Constant Vigilance

One of the purposes for our representative government is so that we can go on with our lives without having to study out each and every issue—and have it decided on by whatever the media persuades the majority to believe. But going on with our lives—leaving the elected officials unmonitored—is too dangerous today. Constant vigilance is required of us.

floor of the Texas Senate
from a tour in 2018

Today’s post is Texas legislation information. But it may be of instructive interest to others. Here are just a few issues I’ve been paying attention to this session.

Just to remind, the Texas Legislature meets mid-January through May every other year. We’re approaching 3 ½ months in. A rule of thumb is, if a bill can’t get voted out of committee in its originating chamber by the end of April, it’s dead. There’s not enough time to get through the remaining steps before the end of the session. So there’s a lot that really needs to happen immediately.

 

School Choice

I’ve been working, along with many others, to pass a bill in the Texas Legislature on school choice. The bill is titled the Family Educational Relief Act. I wrote about it here, and did a shorter op-ed published here.

This bill takes no money away from public schooling; in fact, it adds funding sources. But it is a way for low-income families to escape failing schools.

Opponents will do practically anything to keep kids in failing schools. One tactic, last Thursday, was to put the following amendment in the budget bill (the budget is pretty much the only requirement of the legislature during the session):

Prohibition on Use of Appropriated Money for School Choice Programs. Money appropriated by this Act may not be used to pay for or support a school voucher, education savings account, or tax credit scholarship program or a similar program through which a child may use state money for nonpublic primary or secondary education.

The amendment (slightly longer) was pre-introduced by Republican Rep. VanDeaver, then removed on a point of order, but replaced by this one by Democrat Rep. Herrero.

Beside the basic fact that I disagree with the intent, there are some major problems. This is a policy issue; putting it in the budget does a skirt around the committee process and prevents public discussion. For that reason it is likely to be stripped back out during reconciliation with the Senate. (The bill, SB 1,  originated in the Senate, got loaded up with amendments in the House, and then has to go back to the Senate, where changes will be made until there is agreement on what should be in the budget bill.)

When you talk with opponents of our school choice bill, they say they could never take money away from public schooling—which shows you they have not read the bill.

The vote was 115 in favor of the amendment; 29 opposed (5 not voting, including the speaker during the vote). All of the Democrats voted for the amendment, of course. The problem is, of the 83 Republicans, only 29 voted against it. Two were absent, so that means 52 Republicans voted to keep children in failing schools without a way out under any circumstances.

The Texas Constitution (Article VII, Sec. 1) requires that students be educated:

A general diffusion of knowledge being essential to the preservation of the liberties and rights of the people, it shall be the duty of the Legislature of the State to establish and make suitable provision for the support and maintenance of an efficient system of public free schools.

The Republican Party platform has some 340 planks, including unequivocal support of school choice, but the platform starts with 10 constant principles—which Republican officeholders are required to agree with. Principle 7 is We believe in:

Having an educated population, with parents having the freedom of choice for the education of their children.

In addition, at the Texas GOP Convention, the delegates voted on 8 top legislative priorities, and one of these is school choice:

School Choice for All: Empower parents and guardians to choose from public, private, charter, or homeschool options for their children’s education using tax credits or exemptions without government restraint or intrusion.

In speaking against the amendment, Rep. Toth presented the polling data: all over Texas, among every demographic and party, no less than 70% approve of school choice.

In Florida, a voting bloc of black mothers who wanted school choice made the deciding difference in electing Gov. DeSantis.

Someone wryly said to me, “If only we could get a Republican majority next session—Oh, wait!”

We’ve had a Republican majority in the House and Senate, plus the governor, since 2002. And yet we can’t seem to get the will of the people done.

Here is the vote count on that amendment:

My representative, Hull, voted against the amendment (so, on the side of school choice), as did local representatives Swanson, Oliverson, and Murphy. Schofield, who is usually very reliable, was absent, so at least he wasn’t a wrong vote. Rep. Harless voted in favor of the amendment. I have been thinking he’s more conservative than his wife was, who held the seat before him and was frequently unreliable, what we call “squishy.” Maybe he isn't better. His constituents ought to call him and ask what he was thinking.

