Vouchers or not, families will be fine

If you've seen recent TV ads for and against private school vouchers, you're probably wondering how both sides claim to help Utah families, when both sides say the other side will hurt Utah families.

Utah families seem to be in real trouble, if you believe the TV ads.

Actually, most Utah families are doing just fine. And they will continue to do just fine, with or without vouchers.

The pro-voucher side, mainly through Parents for Choice in Education, its PAC and PIC, so far has the hardest-hitting ads, especially the one with Massachusetts Sen. Ted Kennedy, and San Francisco's U.S. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (in the radio ad version) and MoveOn.org.

A second pro-voucher TV ad talks about the "liberal" National Education Association.

Both ads say don't let these "liberal" people or institutions take away choice from Utah families.

Of course, Kennedy, Pelosi and MoveOn.org have nothing to do with the Utah voucher act, passed by the 2007 Legislature.

They might as well say Osama bin Laden wants to take away parental choice (actually, he might, but he's not on the Utah ballot, either). And while Gov. Jon Huntsman Jr. says he won't be a "poster boy" for either side, he's become one for pro-vouchers, since PCE uses the governor's picture in its TV ads. Huntsman did sign the bill but says he wants to stay out of this fight.

The NEA actually does have something to do with the November election, because it is funneling millions of dollars into the anti-voucher campaign.

But at least we know that the NEA is doing this, and we have a pretty good idea where its PAC money is coming from — public school teachers across the nation who pay PAC dues into the national education group through their local teacher union chapters.

We don't know where all of the money that Parents for Choice in Education is coming from. As reported in last Sunday's Deseret Morning News, the PCE's own PIC and PAC get some funds from the same group's corporation and nonprofit foundation.

We do know, from years gone by, that PCE has gotten a lot of out-of-state money (just like the Utah Education Association has gotten a lot of out-of-state money from the NEA) from individuals and groups that back private-school vouchers.

Meanwhile, the anti-voucher side's hands are not very clean, either.