Can House, Senate leaders close $550M gap on bills?
Republican leadership in the Tennessee Senate and House remain at odds on several high-profile policy proposals as the legislature enters what could be its final month of the session.
Significant fights loom over the two most sweeping legislative proposals of the entire session, a $1.9 billion franchise tax restructure and retroactive refund backed by Gov. Bill Lee, and the governor’s statewide universal school choice proposal — in addition to policy differences on issues like how many members Tennessee State University board the legislature should forcibly remove, and what types of records the Department of Tourism should be permitted to shield from public disclosure.
Though policy disagreements and backroom fights certainly aren’t unusual in state politics, the ongoing tussles over the biggest tent-pole bills of 2024 foreshadow a fast and furious final weeks of session.
Senate leaders on Thursday suggested they’d play hardball with the House over proposed changes to the TSU board, effectively allowing it to terminate this summer if the House doesn’t back their version to overhaul the entire board.
“I believe the Senate is resolute in its position, and failure [by the House] to pass that bill in the form that we think is best will result in the termination of the board completely, and it would require the legislature to come back in January and form a new board,” Senate Finance Committee Chairman Bo Watson, R-Hixson, said Thursday.
The most expensive differences comes in the chamber’s approaches on Lee’s proposed $1.9 billion franchise tax reform and retroactive refunds. While Lee’s original proposal funded nearly $300 million less than fiscal analysts determined the proposal would cost the state, a funding letter sent by Finance and Administration Commissioner Jim Bryson to the Senate Finance Committee pledged to fund the $300 million difference by scrounging up interest earning growth amassed since the budget was formulated in November.
House leadership indicated Thursday that their version of the bill may take a different tack, though details have not yet been unveiled.
“We think that the bill that we sent over to them today is the best approach,” Watson said Thursday, adding that if the House has other ideas, the upper chamber would consider them.
But if the administration has earmarked $300 million in excess revenue to spend on franchise tax refunds — can it find another $250 million to cover the public school teacher health benefits and school infrastructure fees in the House version of the governor’s Education Freedom Scholarships bill?
Watson said that as of Thursday, his committee has not received a funding letter from the Lee administration pledging to fund the additional spending laid out in the House version of the voucher bill.
“We’re unaware of any now. We will get the administration amendment on Tuesday, and that would obviously have to be considered there,” Watson told reporters. “The answer to that question sitting here today is no, we’re not aware of anything like that.”
Lee recently said it was “too early” to consider cost estimates or related funding for a voucher program beyond what he’s already proposed in his budget. The legislation awaiting consideration in both chambers’ finance committees.
Beyond spending considerations, the chambers remain lightyears apart on Lee’s voucher proposal, which Senate leadership wants to push through as a tailored, though still expensive, version.
“I think there is a great deal of distance between the two chambers — that doesn’t mean it can’t be resolved,” Lt. Gov. Randy McNally, R-Oak Ridge, told reporters Thursday, speaking of the voucher legislation.
The House, meanwhile, is attempting to insulate a potentially unpopular program to give public dollars to private school students by wrapping in other public school changes and taking a whack at other things such as testing requirements.
On Wednesday night, the Senate added a version of their voucher bill on to Senate Bill 2787, a caption or placeholder legislation. Senate Education chair Jon Lundberg, R-Bristol, said the Senate needed a “second vehicle.”
“Obviously, we hope to get to a place together. We’ll need two vehicles, potentially, to put those together,” Lundberg said of the House and Senate versions of the Education Freedom Scholarships proposal.
By Thursday morning, House leadership had withdrawn HB 2468, their version of SB 2787. The bill could be resurrected at various junctures, but the withdrawal hints at House leadership slapping down a Senate