On Tuesday, the Alabama Senate voted to raise the cap on the money that can go to the Alabama Accountability Act (AAA). The Alabama Accountability Act was passed in 2013 to allow parents whose children are zoned to Alabama’s worst-performing schools to choose to apply for a scholarship to go to another public school or a private school. That act is currently capped at $30 million. This legislation would raise it to $40 million next year, and if specific targets are reached in coming years, that could increase to $50 million. Potentially the cap could increase to $60 million over six years.
Senate Bill 263 (SB263) is sponsored by State Senator Donnie Chesteen (R-Dothan).
SB263 also raises the number of Alabama students who qualify for scholarships to 250 percent of the poverty line. That would be slightly higher than the median income in Alabama.
Under the existing rules, only students zoned to the worst six percent of schools can qualify for scholarships to go to a private school or another public school. The legislation would also rename those failing schools as priority schools.
Chesteen said that in the old bill, students from just 79 failing schools can apply for the scholarships. This would open it up to students from a school with a D or an F on its report card – 212 schools. SB263 would open up to 25% of the scholarships for students who live outside of those targeted D and F scoring schools if they meet the poverty thresholds.
Sen. Bobby Singleton (D-Greensboro) said, “I think this bill takes care of the middle up. It does not help those in the bottom.”
“It is not easy to satisfy all the components of all the people involved, and it is not easy to get through the process to get here today; nevertheless, I do not support this bill,” Singleton said.
Singleton said that expansion of the AAA would only hurt public schools.
“I think this is going to hurt public education,” Singleton said. “I am here to protect those to whom I see that unintended consequences are happening.
“Our charter schools, they can take a limited number of students, our private schools, they can take a limited number of students,” Singleton said. “If students leave school B for school A, what they are going to do is leave school B with nobody. If that was a bad school, you just left it worse.”
The SGOs have had difficulty over the past year in raising the $30 million to utilize the cap.
“If we have not met the cap, why are we bumping it up?” Singleton said. “25% can go anywhere.”
“If they meet the threshold,” Chesteen said.
“That bothers me,” Singleton said. “They may not qualify at one level, but can roam around the system if they are in poverty.”
Sen. Larry Stutts (R-Sheffield) argued against the bill because he felt it did not go far enough.
“We have been in last place too long,” Stutts said. “It is important that we make a statement that education is important. It is important for the workforce. It is important to parents.”
Stutts is the sponsor of the PRICE Act, which would be a far larger, more expansive school choice bill.
“Your bill (the AAA) has only helped 3,200 students in ten years. My bill would help 7,900 students the first year,” Stutts argued.
The money for the Accountability Act comes from Alabama taxpayers voluntarily electing to take tax credits so that their income tax dollars go to scholarship granting organizations (SGOs) instead of the Alabama education trust fund. The PRICE Act, on the other hand, would transfer $6,900 per student from the education trust fund to an education savings account that would follow the child to the school of the parent’s choice.
“We need universal school choice,” Stutts said. “We need choice throughout the state. The parents know the needs of the children. No one understands the individual needs of the child better than the parents.”
Stutts also objected to the fact that the students can get a scholarship up to $10,000 under this bill, while the amount the student would receive under the PRICE Act – would be just $6,900 – the amount of state support that Alabama public schools students receive from the education trust fund on a per capita basis.
“Are you willing to say that we carry over your bill tonight and commit to me that we will tie these two bills together and pass these two bills out of the Senate together?” Stutts asked.
Chesteen answered, “My plan is to move this bill tonight. I am going to continue to work this bill. If you will continue to work your bill, I will commit to you that I will work with you to get your bill passed tomorrow.”
Stutts said, “I appreciate your bill, but I appreciate my bill more.”
Singleton warned that expanding school choice could lead to a mass exodus of students from public schools.
“You might think that not everybody is going to get up and run, but it might happen,” Singleton said. “It doesn’t say that the child has to fail, just that the school has to fail. They can recruit this star athlete who has a 3.9 to go over here because the school is failing. Usually, when one child leaves, it is the whole family that leaves.”
Sen. Garlan Gudger (R-Cullman) said there are no failing schools in his district, so no one in his district qualifies for the scholarships.
“They told me back in my district that they are not opposed to school choice, but since no one from the district gets the money, and it takes $30 million out of the education trust fund to oppose this,” Gudger said. “It is hard for me to go back to rural Alabama when the money goes to people in other parts of the state.”
Sen. Rodger Smitherman (D-Birmingham) said that more money is going for school choice than raising up the state’s failing schools.
“I am up here for the disparity for the money that goes to raise up poor performing schools,” said Smitherman. “In 2006, the money for at-risk programs for young people who need assistance was $30,800,000 helping students. In 2008 the grand total was $31 million……..in the budget that we just passed, the grand total is $22 million.”
Scholarship Granting Organizations must make annual reports to the state and follow accepted accounting guidelines.
Barfoot said that the bill does not do enough for education choice. While he will vote for the bill, he is committed to coming back with a more comprehensive school choice bill in the future.
Smitherman said that good students should not be eligible for the scholarships.
“We are telling a kid who could be valedictorian or salutatorian. This kid could have a 29 on the ACT. This kid has never failed anything. That kid could get up and leave with $10,000 in their pocket,” Smitherman said. “We need to put something in there where your grades have got to be bad.”
Smitherman said only students with a C average should be eligible for the scholarships.
Chesteen declined that request.
“Public schools are the only schools that have to take everybody, not private schools and not charter schools,” Singleton said.
The debate on the bill began at 4:05 p.m. Eventually, a cloture petition was brought to cut off the debate on SB263 at 8:46 p.m. The cloture motion passed 23 to 9 after four and a half hours of debate.
An angry Sen. Smitherman then demanded that the bill be read at length before the Senate could vote on SB263.
SB263 passed the Alabama Senate as amended 26 to 7 at 9:35 p.m. after Smitherman asked the clerk to stop having the robot read the bill. The legislation now goes to the Alabama House of Representatives for their consideration.
Alabama Today asked Chesteen how many taxpayers contribute to the scholarship granting organizations (SGOs) and how they would promote this to get more taxpayers to contribute.
“2,200 families and over fifty corporations contribute to the SGOs,” Chesteen told Alabama Today. “It is up to the scholarship granting organizations to get the information out to the accountants for them to push to their clients.”
Chesteen told reporters that there would be other school choice bills in the future.
“I think this is one leg, as Sen Stutts said,” Chesteen said. “There will be other opportunities for school choice bills.”
Sen. Stutts told Alabama Today that his bill, SB202 (the PRICE Act), “will be effectively dead” for this legislative session if it is not on Wednesday’s special-order calendar.
According to Stutts, the Senate GOP Caucus is not prioritizing his legislation for Wednesday’s calendar. If SB202 does not pass the Senate by the end of Wednesday’s legislative day, there will not be time left in this session for the House to take the bill up.
Wednesday will be the 25th legislative day of the 2023 Alabama Regular Legislative Session.
To connect with the author of this story or to comment, email brandonmreporter@gmail.com.
