Following is a statement by Dennis Poust, executive director of the New York State Catholic Conference:

“Legislation introduced this week by Senator John Liu to strip Governor Kathy Hochul of her legitimate authority to opt in or out of the federal scholarship tax credit in future years, is a betrayal not only of the leader of his own party, who was just overwhelmingly re-elected to a second full term; it is a betrayal of his constituents in the 16th Senate District in Queens.

“The working-class citizens of Flushing, Bayside, and Fresh Meadows are counting on the scholarship funds to help them afford after-school programs, tutoring, special education services, and computer hardware for their children in public schools, as well as tuition for those kids in his district’s Catholic and other nonpublic schools.

“Senator Liu’s bill attempts to rig the system against parents across our state to appease the leadership of the powerful public school teachers unions, who contribute big money to his political machine.

“He would do well to educate himself about the program, which he incorrectly and dismissively calls a ‘voucher.’ It is anything but that. The tax credit program does not divert a single dollar from city, state, or federal public school funding. It simply allows taxpayers to take a portion of the income tax they would otherwise be paying to the IRS and re-direct it to help kids in the public and nonpublic schools in his district. It’s literally free money to support public and nonpublic education.

“If New York were to opt out of the program, New Yorkers could still get the tax credit by donating to out-of-state scholarship programs. This is why Governor Hochul has wisely said, ‘I’m not going to leave money on the table if it will help our kids.’”

“In this matter, Governor Hochul has it exactly right, and Senator Liu is dead wrong.”