Stockard on the Stump: Zombie bills haunt lawmakers as 113th General Assembly nears (merciful) end

Lt. Gov. Randy McNally tells us the comment that the voucher bill is dead is “premature.”

Yet, an apt description for this version of the General Assembly is The Walking Dead, with less than a week left before lawmakers go home to lick their wounds. 

Gov. Bill Lee’s two biggest priorities might be trudging around, but they’re leaving a stench in their wake, and many lawmakers would like to put a stake through their hearts.

Lawmakers placed more than $144 million in a $52.8 billion budget the House and Senate approved Thursday. But they can’t find middle ground on the different plans each has to enact private-school vouchers for students statewide, up to 20,000 kids next year and everyone the following year.

The Senate version of the budget also includes $1.1 billion in refunds for the “legislative fix” Lee claims is needed for the state’s franchise tax on corporations, while the House plan contains $400 million in refunds and would require companies to disclose the amount of the refund they received. Both versions repeal that tax going forward costing the state $410 million annually. 

The tax cut is set for a conference committee Monday where lawmakers hope to iron out differences. But the governor’s voucher hopes are withering even though he’s been working to shift public money to private schools for more than six years.

The last time the House took a vote on vouchers, in 2019, the FBI started investigating allegations of perks for votes. Guess what: They’re still watching.

After months of lobbying and negotiating in closed-door meetings, lawmakers can’t sign off, though Republican leaders in the House and Senate insist the voucher bills are still alive until the Legislature adjourns sine die or are withdrawn or rejected. That would leave little room for mystery.

Even so, Republican Senate finance committee Chairman Bo Watson of Hixson said Thursday if the measure fails to materialize this session, all of the debate surrounding it will make it easier for lawmakers to come back in 2025 and pass it.

Of course, that’s assuming they have the votes a year from now, after far-right groups like Tennessee Stands and the Constitutional Republicans of Sumner County try to primary many of the lawmakers in favor of vouchers. Don’t worry: there will also be mountains of money to spend by the pro-voucher groups as well, so expect a blood bath this fall.

The Senate cobbled together 17 co-sponsors for Leader Jack Johnson’s of Franklin voucher bill late this week. The yes votes include Education Chairman Jon Lundberg of Bristol, McNally of Oak Ridge, Watson, Ferrell Haile of Gallatin, Mark Pody of Lebanon, Todd Gardenhire of Chattanooga, John Stevens of Huntingdon, Adam Lowe of Calhoun, Kerry Roberts of Springfield, Dawn White of Murfreesboro, Shane Reeves of Murfreesboro, Brent Taylor of Memphis, Paul Bailey of Sparta, Paul Rose of Covington, Ed Jackson of Jackson, Bill Powers of Clarksville and Becky Massey of Knoxville, the latter two of whom opposed vouchers before they were for them.

Obviously, that was designed as a show of strength within the Senate Republican Caucus. But putting together 18 votes in the Senate doesn’t guarantee passage in the House where that version faces tougher sledding.

In spite of the massive amounts of dark money expected to enter this fall’s elections, House members are leery – or scared – of angering voters at home, especially since school districts are the biggest employers in more than half the counties in Tennessee.

Vouchers started the week without a bang as the Tennessee Journal reported the bill was “dead.” The Lookout then found out it likely would be sent back to the clerk’s desk if it couldn’t pass out of the House finance subcommittee, making it virtually impossible to pass the darn thing.

Lundberg, who introduced a plan to save $70 million on vouchers, told the Lookout Wednesday he didn’t think any plan would pass if they didn’t reach an agreement by Friday. That is complicated by the House’s decision not to hold a Friday session, meaning if they want to get something done, they’ll have to be on the horn all weekend.

Considering the rancor, though, you’d think someone would figure out this is a bad deal. Really, it’s nothing more than a push by the Republican Governors Association and other conservative groups to undermine public schools and shift money to privates.

Yet the governor is intent on making Republican lawmakers “walk the plank” for his pet project. 

