What's the Holdup?

Iowa and Utah have already passed universal school choice, while Idaho dithers

Today marks the start of week four of the 2023 legislative session. Perhaps it is just because I am paying closer attention this year, but it really seems like the system is moving at a snail’s pace. Perhaps it is also because other states are leaving us in the dust when it comes to education reform.

Governors Kim Reynolds of Iowa and Spencer Cox of Utah signed legislation last week to make money follow students instead of systems. Meanwhile, our conservative legislators are struggling to get our own school choice bill heard before a committee.

What’s the holdup? Why is Idaho, a state so red that more than 80% of the legislature identifies as Republican, lagging behind Utah, Iowa, Florida, Arizona, and a dozen more states that have passed - or at least introduced - their bills?

Gov. Kim Reynolds @IAGovernor

The Students First Act: Signed, Sealed, and Delivered ✅

Idaho Freedom Foundation issued a scathing statement regarding Senate Education Committee Chairman Dave Lent last week, accusing him of deliberately obstructing a school choice bill that his own committee members have attempted to introduce. Senator Tammy Nichols is the sponsor of a proposal called the Education Freedom Act which would allow families to use a portion of the tax dollars that are allocated to public schools based on enrollment for private school tuition, private tutoring, or homeschool curricula. However, Chairman Lent has fought this proposed bill every step of the way.

Legislators come to the Capitol with their ideas, which are tagged with a routing slip number. These RS’s remain private information - the personal property of the sponsoring legislator - until they are granted a print hearing in a committee. This hearing is generally the first time the public can hear the details of the bill. Once printed, the RS gets a bill number and is posted on the legislative website.

This typically happens fairly quickly and without controversy. A bill being printed is no guarantee it will be approved by the committee, much less passed by the House or Senate. Several Democrats have gotten print hearings for their bills, so why is the chairman dragging his feet?

I am told that Senate President Pro Tempore Chuck Winder guaranteed before the session that any bill with even a single Republican sponsor would get a hearing, contrary to years of tradition where establishment committee chairs unilaterally killed anything leadership did not want to see. Yet we are in the fourth week of the session and the ESA RS has not yet been printed. The only reason we know it exists is because Senator Nichols and her allies in the Idaho Freedom Caucus released the text on their own so that the public can read it for themselves.

It is clear that the Republican establishment does not want universal school choice in Idaho. Legislative leadership, the governor, and the superintendent are all committed to keeping as many students locked within the public school system as possible. Along with Idaho Democrats, they fear what might happen if families are given the flexibility to escape the public education monopoly. What happens to the teacher’s union? What happens to the army of administrators that work for public school districts? What happens to the Planned Parenthood sex ed curricula that is laundered through the Department of Health and Welfare?

The public school system is not going away, but it needs serious reform. Competition is the best way to bring about that reform, and allowing families to use their own tax dollars to tailor a unique education for their children is the best way to produce that competition.

Senator Nichols’ proposal might not pass this year, but even so the people of Idaho deserve to see it debated in public rather than hidden away in a drawer. I am hopeful that Chairman Lent relents soon and gives this bill the hearing it deserves. It’s time for Idaho to lead the way with positive conservatism rather than trailing behind Iowa, Utah, Florida, and Arizona.