Where does the opposition come from? Teachers’ unions. Teachers unions are not about better education for students. They are not even about better pay or conditions for teachers. They are about power for teacher’s unions. And they’ve been accruing that power for a long time. They control the message—in the media, among teachers. Politicians are afraid of them. We need to let the politicians know we are the voices they should be listening to.

Call to Action

We believe we have enough support among Republicans in the State Senate. So here’s an immediate call to action for anyone in Texas:

Call the following and ask for an immediate public hearing for the Family Educational Relief Program, SB 1968, as well as a vote in committee followed by a floor vote so it can be sent to the House:

·         Governor Greg Abbott: 512-463-1782, email https://gov.texas.gov/contact.

·         Lt. Governor Dan Patrick: 512-463-0001, and email ltgov@senate.texas.gov,  info@danpatrick.org or here.

·         Senate Education Committee Chair Larry Taylor, phone: 512-463-0111, and email here.     

 

Constitutional Carry (permitless carry)

screenshot from here

Another legislative priority worth discussing is Constitutional Carry. I think when people use that term, they’re talking about the US Constitutional 2^nd Amendment right to self defense “shall not be infringed,” which means people ought to have the right to carry a firearm without government interference. Texas—while very pro-gun—has allowed concealed carry only with a license. A concealed weapon would be a handgun, so handguns were handled differently from hunting rifles or shotguns.

What this bill is really about is permitless carry. That is, as long as you’re following all the rules a concealed carry permitholder would abide by, you can carry a concealed handgun without a permit.

There are multiple bills trying to accomplish this. As always in the messy legislative process, some get enough attention to move, and others don’t. Thursday, April 15, the House held a hearing on two of these: HB 1927 and HB 1911. HB 1911 was left pending in committee (no vote was taken), but HB 1927 passed out of committee and passed on the House floor, so it was sent to on to the Senate.

The problem is, HB 1927 is not a good bill. I heard from my son shortly afterward it passed the House. He’s a prosecutor and has been working on a case for quite some time now of a gang leader who was charged with illegally carrying a firearm. It is possible to have a permit and still be illegal—because violent gang members are not legally allowed to carry, for obvious reasons. This bill removes the ability to charge violent gang members with illegally carrying a firearm; it facilitates their use of firearms as they carry and deal their drugs through the Texas corridor.

Political Sphere had contacted his representative before the bill’s hearing, but got no response. So I contacted my state senator’s office to see if there was something they could do by way of an amendment during the Senate hearing on the bill. I had met with my senator’s district director in early February. She’s new with the senator this session. She has a background in police work and told me to contact her on issues related to criminal justice. She and the senator had already noticed that problem with the bill. She asked for contact info for my son, and he reports they had a good, long conversation.

Meanwhile, there’s a huge pressure campaign to get HB 1927  passed in the Senate. Any resistance is dealt with as being outright anti-2^nd-Amendment.

Stuff is happening. HB 1927 was referred to the Constitutional Issues special committee, with a public hearing on April 29. Meanwhile, a new bill, SB 2224, was given special permission to be filed (way past the deadline for filing, which was March 12). It has been referred to Administration, which isn’t a normal committee. I believe it is intended to replace HB 1927. It was long, and time was short, but Political Sphere plowed through it, and he’s very pleased. Here’s what he wrote to his state senator:

As a big proponent of Constitutional Carry, I have been following the various bills that have been presented. Unfortunately, the House, in HB 1927 has passed what seems to be an impossibly broken attempt at Constitutional Carry. It is rife with contradictory sections and a completely unworkable framework. As a lawyer who will have to deal with these if it passes, I cannot support this version of Constitutional Carry.

While HB 1911 dealt with many of these issues, I was much more impressed with SB 2224. I was worried that such a rushed bill would have some major problems, but, while there were still a few things missing from my ultimate wish list, I did not find any major problems.

I want to express my utmost support for SB 2224. Please do what you can to see this version of SB 2224 passed by the Senate. Please do not pass HB 1927. As much as I want Constitutional Carry, I want it to have a framework that will hold up through court. That means it would be best to have SB 2224 pass, but would, unfortunately, be better to go without Constitutional Carry than to pass HB 1927. Thank you for your consideration.

Go ahead and use what he says as a pattern, and contact your state senator.

