Proposed legislationeducationThe agenda

OPEN Act

Oversight of Public Expenditures at Nonpublic Schools

An Act relating to the education savings account program, and including effective date and applicability provisions.

Page one

The short version

What's broken, what the bill does, and what it costs, in plain English. If you read one thing, read this.

Iowa already had school choice. Open enrollment has let families pick a public district since 1989, and private schools and homeschooling were always an option. The voucher program mostly changed who pays tuition.

Last school year it cost an estimated $329.6 million. In year one, state numbers showed two-thirds of voucher students were already in private school. Only about 1 in 8 came from a public school. The state auditor estimated this June that 78.5 percent of last school year's users would have been in private school anyway, which works out to about $37,300 for each student the program moved.

Princeton researchers found private kindergarten tuition rose 21 to 25 percent in the program's first year, the one grade where every family qualified. Pre-K, which vouchers don't cover, didn't move.

More than a third of Iowa's counties don't have an accredited private school. In our district, Albia and Bloomfield each got one this year. If you can cover the rest of the tuition and there's a school nearby, you get $8,148 this year. If there isn't, the voucher does nothing for your kids.

Each voucher student sends about $1,256 of state money back to the home district. That's real money, but nowhere near what's leaving.

Every Iowa public school district gets audited yearly, holds public budget hearings and has to answer records requests. A private school cashing voucher checks doesn't have to. When the auditor asked for records on the program's controls, the Department of Education refused, he reported in February 2025. His next yearly audit of the state's books listed no findings on the program. I'm not claiming the money was stolen. I'm saying public money should come with the same checks no matter which school cashes it.

Here's what I'd rather see. The OPEN Act (Oversight of Public Expenditures at Nonpublic Schools) does three things.

An income limit. From school year 2028-29, only families earning up to three hundred percent of the federal poverty line qualify. That's about $99,000 for a family of four at the line set in 2026, updated yearly.

A phase-out. After that year no new students join, and the last vouchers pay for school year 2030-31, so families have time to adjust.

From next school year, any private school taking vouchers gets a yearly audit of that money, a public hearing on how it's spent and open records on it.

The savings are set aside for public schools, through the HELP Act, the PACE Act and Tools for Schools: an estimated $151 million to $218 million in the limit's first year and $350 million to $459 million a year after it ends. The Pay As You Go Act keeps those bills from spending more.

That's the whole bill in brief. The rest of this page is the detail behind it, for anyone who wants to dig in.

See where it goes

Where the voucher money goes, now and under this bill

How to read this Money starts on the left and flows right along the streams; the moving dots show which way. A thicker stream carries more. Point at or tap a box or a stream to see the amounts.

Ranges from our model, which anyone can re-run. The savings are measured against what vouchers would cost under current law, after paying school aid for students who come back. How many come back is not yet known.

The same numbers, side by side

Under current law, before the limit

Voucher paymentsState general fund to Voucher accounts for private school costs
$335 million to $402 million
Home district share for voucher studentsState general fund to Public school districts
$50 million to $60 million

First year of the income limit

Voucher paymentsState general fund to Voucher accounts for private school costs
$155 million to $222 million
Home district share for voucher studentsState general fund to Public school districts
$53 million to $63 million
Voucher savings, which pay for the school billsState general fund to HELP, PACE and Tools for Schools
$151 million to $218 million
School aid for students who come backState general fund to Public school districts
$5 million to $27 million

After the last vouchers are paid

Voucher savings: the school bills first, then STREAM and CAREState general fund to HELP, PACE and Tools for Schools
$350 million to $459 million
School aid for students who come backState general fund to Public school districts
$43 million to $100 million

The analysis

What it costs, and what we don't know yet

For anyone who wants the costs and the tradeoffs. Every figure is a range where the future is uncertain, and every one links back to where it came from.

The math

What it costs and who pays

Voucher savings: the school bills first, then STREAM and CARE
$350 million to $459 million
School aid for students who come back
$43 million to $100 million

After the last vouchers are paid, stream by stream. Each bar starts at zero, and they all share one scale. A pale band is a range; the analysis below says how it was built.

Vouchers cost the state an estimated $329.6 million last school year, according to the Legislative Services Agency. Under current law our model puts the cost for school year 2027-28, the last year before the income limit, at $335 million to $402 million, plus $50 million to $60 million in state supplements that home districts get for voucher students who live in them. Nothing changes for voucher families until school year 2028-29, so every family gets more than a year's notice.

