AS THE SON of two New Hampshire educators and a proud graduate of Manchester public schools, I was raised to believe in the promise of public education. And for my three children, public schools should provide them the same opportunity and promise. But it is clear that Governor Chris Sununu and Republicans in the State House do not believe in strong public schools. At every opportunity Sununu has undermined our public education system and now he has signed a budget that has disastrous implications for our students, educators, and communities.
Sununu’s budget introduces a voucher program that diverts taxpayer dollars from public schools to private and religious schools. That means when a child enrolls in a private or religious school, or is homeschooled, the state will send those families a check. School districts will lose between $4,000 and $5,000 per child that leaves the district. Meanwhile, the average cost of private school tuition in New Hampshire is $19,500. This plan that siphons money from our public schools won’t even help many families afford private school tuition.
The voucher program is estimated to cost towns across our state $70 million according to a study from Reaching Higher New Hampshire. That loss in state education funding will result in higher property taxes for communities across New Hampshire.
While vouchers subsidize wealthy private schools, they will downshift costs to local communities. As a selectman in Brentwood, I know that our town will have to deal with the loss of public education funding one of two ways: by cutting public education services or raising taxes. Neither of those choices is one I want to make, and it’s not something families in any of our communities deserve.
That’s why mayors from Nashua to Berlin wrote a letter to the State House asking legislators and the governor to reject a voucher program. In the letter, the mayors said “we all have concerns about the potential for this initiative to downshift costs onto the property taxpayers of our respective cities” and warned Sununu that “with just a 3% take up rate among public school families in our school districts, we collectively could be facing millions of dollars of new local property taxes.” Property taxes are already high enough, and the governor’s voucher scheme will exacerbate that problem.
This isn’t surprising, Sununu has undermined public education since his first day in office. Sununu appointed Education Commissioner Frank Edelblut despite his clear hostility toward public education.
Sununu has also repeatedly attacked funding for our public and higher education systems. He has proposed flat-funding or decreasing funding for colleges in every budget. He delayed COVID-19 funding to public schools so Betsy DeVos could finish drawing up rules to siphon off more money from public schools to private and religious schools. And he has finally succeeded at defunding public schools through this unaccountable voucher system. All of these actions have one goal in common: to undermine public education.
Enough is enough. Students, educators, and taxpayers deserve schools where every child can thrive. We need to improve the opportunity of public education, not pursue schemes that siphon funds away from public schools to boost wealthy private and religious schools. Sununu’s voucher plan is bad for our students, bad for our educators, and bad for property taxpayers.
Granite Staters need to raise their voices and tell Governor Sununu his voucher plan is wrong for New Hampshire.
Jon Morgan (D) is chairman of Amplify New Hampshire, an advocacy and state accountability non-profit. He lives in Brentwood, where he is a selectman.
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