If SB 2224 passes, I think it will then have to go through the House, from scratch, since it’s not just an amended existing bill. People think this is game playing to keep “constitutional carry” from passing. But it isn’t. It is an attempt to keep a self-contradictory and badly written bill from becoming law and affecting criminal justice in ways the public would not intend.

Call to Action

·         Contact your state senator and ask him to support SB 2224, to replace SB 1927. Find contact info here. 

·         Submit testimony for Thursday’s hearing on SB 1927 to oppose it, so that you can support real Constitutional Carry in SB 2224.

o   To testify in person, follow these instructions.

o   To submit written testimony, use this form.      

Electric Grid

image from here

After the disastrous freeze we had in February, there was a flurry of legislation attempting to prevent future power failures. Some of these are:

·         HB 14: Creating the Texas Electricity Supply Chain Security and Mapping Committee, which will be activated to improve coordination and flow of energy during power disasters.

·         HB 1520: Authorizing the Railroad Commission to obtain securitization bonds during power disasters to protect consumers from being saddled with high electric bills.

·         HB 1572: Closing a regulatory loophole to ensure that facilities purchasing temporary emergency generators are not subject to power generation facility regulations.

·         HB 3648: Directing the Railroad Commission to designate "critical natural gas facilities" during disasters, exempting them from load-shedding requirements and ensuring a consistent flow of natural gas.        

These all look to be good and useful bills. All of them passed the House on April 20, and were moved along to the Senate but have not yet been assigned to committee. But they’re at a good stage so far for the session.

I asked a friend, Fred Reitman, who is usually up on electric grid issues, what news he had for me. While he approves of the bills above, he is looking at what he refers to as “pre-February grid issues.”

We’ve been working on the electric grid since long before the freeze. Multiple legislative sessions. The concern is a solar flare (natural) or EMP strike (terrorism or war attack), which could take down the electric grid. (Read here—better yet read this book.) Fortifying it is a relatively inexpensive solution to prevent utter long-term disaster, and could be passed along to consumers fairly painlessly, without undue burden on electricity providers.

So, on that kind of electric grid issue, here’s Fred’s update:

The most important bill is Sen. [Bob] Hall's SB 1606, and [Rep. Matt] Shaheen's companion bill HB 3792. Those are getting nowhere.

SB 1606 has 23 authors, five of whom are on the Business and Commerce Committee. The problem, once again, is Committee Chair Hancock. The committee needs to vote. Hancock is holding that up. And over on the House side similarly Shaheen's bill was assigned to committee a month ago but no hearing yet scheduled. Go figure.

The Senate Business & Commerce Committee Chair is Sen. Kelly Hancock. In his bio he claims all kinds of conservative bona fides. While this ought to be a bi-partisan issue, it’s a wonder yet again why these elected officials aren’t listening to the people.

Call to Action

·         Call and ask for the SB 1606 to be voted on in committee and sent on for a floor vote:

o    Senate Business & Commerce Committee Chair Kelly Hancock, 512-463-0109, email 

·         Call the Business & Commerce Committee members and request that they vote to pass SB 1606 and move it to a floor vote.

o   Committee members listed here. Find their names, and then go to their member page for contact info.

That’s a good day’s work you’ve just been assigned. Do what you can. Get better at it. And then learn to do more. Because, for those of us who love freedom, free market, and civilization, the odds of getting and/or keeping those things are against us—even in a Republican/conservative-led state like Texas.

The Family Educational Relief Program

How do you lower costs while improving quality? Use the free market.

That is a straightforward, easy to understand concept. We’ve seen it work with phones, computers, and other technologies. It’s true for various services and products as well.

Combine that concept with this one we often say, about government’s role and its interference:

Whenever government attempts something beyond the proper role of government (protection of life, liberty, and property), it causes unintended consequences—usually exactly opposite to the stated goals of the interference.

Today we’ll apply the free market and getting government out of the way to education. If we can allow the free market to do its thing and innovate, we’ll get better quality education at lower cost—guaranteed better than government has been doing.

from the cover of Waiting for 'Superman'

We need to let go of the fear that says, “We can’t trust the free market with something so important to us.” No. We can’t trust government interference with something so important to us.

Isn’t education, though, a basic responsibility of government? Definitely not at the federal level; it isn’t an enumerated power in the Constitution and was never granted to the federal government. The fact that there is a federal Department of Education is a usurpation—a seizure of power not granted.