The income limit, school year 2028-29. A pupil qualifies only if the household earns up to three hundred percent of the federal poverty guidelines. That is the same line the voucher law itself used in its first year for students already in private school. Under the guidelines published in 2026, it comes to $99,000 for a family of four. The cutoff for that first year, school year 2028-29, will come from the guidelines in force then. Those aren't out yet, and the guidelines are updated every year for rising prices, so the real cutoff will likely be higher. By our estimate 44 to 59 percent of voucher students are in families above it. Voucher payments fall to $155 million to $222 million. Families who lose the voucher and move their children to a public school add to state school aid, which we put at $5 million to $27 million. Net of that, the state spends $151 million to $218 million less than current law would that year. That cost is real. The formula counts students the fall before, so it may not reach the budget until the next year, but we subtract it in the first year to be safe. Home-district supplements don't change that year for the same reason.

After the last vouchers. From school year 2031-32, the state pays no vouchers. It pays school aid for students who came back, $43 million to $100 million a year by our estimate. The supplements stop a year later. In school year 2031-32, districts are still paid them for students who had a voucher in 2030-31, and for students who return, who are counted in enrollment instead. Compared with keeping the program, the general fund spends $350 million to $459 million less that year.

Where the savings go. They pay for the HELP Act, the PACE Act and Tools for Schools first. The Pay As You Go Act's scorecard lets those bills spend only what the savings are estimated to bring in, so the school bills spend only the savings the scorecard counts against them, starting with the voucher savings. Once vouchers end, the savings likely cover more than the school bills cost, and the rest pays for the STREAM and CARE Acts or stays in the general fund. The Pay As You Go Act's page has the year-by-year table.

Who pays. Families above the income limit pay their own tuition from school year 2028-29, and every voucher family does after the last payments. Local property taxpayers pay part of the cost of each student who comes back: in school year 2026-27, $685 of the $8,148 state cost per pupil came from local property tax. The model leaves that out.

Where the savings go depends on the Legislature. This bill doesn't appropriate them. If the school bills don't pass, the money the state stops spending on vouchers stays in the general fund. A future Legislature can change any appropriation, which is why the agenda keeps the scorecard as a law of its own.

How the ranges were built. Our model, published with the bill, starts from the Legislative Services Agency's projection of voucher accounts and the state's cost per pupil for school year 2026-27. It draws what nobody knows yet: the growth rates lawmakers will set, how far the account projection is off, what share of voucher families earn more than the limit, and how many families would move to a public school. Each range covers nine in ten of the model's runs, from a fixed seed, so anyone can re-run it and get the same answer.

Open questions

What we don't know yet

The state does not publish voucher families' incomes. My income share comes from the Census Bureau's American Community Survey: 49 percent of Iowa children in a private school or home school, kindergarten through grade twelve, lived in families above three times the poverty line in the 2024 survey. That count includes home-schooled children, uses the Census Bureau's poverty thresholds rather than the federal guidelines the bill uses, and describes families from before the income limit would start. I widened the range to allow for all three.

I can't say how many families would move their children to a public school. I found no study of where students go when a voucher program this size ends. The ranges rest on two figures: in the program's first year about 1 in 8 voucher students came from a public school, and the auditor estimated the program drew 8,838 students into private schools last school year who otherwise would not have been there. Those set the scale, not the answer.

The auditor's 78.5 percent and the Department of Education's two-thirds answer different questions. The Department counted where first-year voucher students went to school the year before. The auditor compared last school year's private enrollment with what the Department projected in 2022, before vouchers, and counted kindergartners too. Both point the same way. Neither is a count of families who would have paid their own way.

The tuition study is a working paper covering one school year and about half of Iowa's private schools. It found kindergarten prices rose most, where every family qualified. It does not show every private school raised tuition that much.

On the program's administrator, the auditor reported that the Odyssey contract was amended three months after it was signed and projected, using the agency's estimates, that the added fees would more than double the contract's yearly cost for fiscal year 2027. That is a projection, not a record of payments. I couldn't find what the state has actually paid Odyssey.

In February 2025 the auditor reported that the Department refused to provide records on the program's controls (report). That was his yearly audit of the state's books, and it had findings on the program's controls over contracts, service organizations and eligibility. The same audit for the next fiscal year, released in February 2026, lists nine findings and none on the program (report). That audit looks at the state's financial reporting. It is not a full review of the program. I'm not claiming misuse of voucher money, and the bill does not depend on any.

Of the private schools that opened since vouchers began and are still open, just one of 60 chose state accreditation, the auditor found. The rest are accredited by independent agencies the State Board of Education approves, which the law allows. They are accredited schools.

