Governor JB Pritzker says the ‘Invest in Kids’ program could be revived but might look a little different.
Lawmakers did not vote to extend the private school scholarship program for low-income children, which is scheduled to end on December 31st. The Governor was asked about it at an unrelated event and said the parameters need some fine-tuning.
“One of the challenges that has been with that program is that there was a huge tax credit, this never gets talked about. 75 percent of the charitable giving that is supposedly being given to investing in kids, 75 percent is being given back to those who gave the money in taxpayer dollars.”
Pritzker feels the size of the credit may also be too large.
“I think we should have tax credits that support education and other things in state government. But we also have the federal government willing to cover about 40 percent of the cost. Why have we created a program that is paying 75 percent of it. This is a problem in the fundamental makeup of it. ”
Invest in Kids is set to end on December 31st unless lawmakers vote to extend the program when they return for the Fall Veto Session. If that happens, the Governor says he will sign the bill.
