Take Action Against Further Expansion of Vouchers

A promise to close the voucher loophole made by Senate and Assembly leaders and backed by Governor Walker may soon be broken.

At Issue
At issue are companion bills drafted to close the taxpayer-funded private school voucher program to school districts beyond Milwaukee and Racine. The Senate has passed the measure and the governor has said he will sign it, but the Assembly has yet to act. On Friday, the Assembly speaker's office said it didn't know if the votes were there to pass the bill.

The inability of Assembly leaders to make good on their promises is suspect, seeing that Representative Robin Vos (co-chair of the Legislature's Budget Committee) is co-author of the bill to close the loophole along with Senate President Mike Ellis. (You'll remember that Senator Ellis was in the news last week for a secretly taped discussion about vouchers and for making disparaging comments about a Green Bay high school at a Madison bar with Representative Vos).

This is another example of the lengths Republican legislators will go to in order to push an extreme agenda versus doing what's right for Wisconsin.

This Affects You
If this loophole is not closed, it will affect your local schools.

Your district is already struggling to make ends meet. What happens if the already shrinking pot of money is - without community involvement, input or oversight - distributed across an unlimited number of private schools in addition to public schools? Your schools will be strained even more - and layoffs and program cuts will intensify.

As people who are dedicated to public education, we understand what's at risk when our public schools are no longer a system to ensure that every child - regardless of where they live or their socio-economic status - has the right to receive a quality education. If this loophole isn't fixed the unraveling of public education accelerates and more districts will join Milwaukee Public Schools in realizing the damage that vouchers bring.

Take Action Now
Tell your Assembly representatives to close the voucher loophole, and ask others to do the same, by following this link.

http://capwiz.com/nea/wi/state/main/?state=WI