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But I think at the local level itís very important for each school board to have a
parent ìwhip.î So just like in congress you have the minority whip and majority whip,
thatís a person whoís going to whip everybody up, get them all excited. That person on the
school board needs to pay particular attention to all the political alerts that the Maryland
Catholic conference or the DC Catholic conference, the Virginia Catholic conference, whatever,
sends out to you. That needs to be their primary job. Theyíre the political whip. And when
something comes out, like a tax credit or voucher initiative, then you get those parents
going. You call their class captains or whoever, the homeroom parent leaders of each grade
and mobilize that parent. Little know fact for legislators- if they get like 5, ten,
fifteen phone calls, itís an earth-shattering event. Because a lot of times state representatives
donít get a whole lot of calls unless itís a major, major issue. So when they have parents
coming out of the woodwork in kind of an organized fashion, itís going to feel like an earthquake
going on. Thatís the kind of energy that we need to generate. So then the parent whip
is in contact with the parents. Along the side issue, and I think this is where we can
alsoÖwe obviously have canonical control because weíre one big Catholic universal
Church, and I think we need to work within the structure of the Church, so I advocate
plugging in with the Catholic conference but also parallel to this, weíve got an outstanding
superintendent here whoís going to be aware of the different legislative actions going
on. He can communicate that down to you, the parents, and parents againÖprincipals, this
shouldnít be more work for the principals; they will then pass it on to the parent whip.
So hopefully our parent whips are getting information from two sides ñ through the
Catholic conference and also through the education office, and theyíre receiving this information,
theyíll get it on out to the parents. Is this making sense? We donít have to create
a brand new structure. All we have to do is go back to our school board, principals and
say you know what; we need somebody who would be willing to be the parent whip. And you
need to be connected to the Catholic conference. And then as I get updates from the superintendent,
legislative actions or whatever, I may not even read these things but Iím going to pass
it on to you because I know youíre going to do such a good job of educating everybody
within our parish and our school. Okay? And thatís their job, thatís empowering the
parent to do something significant for the Catholic schools. This is another little sad
artifact. I was recently asked to write a history of Catholic education in St Louis,
part of a book out of Notre Dame, took twelve metro areas to write the history. I alluded
to the fact that St. Louis was founded as a Catholic city and actually Catholic education
was the first one on the scene there. In the early history of the city, Catholic schools
received financial assistance from the federal, state and local governments. That changed
in 1850, because in 1850 a Unitarian minister became president of the public school board,
and he said you know what, thereís this great concept thatís really catching on back east.
They use property taxes to fund their schools. We need to make sure that our public schools
get that property tax money and we need to make sure that the Catholic schools donít.
And he was successful in getting that forward. So in 1850, in St. Louis, Catholic schools
were educating half of the total population. And even though Catholic schools in St. Louis
(and this was probably true of many cities) noticed the Catholic school enrollment just
really took off, right, but nothing in comparison to the public schools. The big divide there
was of course the public schools were receiving all that property tax funding in the state.
Now interestingly enough, when I was also reading the history on this one, there were
voucher initiatives, there were parents that were rising up, there were congressmen in
Missouri that were trying to do something about this. But unfortunately, Missouri has
a Blaine amendment. Are you familiar with Senator Blaine? Senator Blaine, civil war
era, wanted to make sure that no money ever went to Catholic schools and so he tried to
make a United States constitutional amendment to preclude that. He wasnít successful their,
but he was successful in ensuring that every state that enters the union has the Blaine
amendment which draws a huge wall between funding for any sectarian institution ñ okay?
Sectarian was code were for Catholic schools at the time because there wasnít really any
other major denomination that was operating schools. Okay some positive news, and of course
I have to temper that a little bit here because I know Iím in Washington, DC and we recently
had some significant setbacks in this one so Iím going to have to change the graphic
here. But as you can see historically, if you go back to 1990 in Wisconsin, the number
of school choice programs has drastically increased. Vouchers in ten - this is the untold
story. We are actually winning this battle but youíll never read about it in the popular
press because the battle is being won by parents, by Catholic conferences, by good-willed people,
by legislators that are courageous that are willing to take on some of the powers that
be and move this forward. But again, youíll never hear about this in the popular press.
But we need to take hope in this. The targeted school choice programs, special needs scholarship
programsÖagain, the number of students served drastically increases. Scholarship recipients
by states. I want to talk a little bit about tax credits versus vouchers because especially
in the state of Missouri and in a number of states people will say well weíve got the
Blain amendment, thereís no way we can get any money to go into Catholic schools, separation
of Church and state, blah blah blah. There is a very distinct difference between tax
credits and vouchers. One of the most important advantages tax credits have over vouchers
is a legal distinction of great consequence. And this is from a policy analysis from the
Cato institute. Courts do not consider tax credits to be government money, whereas vouchers
are considered government money. That is huge for us. As a matter of fact (this might be
heresy), I am anti-voucher. I am pro tax credit. I firmly believe that the vouchers could be
the old drug dealer technique, right? We give you some money, give you some money and oh
by the way, now you have to do this, now you have to do this, now your have to do this,
now you have to do this. Thatís what the drug dealers do. Hey, have some drugs. Itís
free. Take some drugs. Oh well, next ones more expensive, okay? Now, maybe thatís just
my paranoid self. Vouchers are state money. What the state gives, the state can also take
away. Tax credits, universally determined by courts, are not considered to be state
money. I had this debate with a colleague whoís a good Catholic, sent his kids to Catholic
schools but heís a long time public schools superÖno offense Burt. As I told him, we
at St. Louis University educate like a third of superintendents in the state of Missouri
so they fund a lot of my education, Iím not speaking ill of public schools. But I asked
him one time, I saidÖbecause he was getting on me about vouchers and tax creditsÖI said
Bill, how do you spend your tax return? Oh I did this andÖwell thatís state money,
why are you using state money? Thatís not state money, thatís myÖwell wait a second,
you paid taxes and the state deductions right and then you got some money back ñ thatís
state money. No, thatís not state money, itís my money. There it is. Tax credits like
tax deductions, money is coming back from me. Thereís a Supreme Court case ñ the Arizona
tax credits just landed in front of the Supreme Court so like a dork and a nerd I went online
and watched the whole board arguments ok? Martin will appreciateÖhe probably does the
same thing, critical case, heíll go on their and watch the arguments. If I was a betting
man, weíre going to win that case 5 to 4, possible 7 to 2. Because there are two justices
that had a real hard time in the line of questioning saying so that means that every money that
a person has that the state possibly could take is state money. That doesnít sound right.
