23-04-2025
Lawmakers to revive bill after Memphis school audit findings
MEMPHIS, Tenn. — Bills to create a state-run oversight board for Memphis-Shelby County Schools are still on the table and will be revived after an audit of the district, two area lawmakers said Wednesday.
State Rep. Mark White and state Sen. Brent Taylor, both Memphis-area Republicans, said in a joint statement that they plan to merge their competing versions of the bill after a forensic audit of MSCS is complete.
House Bill 662 and Senate Bill 714 passed the state House and Senate on Tuesday, but the House approved a version with different language from the Senate.
Sources: MSCS oversight bill may be dead after passing in Senate, House
The bills were to be sent to a conference committee to iron out the details before it is presented to the governor. They are now stalled at that point.
Back in February, the Shelby County Commission approved hiring an auditing firm to look through the school district's financial records from Jan. 1, 2020, to Jan. 31, 2025.
The audit would determine whether taxpayer money may have been misused over the past five years. The district has a budget of $1.8 billion and serves more than 100,000 students.
'It is my concern that the largest district in the state of 110,000 students, we are not performing as we should. There's a lot of bureaucracy in the system,' White said.
These moves come after the MSCS board voted to fire Superintendent Marie Feagins after less than a year, angering a crowd of parents and teachers and making her the district's fourth leader in three years.
MSCS is looking ahead after bills pushing for state takeover die
State lawmakers also point to underperforming schools, though district leaders counter that many schools have shown improvement recently.
'The evidence overwhelmingly demonstrates that Memphis-Shelby County Schools has underperformed for decades. Continuing to invest in failed leadership and administrative mismanagement without addressing the district's fundamental issues is doing a disservice to the people we were elected to represent,' White and Taylor said in a joint statement.
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