday. Additional changes to the budget, sometimes minor and sometimes significant, are usually made by House leadership during the floor debate. Once the budget passes the House it will head to the Senate, which in most years makes no further changes before sending it on to the governor for his signature. The new fiscal year begins July Nesi (tnesi@ is a Target 12 investigative reporter and 12 News politics/business editor. He co-hosts Newsmakers and writes Nesi's Notes on Saturdays. Connect with him on Twitter, Bluesky and Facebook. Download the and apps to get breaking news and weather alerts. Watch or with the new . Follow us on social media: Close Thanks for signing up! Watch for us in your inbox. Subscribe Now Copyright 2025 Nexstar Media, Inc. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.
