TN Anti-Immigrant Bills Carry Steep Cost
Taxpayers on the hook for turning schools into ICE agents
The Tennessee Small Business Alliance held a press event today and called on lawmakers at the Tennessee General Assembly to reject a raft of anti-immigrant bills the group says will cost state taxpayers millions of dollars.
The group’s media release noted:
Today, Tennessee school board members, students, and education advocates denounced HB 1711/SB 2108 and HB 793/SB 836, two bills that would require K-12 students to "show their papers" and impose an estimated $55 million annual cost on Tennessee school districts.
The advocates cited a new report from the Immigration Research Initiative (IRI) that shows:
Verifying the status of all students in the state would entail hiring, training and equipping an estimated 934 school personnel. For context, that is roughly half the number of school nurses in Tennessee public schools.
The cost of hiring these 934 employees would total roughly $55 million statewide.
These are not one-time costs. The expense for each district would be highest in the first year of implementation but would continue to recur every school year.
"All children, regardless of where they were born, the color of their skin, or how much money their parents make deserve to go to school without fear of discrimination or fear of being targeted and tracked by their teachers or administrators," said Sarah Marhevsky, Franklin County School Board member and former teacher.
“We don’t choose our parents. Children aren’t responsible for the choices of their parents, either, and these bills unfairly penalize students for forces beyond their control. How could any educator look at a child and say, ‘No, you can’t go to school? No, we won’t educate you?’ I’ve taught students of all different backgrounds at three different schools, and those are things I would never say,” said Marhevsky.
