WTF? Here we go again....
Ohio General Assembly is set to screw poor, mostly minority kids (again) so taxpayers can subsidize private school tuition for wealthy, white adults
This is a huge budget year for Ohio public education. That’s because this biennial budget is supposed to be the one that finally meets the state’s constitutional requirement to provide a “thorough and efficient” education funding system.
The so-called Fair School Funding Plan — the state’s second effort to calculate and fund the needs of every student in every school district (after the Evidence Based Model, which I developed with then-Gov. Ted Strickland while I was in the General Assembly in 2009) — was supposed to be phased in over 3 budgets, or six years. The state largely kept its promise during the first two budgets.
But will it continue this year? Especially given current House Speaker Matt Huffman’s position that taxpayers should subsidize wealthy parents’ private school tuition bills — and even pay for those private school buildings, which no other state has done.
(For more information on Ohio vouchers, read my pieces here and here.)
For his part, Gov. Mike DeWine did follow through (for the most part) on the promise with his introduced budget. But there’s no question where the real power on Capital Square lies — in the Speaker’s chair.
Huffman claims that fully funding the plan is “unsustainable”, even though his plan that created a $1 billion plus taxpayer subsidy for private school tuition somehow is sustainable. Since that $1 billion program is NOT audited by the state while every dollar spent in public schools is, one would think that someone as sincerely concerned for our tax dollars as Huffman might be concerned that $1 billion literally can’t be accounted for.
But I digress.
So let’s assume that Huffman will take the $347 million remaining to fully fund the Fair School Funding Plan, which is unsustainable, and give even greater tuition subsidies to wealthy parents, which apparently is sustainable.
What would that mean for the 1.6 million Ohio students attending its public schools?
Simple: If you’re poor, minority kid living in Ohio’s urban communities, you’re going to get screwed.
Like really screwed.
That’s because 1/2 of the money that has yet to be distributed through the new formula is for places like Columbus, Cleveland and Cincinnati. It’s also for places like Ashland, Mansfield and Lima. And what do those places have in common?
They’re poorer and less white than the rest of the state. How much poorer and less white?
Try this: 1/3 poorer and about 1/2 to 1/4 as white.
If you include Poor Small Town districts like Cambridge, Bellaire and Defiance, then about 72 percent of the remaining Fair School Funding Plan money is outstanding in schools where 2/3 or more of the students are economically disadvantaged and are significantly less white than the rest of the state’s students.
So if the Ohio General Assembly decides to not fully fund the Fair School Funding Plan this year, it will mean that poor, and mostly minority students will be hurt most.
And once again, the Ohio General Assembly will fail our state’s neediest students.
All I can say to that is, “What the f***k?”
We’ve missed you. Carry on.