LETTER: Voucher amendment abused the legislative process

Regardless of how we feel about school vouchers, we should all be offended by the flagrant disregard that members of the Pennsylvania Senate recently showed for our state constitution. The Pa. constitution explicitly prohibits amendments to bills that change the original intent of a bill and the Pa. constitution expressly prohibits the mashing of two bills together into one bill.

House Bill 479 started life as a simple one-page ambulance mileage reimbursement bill that passed the House unanimously and then went on to be reported out of the Senate Health Committee unanimously. After second consideration on the Senate floor, HB 479 was sent to the Senate Appropriations Committee for a late unscheduled meeting. HB 479 (the ambulance reimbursement bill) came out of that meeting with a 20-page amendment to provide school vouchers to a small percentage of students attending Pa.’s poorest performing schools … certainly not having anything to do with the original intent of the ambulance reimbursement bill and certainly mashing two subjects into one bill.

If school vouchers are a priority, there is nothing stopping the Senate Education Committee from holding hearings and there is nothing stopping this committee from deliberating and voting on Sen. Judy Ward’s Lifeline Scholarship bill (Senate Bill 795).

The abuse of the legislative process that we just witnessed should not be tolerated and should be stopped by simple adherence to the state constitution. Harrisburg is broken. To learn more about the non-partisan Fix Harrisburg campaign, visit https://www.fixharrisburg.com/.

—Ruth Yeiser
Lower Frederick Township