Nebraska school choice supporters, opponents ready for another rematch

Yahoo

28-01-2025

State Sens. Lou Ann Linehan and Justin Wayne of Omaha flank Gov. Jim Pillen after he signed into law LB 753, the Opportunity Scholarships Act, on May 30, 2023. (Courtesy of the Nebraska Governor's Office)
LINCOLN — Advocates and opponents of school choice programs in Nebraska, including one that voters rejected in November, are gearing up for another legislative session featuring efforts to revive the policies.
Lawmakers supporting those programs introduced proposals this month with an end goal of helping students attend private K-12 schools in the state. Two bills would revive the laws passed, repealed, replaced and then repealed by voters in just the past two years.
The latest version in law, Legislative Bill 1402, was repealed by 57% of voters in November — in 45 of Nebraska's 49 legislative districts, 82 of its 93 counties and all three congressional districts.
'I'm not dissuaded by the fact that it was defeated at the ballot box,' said freshman State Sen. Tony Sorrentino of Omaha, one of many lawmakers with school choice proposals in 2025. 'There's been a number of cases that lost at the ballot box and were reinstated, so let's hope for that.'
The effort to revive LB 753 and its one-for-one tax break to fund 'opportunity scholarships' will return to the Revenue Committee, while the effort to revive LB 1402 and its state-funded vouchers or 'education scholarships' will return to the Appropriations Committee.
Two new proposals will go to the Health and Human Services and Education Committees. The first would create and narrow a voucher or scholarship program for private education to youths in foster care. The other would pay families whose K-12 'option enrollment' application to a different public school district is rejected.
Tim Royers is president of the Nebraska State Education Association, which led successive repeal efforts against the state-funded version of the law in 2024, and successfully placed the tax credit version on the ballot before lawmakers replaced that program.
Royers said he and others are disappointed that senators, no matter their approach, are 'choosing to ignore the very clear message that voters set in November on this issue.'
'We're really looking for our leaders in Lincoln to be championing legislation that's going to tackle the real issues surrounding education and not trying to relitigate something that has already been resolved at the polls,' Royers said.
Royers said the focus should be on getting friendly, pro-public education legislation over the finish line, such as those to tackle teaching vacancies statewide. He's confident school choice efforts will be stopped before a major vote this year.
But if needed, Royers said, opponents are ready for a school choice rematch, even if they have to 'make it an annual summer habit' to get signatures to repeal the laws.
'We joke about it, but in all seriousness, we will out-resolve them on this issue,' Royers said. 'We will be more tenacious than them. We will have more resources and more commitment than them on this. If they don't get that point, yes, we will absolutely put this in front of the voters again so that way they can reject vouchers for the fifth time in the state's history if necessary.'
Sorrentino is the Elkhorn-area successor to former State Sen. Lou Ann Linehan, who championed the previous voucher and tax-credit laws in 2023 and 2024 after years of trying. Sorrentino's LB 509 would nearly word-for-word reinstate Linehan's 2023 tax-credit law: the Opportunity Scholarships Act.
He said that law 'didn't get the proper time' before lawmakers repealed in October, a strategic move as part of LB 1402 by Linehan partly to stop a certified ballot measure seeking to repeal the law. When her replacement scholarship or voucher law made it to the ballot in November, nearly 55% of voters in their Legislative District 39 rejected it.
Sorrentino, a tax practitioner, noted the Opportunity Scholarships Act had raised nearly $10 million of the $25 million it could have raised in its first year. The program could grow over time to $100 million annually, if there is high demand.
Under the Opportunity Scholarships Act, Nebraskans could donate to scholarship-granting organizations for a one-to-one tax credit. Donations from 2024 are still tax deductible, even with the law being repealed.
He said the 'beauty' of the bill is supporting children in their formative years, when their values are set.
'I just don't think you can put a round peg in a square hole when it comes to education,' Sorrentino said. 'Education needs to meet the needs of children, not to meet the needs of organizations or opponents to this.'
Of the four legislative districts that voted to retain LB 1402, the state-funded scholarship program in the State Treasurer's Office, in November, one of the representatives is seeking to revive the program: State Sen. Rob Dover of Norfolk.
The other three districts that voted to retain the law are represented by State Sens. Brian Hardin of Gering, Terrell McKinney of Omaha and Mike Moser of Columbus.
LB 624, from Dover, would revive LB 1402, but his version is one page compared to the repealed section of LB 1402, which was five pages.
Part of his effort is to explicitly define the annual $10 million program as an appropriation, which some have argued can't constitutionally be subject to a referendum. The Nebraska Supreme Court ruled that the more expansive LB 1402 version was subject to referendum because it wasn't a direct appropriation.
Dover said his structure is similar to the READ Nebraska grant program established in 2023 to boost mentorship, at the request of Gov. Jim Pillen. That program was created through the annual state budget, not an individual bill. Dover is a member of the Appropriations Committee.
