State Rep. Jim Dotson -- the sponsor of unsuccessful legislation this year to give families money to spend as they see fit to educate their children -- attended a conference in New Orleans last year sponsored by a group called Ed Choice, which paid more than $1,600 for his trip.
But the Bentonville Republican didn't disclose it on his annual personal financial disclosure report -- called the Statement of Financial Interest -- filed in January with the secretary of state's office, until a reporter for this newspaper recently asked why he didn't disclose it.
"It was an oversight," he said. "I thought it was on there. I'll have to get it corrected."
Dotson was one of at least 10 lawmakers last year who took trips sponsored by two groups that promote school choice.
State elected officials are required to disclose such expense payments on their annual reports. The Statement of Financial Interest report asks them to "list each nongovernmental source of payment for your expenses for food, lodging, or travel which bears a relationship to your office when you appear in your official capacity when the expenses incurred exceed $150."
State law allows officials to amend their reports to disclose unreported trips within 30 days of learning about the unintentional omissions.
On May 25, Dotson amended his 2016 financial disclosure report. It now shows that Indianapolis-based Ed Choice paid $1,655.57 toward his lodging, food and travel to the Aug. 14-16 conference in New Orleans.
Ed Choice was called the Friedman Foundation for Educational Choice, founded by Milton and Rose Friedman, until it changed its name last year. The group's website said it's committed to "universal school choice."
"We extend an invitation to everyone in the state based on publicly available information (usually via the National Conference of State Legislatures)," Ed Choice spokesman Jennifer Wagner said in an email.
Nonprofits such as Ed Choice and the Foundation for Excellence In Education have been paying for educational trips for some state lawmakers in recent years, according to lawmakers' disclosure reports.
Under Amendment 94 to the Arkansas Constitution, state lawmakers are barred from having lobbyists cover their expenses for trips unless the payments are made by regional or national organizations for travel to regional or national conferences at which the state is requested to be represented by elected state officials.
Voters approved Amendment 94 in November 2014. The amendment also prohibits state elected officials from accepting certain gifts from lobbyists, including one-on-one meals and drinks. The amendment also allowed lawmakers to serve more time in the Legislature; created a citizens commission that more than doubled lawmaker salaries in 2015; prohibited corporations and unions from contributing directly to the campaigns of state candidates; and barred ex-lawmakers from registering as lobbyists for two years after they leave office.
Amendment 94 has meant, for example, that the Arkansas Electric Cooperative no longer covers the expenses for lawmakers to travel to Wyoming to tour a coal mine or for a handful to go to Washington, D.C., to attend an annual energy conference. It also means that Microsoft Corp. no longer occasionally pays for lawmakers to visit its headquarters, lobbyists said.
A review of the 2016 Statement of Financial Interest reports, shows that no lawmaker accepted paid foreign trips from any group last year. On reports for 2015, lawmakers reported taking "educational" nonprofits-paid-for trips to China, Israel and France.
House Speaker Jeremy Gillam, R-Judsonia, said of the lack of 2016 foreign trips: "I think there was maybe less opportunity this go-around than before. Sometimes the different topics we were working on were more national than international." He said he had no opportunity last year to go on a paid overseas trip.
In February, the Senate rejected Gillam's bill that would have created an exemption to allow foreign governments to pay for trips for state elected officials. At that time, Gillam said some lawmakers had approached him about allowing nations such as Israel or the United Kingdom to legally be able to pay for lawmakers to visit their countries to expand Arkansas' trade relationships. The Senate later approved a revised version of the bill without the foreign trip provision.
Dotson reported in 2015 that the Foundation for Excellence in Education paid $1,796.60 for his expenses to attend a conference in Denver. The foundation was founded by former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush in 2008 to work with decision-makers on developing and implementing school policies.
Dotson said attending such conferences over the past two years "certainly helped to have a good foundation and understanding what other states have done" and helped in shaping his ill-fated legislation to create education savings accounts.
He said "it was much less work" to introduce "the concept" supporting his bill to state lawmakers who had attended such conferences in recent years.
Dotson's legislation would have created "education savings accounts" to provide about $6,700 per year per eligible student. The money could have been used for education expenses, such as private school tuition, textbooks, testing, summer programs, speech pathology, transportation or uniforms.
Some House members opposed the legislation out of concern that it would harm public schools that serve more than 470,000 students in Arkansas. After limiting his proposal to address the cost concerns raised by Republican Gov. Asa Hutchinson, Dotson's program would have been limited to about 670 families and cost more than $9 million in tax credits over a four-year pilot program.
Dotson's House Bill 1222 failed to clear the 100-member House in a 37-47 vote, falling 14 votes short of the 51 required for approval. Similar legislation -- Senate Bill 746 by Sen. Blake Johnson, R-Corning -- cleared the 35-member Senate in a 22-5 vote but failed in the House in a 43-50 vote.
