PHOENIX — School voucher supporters claim that Arizona's Empowerment Scholarship Accounts save taxpayers thousands of dollars on educating the state's children.
The Capitol's independent budget analyst says they don't.
Research by the Joint Legislative Budget Committee shows that the state general fund pays out more for ESAs than it does to pay for a public school education.
"When a student leaves a school district and goes to an ESA, that is not saving the state general fund money," said Chuck Essigs, government relations director for the Arizona Association of School Business Officials. Essigs has tracked Arizona school finances since the 1980s.
A debate over ESA funding and regulation by the state is taking center stage as lawmakers return to work this week.
In her State of the State speech Monday to a joint session of the Legislature, Democratic Gov. Katie Hobbs warned that the ballooning cost of ESAs could blow a hole in a state budget that's already $850 million in the red through this year.
"Now is the time to advocate for accountability and transparency - not a blank check," Hobbs said.
Republican House Speaker Ben Toma torpedoed Hobbs' proposal minutes before she delivered her speech.
"Any effort to undermine parental choice in education will not succeed," Toma said to applause from Republicans.
Under the ESA program, all Arizona students can use taxpayer dollars to cover tuition at private and parochial schools. The money is also available for home schooling and special education students.
ESA enrollment has soared in the 16 months since the universal expansion - and so has the cost to the state general fund.
School vouchers advocates staged a rally on the Capitol lawn Monday to respond to Hobbs' reform plan.
"By and large, the state actually saves money for every child that switches over to an ESA," Toma, who championed the program in 2022, told 12News.
The Legislature's independent budget analysts have crunched the numbers on ESA spending. They found that state's basic aid to public school districts is lower than the spending on school vouchers.
The JLBC did an apples-to-apples comparison, removing the high cost of educating special needs children, which boosts the average ESA award.
According to JLBC:
- For large school districts that receive state aid, the per-pupil cost for Grades 1 through 8 in public schools was $700 less than the cost of an ESA.
- For public high schools, the per-pupil cost was $900 lower than an ESA.
- The disparity is much larger for districts like Scottsdale Unified and Cave Creek that don't receive state aid.
For high schools, ESA awards were $8,600 per pupil. The non-state-aid districts get nothing.
"They don't get any state general fund money," Essigs said.
"They pay for all of the cost out of their local taxes."
ESA advocates lump public school funding from federal and local sources in their comparisons to vouchers.
None of that money comes from the state general fund.
"It's not like everything is a savings just because those students have left the school district," Essigs said.
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