'I think we should let the kids go where they need to go, where they're the most happy because, obviously, a happy child, a happy student, is going to be much more receptive to learning,' Dover said.
Dover said he wants to be a voice for his constituents, and his primary concern is the roughly 4,500 students who received funds under LB 1402 but might not get additional funding in the future. Some, Dover noted, might go back to hostile environments where they were bullied or felt unwelcome.
'I'm not a Catholic. I'm not Lutheran. There's no gain in my religion to do this,' Dover said. 'I think it's just a responsibility to children, to kids.'
LB 427, from State Sen. Bob Andersen of Omaha, would require the state treasurer to allow families to create educational savings accounts for any K-12 school expenses. LB 131, also by Sorrentino, would expand the state's current college savings accounts to let them be used to cover the costs of K-12 schools.
State Sens. Beau Ballard of Lincoln and Christy Armendariz of Omaha are taking a narrower approach to support students in need.
LB 481, from Ballard, would create the Foster Care Child Scholarships Act focused on foster care youths, a vulnerable population he said the state already seeks to give every opportunity to flourish. He said those children, too, should have an opportunity to go to a school where they can achieve their dreams.
Ballard's bill would set aside $200,000 in state funding for the next two years for HOPE Scholarships for private K-12 schools through the Nebraska Department of Health and Human Services.
'I just don't want to fit students into a box,' Ballard said. 'This is just an opportunity for them to fit their needs.'
LB 557, from Armendariz, would offer significant changes to the state's option enrollment process by which a family can 'option' to a different, participating public school district. Net option enrollment pays the receiving district about $11,000 per student in state funding, multiple senators said.
The bill would give any family $2,500 for the educational support of the student should their option enrollment application be rejected, no matter the reason. LB 557, as introduced, has no cap on those funds.
Armendariz said she plans to amend her bill to narrow its impact to students who qualify for free and reduced-price lunch, at 185% of the federal poverty level, and who are currently in 'failing schools,' which she said would be defined based on state test score proficiency rates.
'Really it's to give more kids in failing schools some sort of an out,' Armendariz said, noting it 'might be a drop in the bucket' of what some people would need.
A similar proposal, LB 633 from State Sen. Ben Hansen of Blair, would empower the State Board of Education to give students' families an 'option enrollment tuition account' after a denied option enrollment application. It would have state K-12 funds follow the student.
Iowa, Wisconsin, national educators urge Nebraskans to repeal state support to private schools
Royers has testified in the past that option enrollment is a positive 'choice' program within public schools but that denials could come because a family doesn't fill out their application correctly or a school is at capacity.
He said the 'obvious' efforts of the new bills to advance a 'voucher agenda' through low-income students or youths in foster care are 'fundamentally wrong.'
'They're trying to utilize some of our most vulnerable students to prop up a foot in the door to set up a much larger voucher program,' Royers said. 'Candidly, we think it's pretty despicable that that's the way that they're choosing to try and do this rather than respecting the lesson they learned at the ballot.'
Royers originally criticized LB 391, from State Sen. Dave Murman of Glenvil, the Education Committee chair, which would create state savings accounts for people with disabilities to use for qualified expenses, including but not limited to education, before he learned more about the program uses.
Murman supports the school choice efforts and said he didn't know education would be covered under his bill. He and Ballard said supporting people in need isn't a 'foot in the door.' National education leaders as well as Royers have noted similar programs usually start small and grow over time.
Armendariz said whether option enrollment works, in practice, 'is a completely different picture' than its purported goals and that the Legislature can't wait.
'My focus wants to be on a child. We only have them for 13 years, and it goes by fast,' Armendariz said. 'To sit here and think about it for 20 [years] is not an option.'
Armendariz noted that she grew up in northeast Omaha, in what is now District 11, and sees a 'real need' for local families. District 11 is represented by McKinney.
'I was one of those kids. My family could not afford any other options than the schools we went to, whether they were failing or not,' Armendariz said. 'This really refines it to pinpoint poor kids that probably, arguably, are not getting the best opportunities that they could.'
Her comments on not waiting echo those of McKinney and former State Sen. Justin Wayne of northeast Omaha, two Democratic lawmakers in the officially nonpartisan Legislature who had joined Linehan and other Republicans in supporting the Opportunity Scholarships Act.
McKinney said change is 'more than overdue' in part because lawmakers are seeking to repeal his 2023 law to prohibit suspensions of children before third grade or to lock children up younger, or charge them with crimes as adults sooner.
'And when you look at the demographic of the kids that will be suspended or locked up, they look like me, they're coming from my community,' McKinney said.
'That's why we can't wait for change,' McKinney said. 'The school system has to change. It has to be modernized. And it has to work for everybody, and not just some, and it hasn't been working for everybody.'
In 2024, McKinney was 'present, not voting' on LB 1402. His district has the lowest average household income in the state and has the highest percentage of people below the poverty level, including seniors and children, according to the most recent legislative data.
