CPS board OKs resolution opposing school tax credit plan

Members of Chicago's Board of Education have approved a resolution opposing the Trump Administration's tax credit program for donations to private and public school scholarships funds, after turning back an attempt to put the issue on hold indefinitely.

The hybrid Board, made up of ten elected members and eleven members appointed by Mayor Brandon Johnson, voted 15-0 Wednesday morning to adopt the resolution in opposition to the Administration's "Education Freedom Tax Credit." It gives donors as much as a $1,700-a-year tax break for giving money to scholarship funds that could pay for a student's tuition to private school.

Three members of the Board abstained, including elected member Ellen Rosenfeld, who sponsored an unsuccessful motion to put off consideration of the resolution indefinitely.

"Politics don't belong in the board room," Rosenfeld told colleagues. "I will never ever ever do anything that divests money from Chicago, from any public schools. I've been an advocate for my whole life. This doesn't belong here. It belongs on our legislative agenda."

"I don't know if I could, like, disagree more," appointed board member Jitu Brown responded. "You shouldn't be on the school board ... because everything here is political."

Brown went on to push back on the Administration's suggestion that scholarship money could be used to pay for public school programs including tutoring, saying the tax credit amounts to an incentive for wealthier people to write off donations to private schools: "Nowhere in the world has vouchers produced equity."

Elected member Jennifer Custer said her constituents are talking about the tax credit program, which the state has not specifically joined, citing a lack of specific rules and guidelines.

"There's been a lot of outreach from the community ... I would say 50-50 for and against," she said, wondering whether lobbying state lawmakers directly was a better way to handle it.

But appointed member Emma Lozano rejected the choice: "We can vote here, and go to Springfield. Why can't we do both?"