Voucher supporters believe parents should be able to get their tax dollars back to make their own education choices. In NH, property taxes, primarily local property taxes, pay more than 70% of the costs of public schools. The tax rate is based on where you live, not the number of children you have in school. In 2022/23, one family received vouchers for home-schooling their 8 school-aged children, to the tune of $40,000. If, as in the past, they also received Education Tax Credit Scholarships, they may have gotten another $24,000. That’s $64,000! Which means that money actually isn’t the family’s taxes being returned to them, but other people’s tax dollars siphoned off into that family’s pockets.

Communities decide what’s best in their public school. That’s why school decisions are publicly available. School board meetings and budgets must be public. A quorum of members cannot meet privately. The private schools that receive vouchers do not meet in public, share their curriculum, budget or anything else. Home-schoolers need only say they have a plan. There is no requirement to provide the plan for evaluation. The voucher program has already spent $45M in public funds. More than 80% of vouchers are used by families who sent their children to those schools before receiving the vouchers. Public schools are created by the public for the public good. Those with and without children pay taxes that support public schools. The premise is that an educated populace benefits all of us.

Maureen Redmond-Scura

Concord