OMAHA, Neb. (WOWT) – On Saturday, the Nebraska Secretary of State’s Division of Elections held public hearings for all 6 Nebraska ballot initiatives, one being the partial private tuition scholarship referendum.

On November 5, Nebraskans will vote to partially repeal LB1402, which passed in April. Section 1 of 1402, allocates $10 million from the general fund, public money, for private education scholarships.

Tim Royers, president of the Nebraska State Education Association, hopes voters will repeal it. Before the public hearing, Royers and his supporters wrote handwritten letters to send to voters with information about why they should repeal.

“Unfortunately, what we’ve seen is worse academic outcomes for all kids, whether they go to a private school or a public school, they do worse academically,” Royers said. “The other thing we’re seeing is these programs are absolutely growing in size and eating more and more out of state budgets with each passing year.”

He worries that failure to repeal could mean more public money going to private institutions.

“This comes at a time when a number of school districts in the Omaha area are seeing cuts to their state funding,” Royers explained. “Bellevue, Gretna, Papillion, Millard, they all lost millions of dollars in state funding this school year. So at the same time as those communities are losing support, we’re now extracting dollars to go to private schools, and that’s the fundamental problem.”

He argued that this program could raise property taxes if not repealed.

“Even if students leave our public schools through this voucher program, there will be no reduction in spending by our schools,” Royers said. “So if we drop state funding, but there’s no cost reduction, it’s going to have to be on the back of our local property taxes, or we’re just going to have to cut teaching positions and cut programs.”

Senator Lou Ann Linehan of Elkhorn introduced LB1402. She told 6 News the bill is about giving kids more opportunities.

“The kids we’re leaving behind are low-income kids whose parents don’t have a choice to move to Elkhorn, move to the Westside, or move to Millard,” Senator Linehan explained. “I don’t think it’s fair to have kids who don’t have options when we’re a city full of options.”

She says 1402 does not divert funds from public education.

“Two years ago, when we passed the original school choice bill, we also dramatically increased public funding,” said Senator Linehan. “We have set aside a billion dollars for the education future fund. We used to pay 40% of ed. special, we know we pay 80%. That one thing costs $150 million, so we increased the public findings for special editions by $150 million. If you’re not an equalized school, you might not get a lot of money per child, so now every child in a public school in Nebraska, regardless of formula, gets $1,500 per student, so that program, those increases cost $328 million. The scholarship program is $10 million.”

At the public hearing, opponents and supporters spoke about LB1402 and why it should or should not be repealed. Omaha Sen. Justin Wayne gave his reasoning to keep LB 1402.

“I’ve been against school choice 15 years ago, 10 years ago, 8 years ago, 7 years ago, but in the last 5 years we’ve run out of options,” said Senator Wayne. “The child in North Omaha needs an opportunity, that parent needs that choice. Therefore, please vote to keep 1402.”

Arizona, Iowa and Florida have passed similar legislation.

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