BJC lauds defeat of Utah school voucher referendum

Voters in Utah have defeated a voucher plan that would have made available vouchers ranging from $500 to $3,000 for students to attend private schools, including religious institutions, regardless of family income or school district.

In the November 7 referendum, 62 percent of the voters in Utah marked ballots against the Parents Choice in Education Act, which was adopted by the state legislature in February. The law passed by a single vote, but opponents collected 124,000 signatures to send the issue to a voter referendum.

The Salt Lake Tribune reported that the voucher programs, which would have been phased in over 13 years, would have cost taxpayers $430 million.

According to The Associated Press, “voucher critics argued the state should not spend money on private schools when Utah has the nation’s largest class sizes and spends less per students than any other state. Voucher proponents contended the program would reduce class sizes in public schools, give parents a choice which school their child goes to that’s not dictated by where they can afford to live and improve public schools through competition.”

The Baptist Joint Committee for Religious Liberty has long decried using school vouchers for students to attend religious institutions.

“The fundamental principle influencing the BJC’s opposition to school vouchers is that tax dollars should not be used to finance the teaching of religion. Government does so no less by passing vouchers through the pockets of parents,” said BJC Executive Director J. Brent Walker. “This is particularly problematic when nearly all the participants wind up in religious schools.”

The AP cited research by the National School Boards Association that reported 10 state referendums on various voucher programs since 1972. Each time, the survey found, vouchers or tuition tax credits were voted down by an average of 68.6 percent. Voters in California, Michigan and Colorado have defeated voucher proposals twice.

Major opposition to vouchers in Utah has come from teacher unions such as the National Education Association, who, according to media reports, spent millions in its campaigns. After learning of the outcome of the referendum, Kim Campbell, president of the Utah Education Association, said “With the eyes of the nation upon us, Utah has rejected this flawed voucher law. We believe this sends a clear message. It sends a message that Utahns believe in, and support, public schools.”

Leading support of the voucher initiative was Overstock.com founder and CEO Patrick Byrne. After the vote, Byrne, who contributed millions to the pro-voucher group Parents for Choice in Education, told The Salt Lake Tribune that vouchers were the only way for students in the United States to compete with other industrialized nations.

“What’s got to happen and it might take Utah five to 10 years to understand [is that] they are at the bottom of the heap [educationally] and the heap is at the bottom of the international heap,” Byrne said.

After the vote, Utah House Speaker Greg Curtis told the Deseret Morning News that he didn’t expect the issue to be addressed in the 2008 legislative session.

— Phallan Davis