Voters likely to see Quality Education Act on ballot

Reclaim Idaho turned in more than 100,000 signatures to the Idaho Secretary of State’s Office on Wednesday in support of the Quality Education Act ballot measure.

The bulk of the signatures have already been verified by local county clerks; however, a final stamp of approval is needed from the secretary of state before the measure officially qualifies for the Nov. 8 general election ballot.

The Quality Education Act proposes to increase Idaho’s corporate income tax rate from 6% to 8%. It would also create a new 10.925% income tax bracket for individuals with more than $250,000 in taxable income, or $500,000 for joint filers.

The measure would generate an estimated $323 million per year for K-12 education. That would be about a 14% increase over current state funding.

The ballot language specifically says the new revenue could be used for things like teacher and support staff salaries, reducing class sizes, hiring school counselors and psychologists, providing classroom materials and supplies, providing special education services, or to support other school programs such as art, music, drama, career-technical education and full-day kindergarten.

More than 100 volunteers gathered at the Idaho Statehouse on Wednesday to help deliver the signatures.

According to the Idaho Press, Luke Mayville, the co-founder of Reclaim Idaho, told the crowd the Quality Education Act wouldn’t solve every problem with Idaho’s education system.

Nevertheless, he described it as “the most significant investment in our schools in a generation.”

Idaho regularly ranks at or near the bottom in the nation for per-pupil student funding. A recent report from the National Education Association also indicated that Idaho teachers, on average, earn about $8,000 less per year than teachers in Wyoming, $16,000 less per year than in Oregon and $27,000 less per year than in Washington.

“I’ve been a second-grade teacher for five years, and each year I’ve seen more and more of my fellow teachers — who have been amazing teachers and mentors to me — decide to leave,” said Twin Falls teacher Leah Jones, in a Reclaim Idaho news release. “If we truly believe that every Idaho child deserves a quality education, we must act.”

Reclaim Idaho is the grassroots organization that sponsored the 2018 Medicaid expansion ballot measure, which was approved by 61% of voters.

A total of 64,945 valid signatures are needed for the Quality Education Act to qualify for the November ballot. It also has to have signatures from 6% of registered voters in at least 18 of Idaho’s 35 legislative districts.

In a Wednesday afternoon telephone interview, Mayville said the measure easily met both requirements.

“We know, based on what the county clerks have already verified, that we have over 70,000 valid signatures, and we qualified in 20 districts,” he said.

The Quality Education Act was written last year, before the Idaho Legislature approved its latest $600 million tax cut.

That bill included a $251 million reduction in corporate and individual income tax rates. Mayville said the new rates — which took effect July 1 — will remain in place even if voters approve the Quality Education Act.

“The (new) lower tax brackets won’t be affected. They won’t revert back,” he said.

The text of the ballot measure specifically adds a new 10.925% tax bracket for higher income earners, and increases the corporate tax rate to 8%.

However, it also establishes a formula to capture a certain amount of tax revenue for the newly created Quality Education Fund.

The intent of the formula is to ensure that the education fund only collects the incremental revenue from the higher tax rates. The state general fund would continue to receive all the revenue it would have under current law.

That formula, though, was based on an upper tax bracket of 6.5% — the rate that was in place when the act was written. As of July 1, that rate is now 6% — meaning if the education act is approved, the state will actually collect more revenue than it otherwise would have.

“This gets at a complexity in the way the initiative interacts with (this year’s) tax cut,” Mayville said. “Based on my understanding, I do believe a small part of the revenue collected by the education act wouldn’t be allocated to the Quality Education Fund, but would remain in the general fund. But it’s only a very small percentage.”

Mayville also noted that the $323 million estimate for the amount of revenue generated by the act was developed early last year.

“Revenues have increased quite a bit since then, so even with this issue, it’s possible the initiative will generate substantially more than $323 million,” he said.

Mayville expects the Secretary of State’s Office to take about 10 days to officially approve the ballot measure. Reclaim Idaho will then hit the road to encourage voters to support the proposal.

Spence may be contacted at bspence@lmtribune.com or (208) 791-9168.