Who gives something up

The tradeoffs

Families in Albia and Bloomfield have a private school close to home for the first time, and both are new this year. This bill ends the voucher that helps many of those families pay for it. Families under the income limit lose it too once the program ends. That is what a sunset means, and it is my choice, not an accident of drafting. The state's first job is the public school every family in Albia and Bloomfield can walk into. The voucher savings go to those schools through the HELP Act, the PACE Act and Tools for Schools. The PACE Act, my school funding bill, makes each year's school aid raise no smaller than the rise in prices the year before, so the public school down the road stops falling behind every budget cycle.

Iowa's private-school families are not much better off than public-school families. In the same survey, 48 percent of public-school children were in families above three times the poverty line. The income limit would cut roughly half of voucher students, not a small group of wealthy ones. So the case for the limit is not that voucher families are rich. It is that public money should go first to the schools every child can attend, and while the program winds down, what is left should go to the families who can least afford tuition.

Each voucher student brings their home district $1,256 a year in state supplements. When a student stays in private school without a voucher, that money stops. That is why the savings don't stop at ending vouchers. They pay for the three school bills, which reach districts across the state: the HELP Act through its area education agency, the PACE Act through school aid, Tools for Schools through equipment grants to small high schools. Once the program ends, those bills cost more than all the supplements together ($50 million to $60 million in school year 2027-28). The money isn't shared out by where voucher students live, so a district's gain won't match its loss dollar for dollar.

Students who come back to public school cost the state school aid, and they cost local taxpayers too. The savings above already subtract the state's share. Those children are Iowa students either way. Local taxpayers help pay for them the same way they help pay for every other student in the district, and the state should pay its part with school aid tied to inflation, which is what the PACE Act sets as a floor.

The voucher law is not free of oversight. Voucher students take the state's tests and their results go to the Department, and the Department may audit the program (both in section 257.11B). What it does not do is make each school that takes the money get that money audited, hold a public hearing on it or open its records on it, the way public districts must for theirs. The fix is to put the checks where the money lands, at the school that takes it, and this bill does that.

The bill keeps all three to the voucher money, which mostly reaches a school as tuition. Tuition families pay on their own, gifts and church support stay outside the audit, the hearing and the open records. Even so, an annual audit and a public hearing cost a small school time and money. For a new school of a few dozen students, that is a real burden, and some may decide the voucher is not worth it before the program ends. I think that is still the right trade: a school that takes public money should be able to show the public where it went. The Department's rules should keep the yearly report simple for a school that small, and a school that would rather skip the paperwork can turn down voucher money and run on tuition, gifts and church support.

The draft text

The draft bill language

For legislators, reporters and anyone who wants the legal wording. This is our draft, written the way Iowa bills are written, so you can see exactly what we mean. If I'm elected, the Legislature's nonpartisan drafting office, the Legislative Services Agency, writes the version that gets filed, and the wording will change. Page one and the costs above are the commitment.

Read the draft bill language

Proposed legislation

A BILL FOR

An Act relating to the education savings account program, and including effective date and applicability provisions.

BE IT ENACTED BY THE GENERAL ASSEMBLY OF THE STATE OF IOWA:

Section 1. NEW SECTION. Education savings account program —— income limit and phase-out. This section joins chapter 257.

For purposes of this section, unless the context otherwise requires:
a. “Education savings account payment” means a payment under section 257.11B.
b. “Income-eligible pupil” means a pupil whose household has an annual income less than or equal to three hundred percent of the most recently revised poverty income guidelines published by the United States department of health and human services.
Notwithstanding section 257.11B, subsection 2, for the school budget years beginning July 1, 2028, July 1, 2029, and July 1, 2030, a pupil shall be eligible to receive an education savings account payment only if the pupil is an income-eligible pupil and is otherwise eligible under section 257.11B.
Notwithstanding section 257.11B, subsection 2, for the school budget years beginning July 1, 2029, and July 1, 2030, a pupil shall be eligible to receive an education savings account payment only if the pupil received an education savings account payment for the immediately preceding school budget year and meets the requirements of subsection 2.
An education savings account payment shall not be approved or made for any school budget year beginning on or after July 1, 2031, and the department of education shall not accept applications for such payments.
Notwithstanding section 257.11B, subsection 6, moneys remaining in a pupil’s individual account in the education savings account fund may be used for qualified educational expenses incurred on or before June 30, 2031. Moneys remaining in any individual account after June 30, 2031, shall be transferred by the department of education for deposit in the general fund of the state.
The department of education shall notify the parent or guardian of each pupil who received an education savings account payment for the school budget year beginning July 1, 2027, of the requirements of this section on or before September 1, 2027.
The department of education shall adopt rules pursuant to chapter 17A to implement and administer this section.

