Getting your Trinity Audio player ready...

This week the Kingsport and Sullivan County Boards of Education joined the chorus from Tennessee counties against school vouchers, and specifically called out the craven nature of tying the bill to disaster relief in a special session.

In a video interview with the Kingsport Times, School Board President Melissa Woods noted the “hold harmless” provision, which claims to protect districts, does not indicate how long it will apply, saying “that could be for one year, that could be for ten years, it is not stated in the legislation.”

Woods went on to express frustration that the Sullivan County Mayor didn’t even reach out to the Kingsport School Board. “It was frustrating and, quite honestly, disappointing for us that seven of our local Mayors would write a letter in support…but none of those Mayors reached out to us. As the Kingsport Board of Education, our Mayor from Sullivan County did not reach out to us.”

As reported by WJHL Newschannel 11, Kingsport School Board Vice President Brandon Fletcher criticized the special session and alleged tactics “to pressure local governments into supporting the bill.”

“Some call it underhanded, some call it posturing…it’s political extortion,” Fletcher said.

Board Member Phillip Marshall said to WJHL, “Because we are against this bill does not mean we are against the relief that needs to be provided to those areas, but I think I can speak for all of us when we say that those two things are completely separate issues, and, to me, lumping these two things together is political posturing and nothing more than that.”

Sullivan County School Director Chuck Carter told WJHL, “we do not believe, and it is in our resolution, that hurricane relief should in any way, form or fashion, be connected to the education savings act.”

Earlier this week, Governor Bill Lee touted the support of seven East Tennessee Mayors for his voucher scam and the disgraceful special session that threatens to hold disaster relief hostage. The Mayors, however, do not speak for all the residents of their counties.

In 2024, eight resolutions opposing school vouchers were passed by school boards in five of the seven counties those Mayors represent. School boards in Carter County, Elizabethton City, Johnson City, Washington County, Johnson County, Sullivan County, Greene County, and Greenville City all oppose the Governor’s voucher plan. More than 70 resolutions were passed opposing the voucher plan in 2024.