At the state level, at least in Texas, for better or worse it is written in the state constitution that the state will provide a free education to all students up through high school. So that means it has to be done.

How much did school closures due to
COVID-19 set Texas student's back?
Infographic from FamiliesEmpowered.org

But, if you lived through 2020, you know, better than you did before, that government doesn’t actually follow through on its promise to educate your children. And, when it doesn’t, it makes you pay for it anyway. For parents who have used an alternative method of educating their children—private school, homeschool, charter school—they’ve been aware of that inequity for a long time.

The Texas legislature is in session. That means (besides that our freedoms are in jeopardy), if we’re going to do something about this—following a year when public schools failed pretty spectacularly—this is the time.

My State Senator, Paul Bettencourt, filed bill SB 1968  last Friday, and later that day Representative Mayes Middleton filed the identical House companion bill, HB 4537. It is called the Family Educational Relief Program.

The bill looks to me to be similar to an Education Savings Account (ESA), although there are some differences. Arizona is noted for doing ESAs several years ago, limited to special education students. The parent would have the option of taking 90% of the amount allotted for the child, to be used in any combination of ways the parent sees fit. It’s similar to a medical savings account in that way. Only approved expenses could come out of the account. But the person manages their own funds.

The Texas bill isn’t aimed at special education students, but at special needs; namely low income. While it could be expanded in future years, as a pilot it is aimed at those whose incomes qualify them for federal free or reduced-cost lunches. Lack of choice harms low-income families’ children most.

There’s a Need

Texas educates approximately 5.5 million K-12 students, roughly 10% of the children in the US’s 50 states. 

A few years ago, we heard from Colleen Dippell, founder of FamiliesEmpowered.org, which specialized in helping families get access to charter schools. She told us in 2017 that there are 900,000 Texas students (almost 1 in 5) attending over 1,000 failing Texas schools—meaning the school didn’t meet the minimal yearly progress (a pretty low bar) for three years in a row.

One approach to solving that deficiency has been charter schools, which are growing ever more prevalent. But her estimate at that time was that there were 130,000 students on wait lists for charter schools. Charter schools simply can’t meet the demand. You might also note that there are multiple bills we have to oppose this session aimed at making it harder for a charter school to start or expand.

Meanwhile there are 100,000 empty seats in private schools.

There’s a demand. And there’s a supply. But they aren’t getting together.

Maybe it’s because the pent-up demand is coming primarily from low-income families who can’t afford to pay private school tuition, and the private schools can’t exactly provide education for free.

This bill uses money already being spent on those students and allows them to use it for private school tuition. It could also be used for online courses—of the parents’ choice, rather than what has been inflicted on them by their school districts during closed schools this past year. It can be used for curriculum, or therapies, or other materials as well.

 

What Are the Details?

If we use round numbers, we can say $10,000 is allotted per student per school year. Of that $10,000, 90% means $9,000 put into a trust for the student, with the parents as trustees, instead of the school district’s board of trustees.

The remaining 10% stays with the school district to pay maintenance and operations costs and loan interest. In other words, for every student in the program, the school district gets $1000 for a student they don’t have to educate. That means, the more students use the program, the higher per pupil spending the school district has. There’s incentive to let the students go into the program.

There are limitations. One is that the payments can’t go to a household member or relative (within three degrees of consanguinity). In short, homeschoolers can’t use it to pay one parent to teach, for example. But a homeschooling family can use it for curriculum, online programs, therapies, etc.

We homeschooled for ten years. Our total costs added up to much less than that for the entire decade, including field trips and camps. That was for all three children. In other words, all our expenses, barring of course loss of income from a second parent working, would be easily covered under this program.

If the account has money remaining at the end of the school year, it rolls over in the child’s account for the following year. That means there’s incentive for the parent to shop around and get a good deal—free market at work.

The Arizona version was arranged to roll over yearly and could eventually be used for college tuition. This Texas version also rolls over to each next year but is only available as long as the child is eligible for public school. That means it could be used for dual-credit courses at a community college, as we did with our kids by age 15 or 16. Or it could be used for university courses—in person or online. But, unlike the AZ plan, once the child graduates and is no longer eligible, any funds remaining return to the program fund for other students to use. That means there’s even incentive for the state to hope families use the fund, because the state educates those students with a possible rebate at the end.

