HB1403 is scheduled to be heard in the PreK-12 Appropriations Subcommittee this Wednesday (1/17/2024) at 8AM.
The Appropriations subcommittee is specifically focused on financial and payment-related aspects of the bill, so those will be the only issues which can be spoken on at this particular meeting.
We're currently working on clarifying language for HB1403 that Jason and Brenda will be lobbying for to address the timing of PEP funding to parents, as well as issues using PEP at public schools, charter schools, or FLVS, which they will be lobbying for before and during this subcommittee meeting.
So for this particular subcommittee on the 17th, we're looking for parents willing to come to the capitol in person to speak, specifically those with testimonies related to:
---Situations where parents had massive delays or issues receiving PEP or UA funds, or issues getting reimbursements processed in a timely manner.
---Situations where parents were unable (or had massive issues) utilizing PEP funds for their children to take extracurriculars or other classes at public schools, charter schools, dual enrollment, or FLVS.
I know many are worried about the instructional materials limitations. However, the instructional materials issue is not directly related to the focus of the Appropriations subcommittee unless you have a financial aspect of it to speak about...
But AFTER this subcommittee, HB1403 will be going to the Education & Employment Committee, which would be a great time for parents to speak on access to instructional materials and equipment for career & technical skills, trade skills, etc., especially for high schoolers.
We don't know yet, though, whether the language concerning instructional materials may already have been amended by the time it hits that committee... (we're hoping it will be, because Jason and Brenda are lobbying for amended language right now!) so we're asking parents to be on stand-by and we'll send out more information on the instructional materials issue as we have it!
In the meantime, we're still encouraging parents to make direct contact with representatives on ALL their concerns, because changes and amendments can be introduced between sessions and then voted on in the sessions! So the in-between time is ALSO important.
Please reach out to your representatives if you haven't already, and voice your concerns!
If you have a financial or payment-related testimony as mentioned above, and would like to speak at the Appropriations subcommittee on Wednesday the 17th, please email us back so we can help coordinate.
Thank you.
Dear Representatives,
First of all let me introduce myself. I’m Christina M’Gaha, mom of 5, 4 of which are In Unique Abilities and 1 of whom is in PEP. I’m very thankful and excited for the opportunity to have an educational choice as at their last school there were some issues. It has been a huge blessing this year especially since we are in and out of doctors appointments and do not have the availability that typical students have and education time fitting into an 8-3 schedule.
The issues we have faced this year in response to funding . First, I applied as soon as applications opened in May I think. I’m a renewal for 1 child, but most were in EO and we were attempting to get funding for UA and 1 brand new student in k5. By June they opened the PEP survey and I filled that out for the 1 student. I didn’t fill it out for all 5 in hopes they would receive funding from UA otherwise I would’ve been left to fall back to EO. August they were supposedly starting to approve and switch PEP statuses. I didn’t receive an email for approval. It was over a month of torture seeing people who had just applied being switched to PEP . Typically school starts the 2nd week in August and I still wasn’t sure if my one student would be approved much less funded. Funding date came and past and I still wasn’t approved 9/1. I saw people from higher tiers, tier 3 when we are low income tier 1 plus I had applied the first day it opened. Finally got approval on PEP sometime in September before funding actually took place. There was a lot of confusion, because awarded doesn’t mean funded, so then we had to wait for funding. We were lucky. Funding dropped for all 4 UA students on 9/15. And the PEP student on 9/18. This was not the case for many families and we were told you could still be placed on a waitlist even though you applied first day. Once we got funded it fixed all that, but there were still issues. We received the funds, but did not have access to those funds. MSS the scholarship shop was not up and running yet, so even though we had funding we couldn’t buy anything. Not only was MSS not available, reimbursement option was not there yet, we still don’t have the ability to ask for a preauthorization on EMA it’s available in legacy and required for certain things. We were able to start entering reimbursements within a week. I think my first reimbursement request might have been 9/18 or 19, I would have to look that up. We were able to enter for reimbursement, but we didn’t actually receive the reimbursement until Thanksgiving. They had finally begun processing reimbursements and we actually received those funds on Thanksgiving Day. Since then it has been a fight to get all of my reimbursements approved and paid. I have been waiting since 9/23/23 on 15 items. We had to play what I call reimbursement roulette or Wheel of Reimbursement. Certain processors would approve your submission without any issues, than others they would find an issue, some the way the date was formatted, or that my name was spelled incorrectly. Had to have matching name spelling, or the biggest one was the EBF. These reimbursements were for Piano/music lessons. Because the teacher has a degree, I can file under Part Time tutoring. EBFs we’re not needed for PT tutoring. One processor would approve but 4 more would go on hold. So I went round and round with them and it doesn’t matter if they were incorrect in their processing we couldn’t get help from anyone to actually look at these issues with incorrect processing. We had to wait for sometimes 2-3 weeks until the next time they checked that reimbursement. This started the 60 day wait over again. Finally, on Friday, I was finally able to get all but 3 of my new reimbursements approved after almost 4 months of waiting. The new ones are within 60 days. Now I’m just waiting on payment. I also have 1 glitched item that I am told has been sent to IT, and I just need to wait for an update. That one has a date of 10/7. 1 item was approved on the receipt and paid but there were 6 other items that didn’t get approved or paid they still say in review today, but the whole reimbursement says completed. My other issue is a bike I purchased for my son for PE. I had a maintenance plan on the receipt which was denied but they removed tax on the helmet which was also on the receipt. Now I have to resubmit the receipt for $4.90 in tax on an item, no way to reopen that submission. So now I have to wait for 60 days again.
In conclusion, we had to wait to get approved, we had to wait to make sure we got funding, we had to wait for access to MSS and reimbursement money. By the time my kids started school lessons it was late September to early October. I had to wait even longer for my senior in high school who is now so far behind in classes he may not be able to walk the stage with his class if he can’t finish in time. He’s a UA student not PEP and goes through an accredited program. There needs to be oversight on these SFOs and repercussions for not doing things correctly. There needs to be specific guidelines on reimbursements being timely and not just within 60 days. If a processor incorrectly processes the time should not start over. EBFs need to be done away with and make a fillable version online when we are submitting, the submission has all that information already or if they want extra details make an extra box to fill out. We have spent most of this year fighting for proper funding and access and want to be able to school with less issues. I’m sure it will get better as time goes, but I just finished getting approval from September and still have a few submissions to go. I haven’t been paid from all the submissions yet. I’m sure it will be soon, but the time spent waiting has really drained us.