Sec. 2. NEW SECTION. Nonpublic schools receiving education savings account moneys —— public accountability. This section joins chapter 257.

1. For purposes of this section, “participating nonpublic school” means a nonpublic school, as defined in section 285.16, that accepts payment from a parent or guardian using funds from a pupil’s account in the education savings account fund under section 257.11B.
2. Notwithstanding section 257.11B, subsection 10, for each school year in which a nonpublic school is a participating nonpublic school, the school shall do all of the following:
a. Have its receipt and use of education savings account moneys for the school’s fiscal year audited by the auditor of state or by a certified public accountant, and file the audit report with the auditor of state and the department of education within nine months after the end of the school’s fiscal year. The auditor of state and the department of education shall publish each audit report on their internet sites.
b. Hold a public hearing each year, at a meeting open to the public, on a report showing the education savings account moneys the school received in its prior fiscal year and how it used them, and the education savings account moneys the school expects to receive in its coming fiscal year and how it plans to use them. The hearing shall be held not less than ten days after the report and notice of the hearing are posted on the school’s internet site and the notice is published in a newspaper of general circulation in the county in which the school is located.
c. Treat its records relating to the receipt and use of education savings account moneys as public records subject to chapter 22. Section 22.7 applies to such records, and a record that identifies a pupil or a member of a pupil’s family is a confidential record.
3. The auditor of state may audit the receipt and use of education savings account moneys by a participating nonpublic school. The department of education and any third-party entity administering the education savings account program shall provide the auditor of state with any record of the program the auditor of state requests, including records of controls to prevent waste, fraud, and abuse, within thirty days of the request.
4. A nonpublic school that fails to comply with subsection 2 for a school year shall not accept payment using funds from a pupil’s account in the education savings account fund for the following school year. The department of education shall notify the parent or guardian of each affected pupil.
5. The department of education shall adopt rules pursuant to chapter 17A to implement and administer this section.

Sec. 3. PAY-AS-YOU-GO SCORECARD. This Act is an offsetting Act under the pay-as-you-go scorecard. Its savings are dedicated to the costs, under covered Acts, of appropriations for school districts, area education agencies, or elementary and secondary education programs of the department of education, other than appropriations for the health care professional incentive program.

Sec. 4. EFFECTIVE DATE. This Act, being deemed of immediate importance, takes effect upon enactment.

Sec. 5. APPLICABILITY. This Act applies to school budget years beginning on or after July 1, 2027.

EXPLANATION

The inclusion of this explanation does not constitute agreement with the explanation’s substance by the members of the general assembly.

This bill relates to the education savings account (ESA) program created by House File 68 of the 90th General Assembly.

The bill phases out the program. Starting with the school year that begins July 1, 2028, a pupil may receive an ESA payment only if the pupil’s household income is at or below three hundred percent of the federal poverty guidelines. Starting with the school year that begins July 1, 2029, no new pupils may join, and pupils who had a payment the year before may renew if they still meet the income limit. No ESA payment is made for any school year beginning on or after July 1, 2031. Money left in a pupil’s account may be spent on qualified expenses through June 30, 2031, and the rest returns to the general fund.

The bill makes no appropriation. The money the state no longer spends on ESAs remains in the general fund.

The bill creates a new Code section in chapter 257 that applies to any nonpublic school accepting ESA money. Each year such a school must have its receipt and use of ESA money audited and the audit published, hold a public hearing on a report of the ESA money it received and expects to receive and how it uses that money, and treat its records on ESA money as public records under Code chapter 22 (examination of public records), with pupil and family records kept confidential. The auditor of state may audit a school’s use of ESA money, and the department of education and the program’s administrator must give the auditor any program record requested within thirty days. A school that does not comply may not accept ESA money the next school year. These requirements apply notwithstanding the limits on state authority over those schools in Code section 257.11B (education savings account program).

The bill is an offsetting Act under the pay-as-you-go scorecard, which a separate bill would create. Its savings are dedicated first to the costs, under covered Acts, of appropriations for school districts, area education agencies, or elementary and secondary education programs of the department of education, other than appropriations for the health care professional incentive program.

The bill takes effect upon enactment and applies to school budget years beginning on or after July 1, 2027.

