News alert: La. voucher program allowed to begin in August

A Baton Rouge judge has refused to prevent the start of a statewide voucher program that will use tax dollars to send children to private and parochial schools. The decision today by Judge Tim Kelley means the program pushed by Gov. Bobby Jindal will begin in August, while a lawsuit filed by teachers unions and local school boards over the constitutionality of the voucher program continues to wend its way through the court. Kelley determined he couldn’t issue an injunction blocking the program’s start because of a law that bars injunctions if a state agency chief says that injunction would cause a deficit in the department. Jindal-backed state Superintendent of Education John White says his department would face a deficit if the laws creating and funding the voucher program were blocked.