BROCK VERGAKIS - The Associated Press | Posted: Tuesday, May 15, 2007 11:00 pm
SALT LAKE CITY -- The state school board missed a deadline Tuesday to adopt rules for a private school voucher program, angering hundreds who rallied at the Capitol to demand action.
Utah enacted the nation's broadest school voucher program, which gives parents $500 to $3,000 per child for tuition at private schools. Opponents, backed by nearly every educational organization in the state, gathered enough signatures to suspend the law until voters decide its fate in a Nov. 6 referendum.
But lawmakers passed a second voucher bill to amend the first and it repeated many parts of the original. Attorney General Mark Shurtleff contends that vouchers can stand on the second bill regardless of the outcome of the referendum.
That bill called for rules governing vouchers to be adopted Tuesday, but the school board has said it wasn't certain the surviving legislation gave it legal authority to act and that it didn't want to undermine the voter referendum.
In a May 11 letter made public on Tuesday, Shurtleff told the board chairman, Kim Burningham, that the voucher program must be implemented immediately.
"All legislation is presumed valid until it is stayed or overturned by a court of competent jurisdiction or repealed by the legislature. Until such time it is the duty of the board, as good public stewards, to obey the law and establish and implement regulations," Shurtleff wrote.
Burningham didn't return messages left by The Associated Press on Tuesday, but has said he believes the state Supreme Court should decide the issue. A lawsuit challenging the board's failure to implement the voucher program is expected within days.
Lawmakers set aside $9.3 million for the first year, including $3.9 million to help public schools that lose students. Voucher supporters say families who couldn't afford to send their children to private school would be able to do so while public schools would have smaller class sizes and still receive some money for students who are no longer there.
Ogden residents Laura and Derek Johnson brought their two children, ages 7 and 3, to the Capitol in support of the program. Laura Johnson said she can't afford to send her children to private school without vouchers. Until that happens, she said she'll home school her children.
Voucher opponents argue Utah shouldn't spend public money on private schools when it consistently ranks at the bottom among states for per-pupil spending and near the top for class sizes.
Senate Majority Leader Curt Bramble, R-Provo, said public schools don't work for every student. He said evidence of that is abundant because there are so many parents sending their children to charter and private schools.
"This is about control. This is about a labor union that doesn't want anybody playing on their turf," Bramble said.
Messages left with Utahns for Public Schools, a coalition of educational groups including Utah's largest teachers' union, were not immediately returned.
This story appeared in The Daily Herald on page D1.