A Tennessee bill that would expand a program giving low-income families funding to pay for private school tuition to three more counties has passed its first legislative hurdle.
Senate bill 11, which has been heavily amended since its original filing, would allow students zoned for the Clarksville-Montgomery County, Knox County and Rutherford County school districts to participate in Tennessee’s education savings account program. The program is already available in Hamilton, Davidson and Shelby counties.
The pilot program, which is in its third year, allows low-income students to use around $9,300 of state and local money for private school tuition and other education-related expenses.
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Though similar, the savings accounts are distinct from the statewide private school tuition grant program Gov. Bill Lee signed into law in February.
The Education Freedom Act gives up to 20,000 students $7,295 each in public funding to enroll in private schools starting in the fall. Half of the grants are reserved for students with disabilities, students eligible for the pilot program and families at or below 300% of the income limit to qualify for free or reduced-price lunches — about $175,000 for a family of four. Those requirements will be lifted after the first year.
While students in the three school districts the bill would add are eligible for the statewide program, the bill’s sponsor, state Sen. Todd Gardenhire, R-Chattanooga, said he was concerned low-income students wouldn’t be able to take advantage of it.
The savings account program is only available to families who earn less than double the income limit to qualify for free lunch — about $81,100 for a family of four.
“The cynic in me tells me after two to three years those families — and they’re probably single parent families or grandparents raising those kids — probably won’t have the muscle, if you want to call it that, or influence to get in there and apply for those scholarships and take advantage of those situations,” Gardenhire said at a committee hearing. “This just allows the low-income people the chance, because the cap comes off of this latest thing, and I want to protect those people down below the caps.”
His proposed legislation, he said, expands the program to the state’s remaining three urban areas where the majority of the private schools are.
Senate education committee members voted 6-2 to advance the bill Wednesday. Republican Sens. Bill Powers of Clarksville and Joey Hensley of Hohenwald voted no.
Powers, who represents Montgomery County, said his constituents were not in favor of the bill. Expanding another private school tuition grant program without allowing the newly passed program to launch and its impact on state funding to be understood, he said, would be fiscally irresponsible.
“Families interested in an education scholarship already have the opportunity to apply for that through the education freedom scholarship program that just passed,” he said. “It would be redundant to expand this existing ESA program for only a few counties when we already have a statewide program.”
Montgomery and Rutherford counties have both had seven schools indicate they intend to participate in the education freedom program, while Knox County has had 14, according to a list on the Tennessee Department of Education website.
When the statewide program was introduced earlier this year, Gardenhire said he got at least 10 phone calls from superintendents — and more from school board members — who said they would rather have the savings account program than the new one.
“It will be somewhat controversial to some because the education industrial complex has such a hatred toward children having the opportunity to better themselves,” Gardenhire said by phone. “They want to keep them in non-performing or failing schools to justify their existence, and I’m not for that. I’m for giving these children, especially lower-income families, the opportunity to take advantage of what we’re doing here in the legislature and with the governor.”
The bill now heads to the full senate. A house education subcommittee is scheduled to hear the bill Tuesday.
Staff reporter Sarah Dolgin contributed to this story.
Contact Shannon Coan at scoan@timesfreepress.com or 423-757-6396.