In fact, if they go against tax credits on this issue, itís going to call into question
the whole 501c3 charitable contributions, because if those are tax deductible, thatís
state money, how far do we go? And the US Supreme Court generally does not want to create
more messes; they want to try to tidy things up and pull things together. So if you go
and read the aural arguments Iím guessing our supreme court is going to put a big stamp
on tax credits for all the states by either a 5 to 4 or a 7 to 2. Weíll find out sometime
before July. So again this is from the Cato institute: the courts have never overturned
modern education tax credits or deductions they have been upheld in all state and federal
challenges. The Cato institute also calls them bullet-proof. Tax-credits are viable
in every state but Michigan (whose constitution specifically prohibits education vouchers
or tax credits. So fortunately we donít have anybody from Michigan. Theyíre the only state
that they have on case law, US state Supreme Court saying thatís not permissible. And
again, as I said, hopefully weíll have a favorable Supreme Court decision before July,
which will create open season on tax credits in all fifty states. I want to talk a little
bit about the Iowa tax credit situation. And the reason why Iím going to share this with
you briefly is Iowa is not a red state. A lot of times people say tax credits is a Republican
thing, itís conservative thing. Iowaís not a Catholic state nor is it a Republican state.
So what happened there is they have four dioceses, they got four Catholic tuition organizations,
and they have criteria for giving assistance to kids. The Catholic tuition organizations
solicit donations. Thereís a limit put by the state. For the entire state I believe
itís around 10 million dollars. The diocese of Des Moines has a 2 million dollar lid.
All donations are 100 percent tax deductible on the federal income tax and represent a
65 percent tax credit on Iowa taxes. So if you give a hundred dollars, you can mark off
65 dollars on your Iowa tax return, ok? But it doesnít end there. Since that hundred
dollars went to a 501c3, it is one hundred percent tax deductible on your federal. So
a lot of times that chops off another thirtyÖnow first time I heard this, again, I told you,
Iím not a smart guyÖexplain this to me again. Explain it to me again. So the net effect
is that a contribution of 10,000 dollars to this Catholic tuition organization costs an
individual only 400 dollars. Is that amazing? Explain that again. Exactly, exactly. Now
this is assuming somebodyís in the upper tax bracket, you know, thirty percent tax
bracket there. And again, because itís sixty five percent right off the top of the state
income tax, but since itís going to a charitable organization, this Catholic tuition organization,
itís one hundred percent tax deductible on the federal. And if youíre in the thirty
percent tax bracket thatís going to take off another thirty percent, so 65 percent,
plus thirty percentÖyouíre up to 95 percent. Is that making sense? In Arizona, the one
thatís before the Supreme Court, it was one hundred percent. So in Arizona, the question
is do love your state, or do you love helping Catholic kids go to school? Love the state,
but want to help kids go to a Catholic school. You have to pay one of them. The average scholarship
is 856 dollars, schools participating: 156, there are 11 student tuition organizations
in the state of Iowa; the total donated is one hundred million dollars going to the schools.
Now if you assume a five percent return on the endowment, thatís like having a 200 million
dollar endowment just dropped in your lap. How many people would like to have a 200 million
dollar endowment tomorrow? Okay, this is incredible. Are you getting excited? Okay. Notice the
student participation has increased every year. This isÖI was a president of a Catholic
school in Iowa. We do have textbooks that are funded by the state and also buses. And
so when I was a superintendent one year, the law states that transportation for parochial
schools be covered when the legislature appropriates it ñ not require to, but if they do except
it. So one year I heard that Governor Villsack was going to cut that and I got notice from
my superintendent on like a Wednesday. Now I didnít have a parent organization or anything,
but I was president of a school system that had four buildings, we bused kids from all
over Southwest Iowa to come to our school, and so the cost would be catastrophic. I think
it was equivalent to like 150,000 dollars in busing costs. So I quickly sent out an
email to all my parents saying oh my gosh I just heard about this. This would cost us
150,000 dollars; we would have to raise tuition. Please contact Governor Villsack and tell
him we desperately need this funding for transportation. So he got hammered by like, as I understand
it, 250 emails slash phone calls. You know from my people, as well as other Catholic
school parents from across the state. That was an earthquake because on Monday he held
a press conference and apologized for considering taking funding away for transportation for
kids in parochial schools. Thatís where I learned the political math. It doesnít make
sense to alienate five percent of the electorate, which is who we have in Catholic schools,
over .01 percent of the budget. Thatís bad politics, especially when those parents are
organized, active and watching. Does that make sense?