Democratic Party of Utah launches informative series on vouchers

SALT LAKE CITY – Over the next few months the Utah Democratic Party will produce a series of informative vignettes in an attempt to clarify misconceptions regarding a proposed taxpayer-funded voucher program, the chair of the Utah Democratic Party announced Monday.

“Republicans in the Legislature squeaked through vouchers in the last session,” said Wayne Holland. “And ever since, voucher supporters have attempted to defend the plan by spreading half-truths, distorted messages and innuendo. Voters in the upcoming referendum need the facts.”

Holland added that the majority of Utahns, like the majority of Americans, believes that public schools are important, democratically controlled neighborhood assets. “This radical voucher idea threatens the very historical foundation on which many Utah communities have been built,” said Holland.

The first vignette tracks the origins of vouchers to the radical, anti-community ideas of economist Milton Friedman; the second describes vouchers as a tool to develop “white flight” academies of Southern segregationists in the late 1950s and early 1960s (See next post).

The vignettes will be posted on www.utdemocrats.org, and available as pdf files.