School voucher bill advances to Texas House floor

AUSTIN, Texas - The Texas House on Thursday advanced the Senate's school voucher bill out of committee and onto the House floor in a party-line vote.

School choice bill

What we know:

The committee also voted to advance Senate Bill 2 on what is called a committee substitute.

Essentially, they passed the bill, but it still contains language from the House version of the bill.

There are mostly cosmetic differences between the two versions, but ultimately the bill would allow students to attend private school with public funds.

SB 2 advances out of the House Committee, by a vote of 9 to 6, mostly among party lines.

What they're saying:

Republicans say this is a way to provide more choices for parents.

Democrats push back, saying there is already choice and there should be a greater focus on making public schools better.

The Democrats held a news conference before the committee vote and Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick told reporters that he is confident vouchers will pass – something that didn't happen last session.

"I reject this idea that we can do both," said Talarico. "Every budget decision is a choice. We don't have room to play around with taking those precious tax dollars out of our public schools and giving them to wealthy families. That will hurt the 5.5 million public school students around the state."

"I have confidence in Speaker Burrows. We are singing from the same songbook. During these eight to nine weeks, the execution has to take place in the house," Patrick said. "There's a new sheriff in town, over there. And that's why I'm optimistic. I'm a little concerned about the clock ticking, but I'm optimistic the new sheriff is going to do what he said he'd do."

Dig deeper:

One change in the House version of the bill says if a voucher student returns to public school, that school will get 10% of the student's education savings account funding.

The bill caps the spending for the first two years of the program at $1 billion.

Despite building in priorities for low-income households and disabled students, opponents argue, the majority of children won't qualify. 

"This bill increases the demands on the taxpayer because they have to fund a whole now new lane of schools. And in fact, we are saying that after this next year cap expires. could be on the hook for the private school tuition of every child currently in private school." said Rep. Gina Hinojosa.

Controversy

The passage wasn't without controversy, however, as the committee did not livestream the vote, something that's been standard procedure in recent years.

Rep. James Talarico spoke about the lack of transparency over the unusual decision not to livestream the full meeting. 

"We need more transparency, not less. We don't need backroom deals. We need an open process where Texans can hear about the massive changes that are being proposed to our public education system," he said.

School funding bill

The House also advanced a school funding bill.

House Bill 2 is designed to increase financial support for public schools by raising teacher salaries and boosting the "basic allotment" schools receive for each student per year. 

From the originally proposed $220 to $395.

Following no major dissent, House Bill 2 passed committee on a 13 to 2 vote.

The Senate recently passed a public school teacher pay bill.

What's next:

Texas leaders like Gov. Greg Abbott and Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick are hopeful school choice legislation is able to pass this time.

In past years, school choice legislation failed in the House.

Lt. Gov. Patrick says he's putting his faith in newly-elected House Speaker Dustin Burrows to fully see it through.

"There's a new sheriff in town, over there. And that's why I'm optimistic. I'm a little concerned about the clock ticking, but I'm optimistic the new sheriff is going to do what he said he'd do," Patrick said.

At this time, it is not clear when the bills will go to the House floor.

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