Legislation on education savings accounts has been enacted in Arizona, Florida, Mississippi, Nevada and Tennessee, according to the National Conference of State Legislatures. Advocates say Nevada has the most expansive law. The Nevada Supreme Court ruled that the state cannot pay for the accounts using money that's intended for public schools.
Dotson said that in Arkansas, "It was a lot harder sell than what I had originally anticipated because I have studied it long enough that it made sense to me, but not necessarily to everybody else.
"I think in the future, now that it has been introduced and been talked about and vetted, it is a good opportunity for people to delve into it deeper, and actual details, as opposed to, 'Here is a new concept, I don't know what it is,'" he said. He said he expects to introduce similar legislation in 2019, if he's re-elected next year.
Two other lawmakers also amended or plan to amend their personal financial disclosure reports for 2016 to add education-related trips.
On May 26, Rep. Bob Ballinger, R-Hindsville, amended his report to disclose that Ed Choice paid for his hotel, meals and travel expenses totaling $1,619.92 to attend the New Orleans conference on Aug. 15-16.
"I made an error on it. Somehow it slipped my mind when I filled out the Statement of Financial Interest," said Ballinger.
Rep. Vivian Flowers, D-Pine Bluff, said she attended an Ed Choice conference in Arizona last summer, where "I learned more about the different kinds of school choice initiatives that Ed Choice supports and champions throughout the country -- private school vouchers, education savings accounts, tax credit scholarships."
"I went but did not include it on my report because I neglected to submit my receipts for reimbursement, which I discovered when I emailed them to find the total cost for the trip," she said in March.
"I haven't gotten the reimbursement yet, so I haven't filled my amendment [to disclose Ed Choice's payment for her expenses]," Flowers said last week.
Rep. Karilyn Brown, R-Sherwood, and former Rep. Nate Bell, an independent from Mena, also reported that Ed Choice paid for their trips to conferences last year. Brown reported that the group paid $1,531 of her expenses for air and ground transportation, lodging and meals for a conference Aug. 14. Bell reported it paid $1,184.21 for his expenses for hotel, airfare and meals for an Arizona education facility tour and seminar Oct. 16. Bell's term in the House ended in January.
The Foundation for Educational Excellence paid for trips to conferences for Reps. Charlotte Douglas, R-Alma; Kenneth Henderson, R-Russellville; Grant Hodges, R-Rogers; Stephen Meeks, R-Greenbrier; and Laurie Rushing, R-Hot Springs, according to their Statements of Financial Interest for 2016.
Henderson and Rushing each reported that the foundation paid $836 for a conference scholarship and two nights in a hotel in December 2016. Hodges reported that the foundation paid $444.45 in airfare for an Excel in Education conference Nov. 30-Dec. 1. Meeks reported that it paid $425 of his expenses for an educational conference in November 2016. Douglas reported that the foundation paid $1,410.14 for travel, meals and hotel expenses in Phoenix, and paid $451.32 for a conference last year.
In 2015, the foundation paid expenses for Bell, Brown, Hodges, Henderson and Rushing -- in addition to Dotson -- to attend a conference in Denver, according to their Statements of Financial Interest for 2015.
The Foundation for Excellence in Education says it invites lawmakers from all states to attend its annual meeting. Its sister organization, ExcelinEd in Action, supported education savings account legislation in states around the country.
Ballinger, Brown, Dotson, Douglas, Henderson, Hodges, Meeks and Rushing voted for Dotson's and Johnson's legislation this year. Flowers voted against it.
Several lawmakers said they were philosophically inclined to vote for those bills even before they attended the conferences.
Brown said that was the case with Dotson's education-savings-accounts bill. She favored it even before she went to the New Orleans conference, where such accounts were "one of the things that was discussed as a viable choice."
Meeks said that before he attended the conference, he "had never heard" about education savings accounts nor "how they worked."
He said he visited two private schools in Arizona that catered to students with autism and special needs, and he saw firsthand the difference the schools make in the lives of these students. One of the schools is the New Way Academy in Phoenix, he said.
"I already supported school choice beforehand. It made me support it even more," he said.
Rushing said she attended the foundation's Nov. 30-Dec. 2 conference in Washington, D.C., and it validated "what I already firmly believe in with school choice.
"Dotson's bill is one I would have supported based on what I was hearing from my constituents. The conference gave me the knowledge to make an educated choice based on facts and not the political rhetoric," she said.
Flowers said that based on the advice of her legislative colleagues, she went to Arizona to learn more about school-choice options.
She said she is "in a super minority" in the state House of Representatives, which consists of 76 Republicans and 24 Democrats. She said she went to the conference to become more informed and see if there were opportunities to tweak legislation on the behalf of school districts, such as the Dollarway School District.
"Most of what I saw and learned I didn't agree with," Flowers said.
SundayMonday on 06/04/2017