Senator Lesniak Blogs for School Choice Bill

On Thursday, the Senate Economic Growth Committee will consider legislation that CIANJ has long-supported and with which regular blog readers are very familiar - the Urban Enterprise Zone Jobs Scholarship Act. The bill (S-1607) would allow corporations to receive a 100% tax credit for dollars contributed to scholarship organizations in seven New Jersey cities.

The organizations would then distribute the funds in the form of scholarships to poor children in these cities to be used at public or non-public schools. Scholarship amounts would be set at roughly $6,000 per-pupil for grades K-8 and $9,000 for students in grades 9-12. This would lower the state's per-pupil expenses by between 40% and 60% for each scholarship recipient. Plus, students would undergo testing to ensure student achievement is being improved.

Senator Ray Lesniak, Chairman of the Economic Growth Committee, has written about the legislation on his NJVoices blog. Both he and Senator Tom Kean, Jr. have sponsored the bill, which would offer taxpayer savings while improving student achievement in the seven pilot districts. As Senator Lesniak aptly notes,

Just a few stats serve to describe the taxation sword of Damocles hanging over our heads. New Jersey has the highest public school per-pupil spending in the U.S.: more than double that of parochial schools. [Should private schools continue to close], More teachers would have to be hired, at the highest average salaries in the nation. Our unfunded liability for teacher pensions and retirement healthcare--already the highest per capita in the U.S.--would rise again. And new schools would have to be built to accommodate the additional students--while existing parochial schools were left empty and unused.

Those who oppose S-1607 argue that New Jersey cannot afford the $24 million first year cost at a time of fiscal distress when other services are being pared. I say New Jersey cannot afford not to preserve its faith-based school systems.

If we allow these financially distressed schools to close, educating its students in far more expensive public schools would far exceed the cost of the scholarship program. It would also leave these same taxpayers with a Hobson's choice: either tolerate further overcrowding in the public schools or pour yet more billions into additional public school buildings. This would be fiscal irresponsibility at its worst.

Similar programs have already been launched in states such as Pennsylvania and Arizona, benefitting tens of thousands of children and the taxpayers alike. Giving New Jersey's inner-city school children the same opportunity should be a priority of legislators everywhere.