State Senator Scott Bennett expects more state funding will be sought next year to give tax credits to help finance tuition waivers for children to enroll in private schools. On WDAN Radio’s Newsmakers program today (Tuesday) Senator Bennett said the tax credits are going to adversely affect other taxpayers. ‘’You have to give at least $10,000 for the tax credit to start. But you can give up to a million dollars a person – which doesn’t sound like middle-class to me when a husband and wife can give $2-million dollars to this foundation and it will be provided for scholarships. And it doesn’t mean you’re going to get a deduction on your taxes, it means it’s a tax credit of 75-percent. So if you’re a couple that gives $2-million bucks,’’ said Bennett, ‘’whatever you owed in taxes that year – subtract $1.5 million. And that means that burden falls on you and me, so that’s where I get really frustrated with this.’’
Senator Bennett thinks the $75-million dollars going to establish the tax credit program to finance tuition waivers is being misrepresented. ‘’So it’s going to be a huge boon for private schools – athletics I would assume. It’s going to go largely to students who have academic or athletic talents. But really what this is – is a tax shelter,’’ added the Senator. ‘’And people say ‘well, it’s only $75-million dollars and it’s a pilot program’. But it’s just opening that door and next year they’re going to ask for more,’’ says Senator Bennett. Plus the Senator wonders where the State of Illinois is going to get the $75-million dollars that was promised to launch the program.
The tuition waivers being financed by the funds is to help poor and middle income children enroll in private schools, instead of attending public schools. And some of those private schools could be religious. It has some lawmakers wondering whether spending state funds that way is constitutional.
