James Leininger (photo)
Anti-public school billionaire
By Gary Scharrer
Express News
Austin-After spending millions this year trying to elect school-voucher-friendly legislators, a San Antonio businessman now is bankrolling a public relations campaign aimed at getting low-income parents to carry part of the battle.
Billboards and radio spots in Houston, Dallas, Fort Worth and San Antonio ask parents to help influence Texas legislators to give parents a choice in selecting schools for their children.
Texans for School Choice wants a pilot program that allows low-income families in the state's urban public school districts to send children to any school, including a private or religious school, at taxpayer expense.
"We very strongly believe that the choice of the best schools should not be an option exclusive to the wealthy," said Ken Hoagland, spokesman for physician-turned-business- man Jim Leininger.
Leininger will spend up to $500,000 for the campaign, which coincides with the start of a new school year. The two-month campaign could evolve into another public relations effort early next year when state lawmakers open a new legislative session, Hoagland said.
"Every billboard and every radio ad contains one common message: When you give parents a choice, you give children a chance," Hoagland said. "We very strongly believe that parents should have the right to choose the best school for their own children."
Leininger spent more than $3 million earlier this year on issues dear to his political outlook and candidates sympathetic to those issues. The billboard and radio campaign are ways to increase public involvement, Hoagland said.
Leininger has spent close to $100 million over the past decade on scholarships and schools for low-income children, but he has fallen short in getting legislative support for school vouchers.
"He is not giving up. We have been fighting this battle for a decade," said Craig Tounget, formerly executive director of the Texas PTA and now coordinator for the Coalition for Better Schools, which opposes school vouchers.
The coalition opposes using public tax dollars for "unproven or untested" private and religious schools, Tounget said.
Sen. Leticia Van de Putte, D-San Antonio, said she's not surprised by Leininger's direct appeal to parents considering his failure to influence the Legislature.
"I applaud anybody who gets involved in issues of the day. Unfortunately for Dr. Leininger, the majority of Texans and a majority of the Legislature supports public schools and wants to focus our time and resources into building a quality public education system," said Van de Putte, a member of the Senate Education Committee.
Low-income parents with school-age children can't afford to wait for inner-city public schools to get better, Leininger's spokesman said.
Leininger targeted most of his campaign contributions this spring on five state House Republican primary contests. Leininger-backed candidates won two. But school voucher advocate House Education Chairman Kent Grusendorf, R-Arlington, whom Leininger also supported, lost in the primary to a challenger who opposes vouchers.
The House has narrowly defeated school voucher bills in the past. The issue has not come up for debate in the Senate, where opponents have more than enough votes to block school vouchers, Van de Putte said.
The Houston Independent School District offers an extensive school choice program for parents, including charter schools and the option of sending their children to other schools within the district, but there is little demand, said Rep. Scott Hochberg, D-Houston, a member of the House Public Education Committee.
Public schools are the first choice for an overwhelming majority of parents, Hochberg said. Public schools remain "the only place where students have a right to demand an education regardless of their financial conditions, regardless of the academic background of their parents, regardless of their own prior performance in schools.
"I don't know what anybody else does with billboards or otherwise to change that," Hochberg said. "We need to be about the business of making our neighborhood schools as good as they possibly can be for all students, not just those who the private schools will choose to let in."
gscharrer@express-news.net
Editor's Note: The legislature will be targeted again this next session to allow vouchers.
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