If it passes, Amendment 2 doesn't automatically institute a voucher program, but it does clear a path for Kentucky lawmakers to craft and — given the current makeup of the General Assembly — likely approve legislation in that mold. So the Kentucky Center for Economic Policy did a deep dive into how such programs have played out in other states. And they say the effects are clear.
"Those states are enacting and expanding private school voucher programs whose costs are exploding. Those vouchers provide windfalls to better off families with students already in private schools, and they shift dollars away from struggling rural areas and from public schools that are open to all students, to wealthier metro neighborhoods," KCEP director Jason Bailey told reporters.
Bailey said that, even if Kentucky implemented a smaller scale voucher program in line with neighboring Ohio's or Indiana's, the move would cost the state budget nearly $200 million, or the equivalent of 1,645 school personnel.
The report also suggests that — again based on other states that have taken up voucher programs — that 65 to 90% of the costs would subsidize families already sending their children to private schools or who are planning to do so.
The numbers run counter to arguments put forward by advocates of Amendment 2 and public school alternatives.
"All this bill does is... give the people of Kentucky the ability to do what most other states have done in the education space, and have been doing successfully for many years," Sen. Stephen West said just prior to that chamber's final vote on the proposed amendment in March.
Amendment 2 supporters say a voucher style program won't overburden public schools, in part because the students who switch from public to private would take some pressure off public schools.
Opponents, however, say that many fixed cost schools face, from personnel to maintenance, would remain steady while money is siphoned away to private schools.
