Special Education Funding. Currently, families can save $500 per year in tax-preferred accounts for education. A bill before the Senate would have allowed for an increase in that amount to $2,000 per year. However, Senator Christopher Dodd (D-CT) offered an amendment to the education savings account bill that would have disallowed that proposed increase and instead would have authorized the distribution to states over the next five years the sum of $1.2 billion for special education programs. Under the Dodd amendment, spending decisions would be made by the federal government rather than by parents who would otherwise have been able to decide for themselves how to spend the money accumulated in education savings accounts.
The Dodd special education amendment to S. 1134 was rejected by the Senate on February 29, 2000 by a vote of 44-54 (Roll Call 15). We have assigned pluses to the nays.