What about parochial schools? Is that a problem? No, it isn’t. The Supreme Court recently ruled in a Montana case that money used by parents for the education type of their choice is not an establishment of religion when it goes to a parochial school; in fact, it would be an infringement on freedom of religion to bar that educational choice only for religious reasons. So that is now settled law.

 

What about Accountability?

Service providers and vendors must get pre-approval according to rules set by the Comptroller to participate (i.e., to get paid by a parent out of the child’s fund).

Private schools have to show notarized documentation related to following the rules, including the number that can be accommodated, safety measures at the location, etc., and would need to be accredited. Actually most private schools in Texas are unaccredited, so this is a limitation. Or it is incentive to get accredited. (Note: there is no correlation between accreditation and education quality.)

Private tutors, therapists, or teaching services must provide notarized documentation of their qualifications, licensing, current employment (when applicable), and criminal history.

Online course or program providers must show notarized documentation of their qualification to serve the students, accreditation, etc. Services and vendor types not listed must also provide evidence of qualification to serve.

In other words, it’s on the service providers to apply, and the Comptroller’s office to verify their validity, so the parent doesn’t have to.

Theoretically, if a parent wanted to use something not on the list, they could let that service provider about the program and suggest they apply. But otherwise the parents simply use those services already verified by the Comptroller. The state’s agent would post a list of approved service providers and vendors for parents to use.

While an education service provider may not charge a child participating in the program an amount greater or less than the provider’s standard amount charged for that service, a parent can choose to pay out-of-pocket for anything either not on the list or any cost beyond the limits of the student’s allotment. For example, in a market where this program is well established, it is likely private schools would work to make costs fit within the allotment; however, more expensive private schools can still be used, but the parent would pay anything over and above the allotment. This is still better than having to pay the full tuition over and above the taxes the parents pay the state without receiving any educational service from the state.

 

Where Does Funding Come From?

image found here

The Comptroller allots money for the program. The amount allotted is the only limitation on how many students could participate. Funds come from the state's education funding and also from grants, gifts, and donations as well as from additional general funds the Comptroller may put toward the program.

About those grants, gifts, and donations: A company wishing to donate could make a tax-deductible gift to the program. Even better, it could apply for a tax credit—up to half the entity’s estimated tax payment could be allotted to this program. (This comes under Chapter 230, Subsection B, which is longer and more technical than I want to go into here.) This would actually increase funds going to education without raising more tax revenue to do so.

A small percentage of the student’s allotment (no more than 3% of any of four payments or a total of 5% annually) goes to the Comptroller’s office for administering the program.

No Curriculum Interference: Another good feature is that the Comptroller’s office has a hands-off approach to curriculum; it only handles the funding. If the TEA or Commissioner of Education were handling the fund, they would no doubt attempt to control what is taught and how, which kind of defeats a main purpose of school choice.

There’s no federal money used, which means there’s no federal control over what is taught or how, or anything else to do with the program. That’s a definite plus. I think it also means, any education block grant to the state is divided up among students still in public schools, leaving more of any such funding to spread among fewer students—another incentive for public schools to support this program.

 

Any objections?

The people who have drafted this bill have decades of work and experience behind them, working toward school choice. They have addressed every objection opponents have voiced.

·         It particularly helps low-income students.

·         It does it without causing public schools to lose funding; it even increases their per student amount.

·         Vendors, service providers, and private schools are all held accountable—as are the parents serving as trustees of their child’s accounts.

It doesn’t address the opponents’ unvoiced objections—that they want to maintain control over what is taught, and that’s more important to them than actually providing an education to every student.

It’s voluntary. This is only for parents who are interested and involved in their children’s education. Uncaring parents don’t have to bother with it; they can leave their children right where they are.

 

It Introduces the Free Market

The most valuable thing about this program is that it introduces the free market into this tiny corner of what has been a failing government monopoly. Free market, once introduced, is likely to grow. That is likely to lead to innovation, which means better education at lower cost, something people have been saying couldn’t be done, even by adding obscene amounts of money. It can’t be done by government. But when government gets out of the way, and allows caring parents and the free market to see to education, the possibilities are unlimited.

If you’re in Texas, let your state senator and representative know you support the Family Educational Relief Program. If you’re outside of Texas, let your representatives know about it and ask them to do something similar in your state.