A proposed school voucher bill continues to have problems in the Tennessee House Finance Subcommittee with the chairman now saying he won’t vote for it until the measure unless its amended to include his own plan.
Rep. Mike Harrison“Unless that amendment goes on, I can’t vote for it,” Rep. Mike Harrison, R-Rogersville, told reporters Monday.
The Senate-passed bill would allow low-income parents, whose children attend failing public schools in the bottom 5 percent of schools statewide, to use taxpayer-funded vouchers to send the students to private and religious schools.
As approved by the Senate, the bill says the number of first-year students would be limited to 5,000 students, slowly increasing over a several-year period to 20,000.
But if there are not enough students zoned for the school who apply, remaining slots would be open to any low-income student zoned for any school in the entire district even if their school isn’t failing