McKinney said fewer than 50% of students in some of his schools are on track to graduate.
He said he approaches school choice legislation thinking about his community, so he wasn't surprised when his district's voters voted to keep LB 1402. McKinney said he takes himself out of the conversation and focuses on the concerns affecting his community, not yet reading or weighing in on Sorrentino's revival of the bill he previously supported.
McKinney said those issues are sometimes left out of the conversation of issues facing District 11.
'The real question is: Are we OK knowing that we have districts and communities where kids have been historically failed, and we have done nothing about it but say wait?' he said.
Whether McKinney and at least one other Democratic lawmaker, or two, support any school choice effort could be key to any of the legislation passing.
At least a couple of rural Republicans, including State Sen. Myron Dorn of Adams, say voters have already spoken. Dorn voted to allow LB 1402 to take effect partly to repeal its predecessor.
'If the Legislature is going to listen to our voters, then we shouldn't pass that same type of bill up here,' Dorn said.
State Sen. George Dungan of Lincoln, a lead opponent of Linehan's past efforts, said he's a big believer that public dollars should remain in public schools, which isn't a policy choice, he noted, but a constitutional mandate in Nebraska.
The Nebraska Constitution prohibits state appropriations to schools 'not owned or exclusively controlled by the state or a political subdivision thereof.'
He said either directly, in the case of LB 1402, or through 'loopholes' like tax credits, 'they achieve the same goal' of sending public dollars to private schools.
Freshman State Sen. Ashlei Spivey, who succeeded Wayne in northeast Omaha, said she acknowledges the split views of vouchers and school choice in her district but that overall, voters have spoken.
'The true question for me is why aren't parents happy with their school choice for their children, and how can we make sure that our public education system is meeting the needs of the unique challenges and opportunities especially faced in my district?' Spivey said.
McKinney questioned what opponents would suggest as a solution, and Spivey said she looks forward to working with local leadership on finding steps forward.
'We do not have the luxury to wait, and this is a top priority for me in ensuring that people have access to equitable, quality, fully funded public education,' Spivey said.
Dungan said he agreed that public schools can always be improved, ensuring that public education statewide serves students well, 'not just adequately, but successfully,' while noting not every school will handle situations the same.
'I don't think the way to answer that problem is to dismantle the system or fund it any less,' Dungan said. 'I think the way to handle that problem is to make sure that we have the best public schools in the country.'
Supporters of LB 1402 didn't fund an opposition campaign last year as they did in 2023 to try to preserve the tax credit for funding scholarships in the face of a public vote.
Families urge Nebraskans to retain state support to private schools
Jeremy Ekeler, executive director of Opportunity Scholarships of Nebraska, a group that benefited from both of Linehan's school choice laws, said he is encouraged by the passion of senators seeking to help Nebraska kids and families.
'Thousands of Nebraska families are counting on lawmakers to protect their right to access the education that works best for them,' he said in a statement.
Linehan has said if Nebraskans knew they were voting to take funds from students, they would have preserved the laws, and she expected parents to demand answers if the repeal won.
Sorrentino said supporters are energized more than before. He'd be happy with any 2025 proposal 'getting some air time' because 'repetition, sometimes, drives the point home.'
'These are all Nebraska's kids, these are all God's kids, and they weren't all created equal, both financially and needs-wise,' Sorrentino said. 'I don't see why we turn our back on a young man or a woman for financial need just because we have public schools.'
LB 131 (State Sen. Tony Sorrentino of Omaha) — Allow NEST 529 plans under the College Savings Plan Program to be spent on any K-12 education costs.
LB 427 (State Sen. Bob Andersen of Omaha) — Require the state treasurer to create separate educational savings accounts for any K-12 education expenses.
LB 481 (State Sen. Beau Ballard of Lincoln) — Adopt the Foster Care Child Scholarships Act, to give foster care youths HOPE Scholarships to attend private schools.
LB 509 (Sorrentino) — Adopt the Opportunity Scholarships Act, a 2023 law that provides dollar-for-dollar income tax credits for donations to scholarship-granting organizations.
LB 557 (State Sen. Christy Armendariz of Omaha) — Change provisions related to option enrollment for a student who applies to a different public school district than their own and allow a family whose application is rejected, for any reason, to get $2,500 from the state for 'the educational support of the student.'
LB 624 (State Sen. Rob Dover of Norfolk) — Appropriate $10 million annually to the State Treasurer's Office to distribute education scholarships or vouchers for students to attend private K-12 schools.
LB 633 (State Sen. Ben Hansen of Blair) — Require the State Board of Education to provide families whose applications for 'option enrollment' to a different public school district are rejected to set up tuition accounts for private K-12 schools. The accounts would include the state funding amount earmarked for each student.
SUPPORT: YOU MAKE OUR WORK POSSIBLE