Green Bay citizens are being urged to take alarm and vigorously oppose Governor Scott Walker's proposal to open the floodgates on religious school vouchers.
The Freedom From Religion Foundation has been airing two 30-second TV commercials on WFRV-TV (CBS) on the six and ten o'clock news broadcasts this week, continuing through Friday. It's also placing an anti-voucher ad on next Sunday's local airing of CBS Sunday Morning.
"We have a sense of urgency to inform the public about the disastrous consequences, if Walker's voucher expansion is adopted," said FFRF Co-President Annie Laurie Gaylor.
In the Green Bay Area Public School District, 57.8% of its currently enrolled public school students (12,083) would, if Walker's scheme passed, be eligible for vouchers, removing thousands of dollars per student in aid from public schools. Most private schools are religiously-segregated.
"Walker's reckless scheme would defund and ultimately destroy our public schools," Gaylor added. "We should end Wisconsin's failed voucher experiment, not expand it."
FFRF notes that Walker's recently expanded statewide voucher system has resulted in a system where 100% of the state-funded schools are Christian, and 73% of students attend Roman Catholic schools.
One spot explains:
Our public schools are under attack by Governor Walker. He wants to take money from our public schools and use it to support someone else's religion. Your tax dollars shouldn't fund religiously-segregated schools. Nearly half of our state's students would be eligible for vouchers under Walker's scheme. Vouchers are bad for children and bad for education. Help us stop Walker's brazen attack on our public schools.
A second, more dramatic ad, says:
There is no such source and cause of strife, quarrel, fights, malignant opposition, persecution, and war, and all evil in the state, as religion. Let it once enter our civil affairs, our government would soon be destroyed. Let it once enter our common schools, they would be destroyed. [quoting a Wisconsin Supreme Court decision] Stop Governor Walker's disastrous proposal to expand vouchers for religiously-segregated schools.
The TV commercials also began airing in Madison April 6 for two weeks on the 6 p.m. and 10 p.m. news broadcasts on WISC-TV 3000, the Madison-area CBS affiliate. A few also aired in La Crosse-Eau Claire.
The ad takes viewers to a splash page, ffrf.org/stopvouchers, which encourages them to contact legislators, and provides background and anti-voucher FAQs. Read Wisconsin FAQ. Read "Dispelling the myth of 'school choice,'" FAQ.
FFRF, a national state/church watchdog based in Madison, Wis., has 22,000 nonreligious members nationwide, including more than 1,300 in Wisconsin and many in the Green Bay area.