Sources

Where every number comes from

For anyone checking our work. Each figure with the site it came from and the day we checked it, and each law the bill cites.

Show every source

Figures

1989Open enrollment has let families pick a public district since 1989, and private schools and homeschooling were always an option.legis.iowa.govchecked 2026-09-27
$329.6 millionLast school year it cost an estimated $329.6 million.legis.iowa.govchecked 2026-09-27
two-thirdsIn year one, state numbers showed two-thirds of voucher students were already in private school.educate.iowa.govchecked 2026-09-27
about 1 in 8Only about 1 in 8 came from a public school.educate.iowa.govchecked 2026-09-27
78.5 percentThe state auditor estimated this June that 78.5 percent of last school year's users would have been in private school anyway, which works out to about $37,300 for each student the program moved.auditor.iowa.govchecked 2026-09-27
about $37,300The state auditor estimated this June that 78.5 percent of last school year's users would have been in private school anyway, which works out to about $37,300 for each student the program moved.auditor.iowa.govchecked 2026-09-27
21 to 25 percentPrinceton researchers found private kindergarten tuition rose 21 to 25 percent in the program's first year, the one grade where every family qualified.edworkingpapers.comchecked 2026-09-27
Thirty-sixIowa counties with no accredited private school. Page one says "more than a third of Iowa's counties" (36 of 99), Brett's wording from 2026-10-03.educate.iowa.govchecked 2026-09-27
99www2.census.govchecked 2026-09-27
$8,148If you can cover the rest of the tuition and there's a school nearby, you get $8,148 this year.legis.iowa.govchecked 2026-09-27
$1,256Each voucher student sends about $1,256 of state money back to the home district.legis.iowa.govchecked 2026-09-27
$99,000That's about $99,000 for a family of four at the line set in 2026, updated yearly.govinfo.govchecked 2026-09-27
$685Local property taxpayers pay part of the cost of each student who comes back: in school year 2026-27, $685 of the $8,148 state cost per pupil came from local property tax.legis.iowa.govchecked 2026-09-27
49 percentMy income share comes from the Census Bureau's American Community Survey: 49 percent of Iowa children in a private school or home school, kindergarten through grade twelve, lived in families above three times the poverty line in the 2024 survey.www2.census.govchecked 2026-09-27
48 percentIn the same survey, 48 percent of public-school children were in families above three times the poverty line.www2.census.govchecked 2026-09-27
2024My income share comes from the Census Bureau's American Community Survey: 49 percent of Iowa children in a private school or home school, kindergarten through grade twelve, lived in families above three times the poverty line in the 2024 survey.www2.census.govchecked 2026-09-27
8,838The ranges rest on two figures: in the program's first year about 1 in 8 voucher students came from a public school, and the auditor estimated the program drew 8,838 students into private schools last school year who otherwise would not have been there.auditor.iowa.govchecked 2026-09-27
just one of 60Of the private schools that opened since vouchers began and are still open, just one of 60 chose state accreditation, the auditor found.auditor.iowa.govchecked 2026-09-27
nineThe same audit for the next fiscal year, released in February 2026, lists nine findings and none on the program (report).auditor.iowa.govchecked 2026-10-01

Laws cited

HF 68The Students First Act (enrolled, 2023), which created the education savings account program in new Code section 257.11B (Sec. 7, pp. 2-9). For 2023-24 a pupil already in a private school qualified only with household income at or below three hundred percent of the federal poverty guidelines, and for 2024-25 at or below four hundred percent (p. 3-4); from 2025-26 every pupil in a private school qualifies (p. 4). It also counts voucher pupils in their home district's teacher salary, professional development, early intervention and teacher leadership supplements (Secs. 3-6, p. 2). legis.iowa.gov
chapter 257Financing school programs (the school aid formula). All three new sections of the bill join it.legis.iowa.gov
257.11BThe education savings account program. It sets who is eligible, makes each payment equal to the regular program state cost per pupil, creates the account fund with a standing appropriation of the amount necessary, carries unspent account money forward, requires voucher students to take state tests, lets the Department of Education audit the program, and limits the state's authority over nonpublic schools that accept the money. legis.iowa.gov
285.16Defines "nonpublic school" as a nonpublic school accredited as provided in section 256.11. Section 257.11B uses the same definition.legis.iowa.gov
chapter 22Examination of public records (open records). A school corporation is a government body under it.legis.iowa.gov
22.7Confidential records, including personal information in student records.legis.iowa.gov
chapter 17AIowa administrative procedure act; governs the department's rulemaking.legis.iowa.gov