The following news articles appeared in the February 21, 2008 issue of The Catholic Standard & Times

    · "Maryland considers tax-credit efforts like PA’s EITC, BLOCS programs"
    · "EITC tax credits still available for 2007-2008"

 
MARYLAND CONSIDERS TAX-CREDIT EFFORTS LIKE PA’S EITC, BLOCS PROGRAMS
by Lou Baldwin, Special to The Catholic Standard & Times

If they work in Pennsylvania there is no reason they can’t work in Maryland.

That is certainly true when “they” are Educational Improvement Tax Credits (EITC).

On Feb. 13, John V. Killen, senior vice president and director of community investment for Sovereign Bank, and Christina F. DiMichelle, associate director of BLOCS (Business Leadership Organized for Catholic Schools) traveled to Annapolis, Md., to testify before a Maryland State Senate Budget and Taxation Committee.

The topic was EITC, the innovative tax credit program Pennsylvania instituted in 2001, through which companies receive up to 90 percent credit against their state taxes for grants they make to agencies that provide scholarships to nonpublic school children. (Other grants benefit public school programs.)

At present, Maryland lawmakers are considering adopting a similar program called BOAST (Building Opportunities for All Students and Teachers).

During Pennsylvania’s current school year, BLOCS has distributed $2.1 million — in 3,920 EITC grants — and it has distributed more than $12 million since its inception, DiMichelle said in her testimony.

“I speak with many families, school administrators and donors on a daily basis,” she told the Maryland senators. “They tell me emphatically that this program has been a lifeboat for our families and families seeking not only a strong academic education, but one that focuses on building a child’s character and esteem.”

She emphasized that BLOCS does not consider a child’s race, religion or ethnicity when it distributes scholarship money.

“We distribute our funds solely on the basis of a family’s income,” DiMichelle said. “We, along with many of our donors, know that educating our future workforce is not about them being Catholic or non-Catholic — it is [about] educating our students to succeed and to become productive citizens in our society.”

Sovereign Bank operates in eight states, including Pennsylvania and Maryland, according to Killen’s testimony. Participation in the EITC program, he said, has benefited the bank as well as helped provide tuition assistance and education improvements to hundreds of schools and more than 1,000 public and non-public students from low- and moderate-income families throughout the bank’s principal markets in Pennsylvania.

“The Pennsylvania EITC program has accomplished what many Pennsylvanians have been advocating for years — a way for the business community to become directly involved and supportive of education,” Killen said. “The Pennsylvania EITC program is a national model with proven success in helping families with school option choices. I highly recommend that Maryland and other states enact similar programs for support of education, our national priority.”

Killen and DiMichelle testified at the request of the Maryland Catholic Conference, which was represented by Mary Ellen Russell, the conference’s deputy director for education and family.

“For Catholic — and many other nonpublic — schools, the BOAST Maryland tax credit holds great promise for our efforts to continue a service we have provided for generations to lower- and middle-income families,” Russell said in her testimony. “Our state offers tax credits to reward investment in many worthy enterprises. Surely there is no investment more worthy of our support than the investment in Maryland’s students and teachers.”

Lou Baldwin is a member of St. Leo Parish and a freelance writer.

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EITC TAX CREDITS STILL AVAILABLE FOR 2007-2008

Companies that wish to participate in Pennsylvania’s Educational Improvement Tax Credits (EITC) program for the 2007-’08 school year may still do so.

This year, the state of Pennsylvania increased its allocation to the very successful program, from $59 million to $75 million.

It breaks down as follows: $44,666,667 for nonpublic school scholarship organizations, $22,333,333 for innovative public school programs and $8 million for separate, pre-kindergarten scholarship programs.

According to the Harrisburg-based REACH (Road to Educational Freedom through Choice) Alliance, of the 2007-’08 allocation, $7.45 million remains for K-12 scholarship organizations, and $1.12 million remains for the pre-kindergarten organizations.

The way it works is simple: A business that makes a donation to a scholarship-granting organization such as BLOCS can write off 75 percent of the donation against its state taxes. If it makes a two-year commitment, it can write off 90 percent of the donation.

The state funding is in the form of those write-offs.

Individual businesses can receive up to $200,000 in tax credits. However, if a corporation has several corporations under it, each is eligible to receive credits up to that amount.

For further information contact BLOCS at (215) 587-0590.