Why Lee is continuing to push this when a wide majority of Tennesseans don’t want it is perplexing. He campaigned six years ago as a “political outsider,” but it’s becoming clear he’s operating not just outside the political status quo but in an apocalyptic world where zombies wander around infecting the main characters. My God, it’s more than a TV series.

Budget moves

In passing a budget – the only thing lawmakers are required to do constitutionally — Republicans turned back Democrats’ efforts to enact grocery tax holidays, increase pre-kindergarten education and renew maternal health money instead of funding crisis pregnancy centers, which are known for anti-abortion counseling.

Instead, they poured up to $1.55 billion into franchise rebates and $145 million for the first year into the governor’s voucher idea. That will be followed by a universal deal that could cost more than Fort Knox over the next decade.

Apparently, warnings at the session’s start that Tennessee was hitting an economic downturn also a little “premature,” to use McNally’s description. We also keep hearing lamentations about the Biden economy, yet the state has almost $2 billion to stave off an unclear threat to its franchise tax and the dreamed-up need to send public school students to private schools.

State attorney general steers energy toward pregnancy center fundraising

Sen. Jeff Yarbro of Nashville and a host of Democrats noted Thursday that Republican lawmakers like to brag about being “fiscally conservative” but wound up passing the most “irresponsible” budget he’d seen.

“It spends money that should be used for public purposes on private entities. It fails to allocate enough dollars to pay for the things the supermajority has foisted on districts, and rather than fully funding public schools, it siphons a bunch of money into private-school vouchers, even though they haven’t even passed legislation on that front yet,” Yarbro said.

House finance chairwoman Patsy Hazlewood of Signal Mountain defended the spending plan in the other chamber, pointing out it brings K-12 spending to $6.8 billion, including funding to bring starting teacher pay to $50,000 by 2026, $15 million for charter school buildings (which brought jeers from Democrats), $50 million for rural health-care grants (where communities are losing hospitals, it was noted) $10 million for children’s hospitals, $15 million for behavioral health, $16 million for rural health and the list goes on. (Somebody needs to write a budget story next week, probably Adam)

Asked why the Legislature couldn’t afford to keep funding Stax Museum and several other Memphis nonprofits, Hazlewood responded, “If you look at our state’s checkbook, we’re a middle-class family. We don’t drive a Cadillac but a Chevrolet.” That was later amended to a Ford, which brought derision from the press booth, where some folks who’ve been driving a GM-produced truck since 1993 took exception.

That’s (not) what she said

Republican Sen. Brent Taylor of Memphis left the crowd puzzled this week when, while addressing a bill dealing with Memphis hotel taxes, said folks there had been “working harder than an ugly stripper” to make it happen. 

While I’m not what you’d call the most politically correct person in the room, this caught my ear.

My first reaction was to think: It takes one to know one. Secondly, the better the response would be: Beauty is in the eye of the beholder.

East Bank plan still working

Democratic Sen. Heidi Campbell of Nashville postponed consideration of the East Bank Authority bill until next week because of amendments on the board’s makeup. It’s either adding Senate and House speakers, or their representatives, or possibly the Economic and Community Development and tourism commissioners.

Once everything’s ironed out, Campbell believes this bill will fly. 

Yet another postponement, though, Thursday morning led one wise guy to proffer: By the time they consider this, the East Bank’s going to be the West Bank.

That led someone to say, leave it to a sarcastic soul to bring the Israel-Hamas war into the fray. 

Truth be told, the coiner was talking about the shifting sands of time, not the Middle East conflict. But, hey, take credit for cleverness when possible.

Farewell Dickey

One of the world’s great guitarists, Dickey Betts of the Allman Brothers, died Thursday at age 80. It’s hard to believe he outlived Duane Allman by more than half a century.

Duane was the slide guitarist while Dickey was the band’s picker. It’s pretty tough to beat “Whipping Post,” “One Way Out,” “Statesboro Blues,” and the list goes on for a jam band that turned into a classic rock favorite that I saw in 1980 at Municipal Auditorium. 

“Lord, I just can’t go out that door.” *

(* “One Way Out,” The Allman Brothers Band)