$1.1 Billion is A Lot of Money and 170,000 is A Lot of Students

On Wednesday evening, the Florida Senate took up HB7067, this year’s voucher expansion bill which seeks to quadruple the current annual enrollment growth rate and place qualifying income thresholds on an automatic escalator for the state’s new, directly funded Family Empowerment Scholarship (FES). You can read more about the bill here, here , and here.

Senator Tom Lee (R-20) offered an amendment (159850) to the bill, requiring participating private schools to report to the Department of Education their student enrollment, how many of their students are participating in voucher programs, how many are also participating in dual enrollment or virtual school programs, and the number of students who withdrew from the school by grade level, transferred to another school and the reason why. He got immediate pushback from pro-voucher senators like Senate Education Appropriations Chair, Kelli Stargel (R-22) and Senate Education Chair, Manny Diaz, Jr. (R-36). (You can watch here at 2:54:45)

Florida Politics covered the story, where Lee questioned why such basic accountability measures would be considered “oppressive”:

Stargel asked Lee whether the government needed to oversee the parents’ decisions on what school they placed their child in, arguing the money goes to the student, not the school.

“I think that’s a narrow view on accountability, Senator,” Lee replied.

Lee said after the Senate adjourned that he was prepared to continue to be a thorn in people’s sides. 

“This argument has just gotten ridiculous,” he said. “Where we gotta bring up who trusts parents … We’re appropriating $1.1 billion to be used for schools. Do we not have some obligation to the taxpayers to make sure that we’re getting the kind of data that helps us make policy around this program or deflect criticism?” 

Senator Lee pointed out that, all together, Florida’s voucher programs now serve 170,000 students at a cost of $1.1 BILLION per year and suggested “anyone appropriating $1.1 billion in a business would want some basic information about how those students are doing in those schools. “

We agree. Again, as we have written before: “from day one we have been in favor of a roll-back of the harsh, high stakes, test obsessed accountability requirements imposed on our public school children. We are NOT in favor of imposing such a system on a single extra student but the contrast between what is expected for these Family Empowerment recipients and the rest of Florida’s 2.8 million publicly funded school children is stark.”

Still, a $1.1 Billion annual program surely demands some oversight, doesn’t it?

To put things in perspective, if you haven’t noticed, 170,000 students is a lot of students:

• The 170,000 students participating in all of Florida’s voucher programs would make “vouchers” the 6th largest district in Florida (behind Dade, Broward, Hillsborough, Orange and Palm Beach County).
• The 170,000 students participating in all of Florida’s voucher programs would make “Florida’s vouchers” the 13th largest school district in the NATION.
• At 170,000 students, there are more students enrolled in Florida’s voucher programs than in Florida’s 33 smallest school districts combined.
• 170,000 represents 6% of Florida’s 2.85 million publicly funded school children.

More perspective, $1.1 Billion/year is (obviously) a lot of money. In the absence of an agreed upon budget from the legislature at this time, we chose to compare annual voucher spending to the spending celebrated in Governor DeSantis’ initial Bolder, Brighter, Better Future budget proposal:

• The highest state K-12 public schools funding of all time at $13.2 billion: $1.1 billion represents 8.3% of that total state K-12 public schools funding
• The highest total K-12 public schools funding of all time at $22.9 billion: $1.1 billion represents 4.8% of that total K-12 public schools funding.
• The state’s entire Voluntary Pre-Kindergarten (VPK) funding at a level of $415 million ($1.1 billion represents 2.7 times VPK funding)
• The entire Florida College System state operating fund is “only” $1.3 billion.

170,000 students is a lot of students. Who is assuring they are being offered quality choices? Should we be sending $1.1 billion of public funds to schools lacking basic accountability metrics? We suspect taxpayers will say “no.”

In an interview published yesterday in Florida Politics, Senator Lee, yesterday, where he expressed his frustration over education issues; saying “sometimes he feels like Republicans have run out of good ideas,” and promising to call into question these policies:

“Until you get a chance to go ‘mano a mano‘ with people on this floor and tell the truth and play a little game of show and tell here about what’s really going on, you’re not going to move public policy in this state because the fix is in.” 

Thank you, Senator Lee, for calling out the accountabaloney. We encourage you to continue to be that thorn in people’s sides. We hope other legislators will join you and insist on basic accountability metrics, allowing the legislature adequate data to guide policy decisions, before expanding this $1.1 billion program.

---

Please note, the failure to pass HB7067 will NOT eliminate the Family Empowerment Scholarship but, merely, keep the current income eligibility requirements (300% Federal Poverty Level or just over $77,000) and the current expansion rate of about 7,000 students/year.