WASHINGTON, D.C. – U.S. Senator Shelley Moore Capito (R-W.Va.) is pushing for regular public updates on the reopening status of our nation’s schools and accountability for how the hundreds of billions of dollars in taxpayer money that is going to the U.S. Department of Education for COVID relief is being spent.

This week, she joined her Senate colleagues in introducing the School Reopening and Spending Transparency Act, which would require the Department of Education to publish information on the use of COVID relief dollars and schools’ operating status.

“We need to ensure schools are doing what is in the best interest of every student, and that means in-person learning,” Senator Capito said. “This legislation would provide transparency for the hundreds of billions of taxpayer dollars being sent to help schools reopen. In West Virginia, we’ve proven that schools can safely reopen, and it's past time schools in other states that have more than enough funds follow suit.”

BACKGROUND:

Under the bill, authored by U.S. Senator Joni Ernst (R-Iowa), the Department of Education would establish and maintain a public website tracking the education expenditures by states of federal funds from the major COVID relief bills Congress has passed since the start of the pandemic, including the Democrats’ latest $1.9 trillion bill that included $128.6 billion in relief for schools. The nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office (CBO) estimates that only 5 percent of the funding in the latest bill will actually be spent by the end of this fiscal year. In fact, CBO projects that it would take seven years for the money to be spent in its entirety.

The bill would also require the department to report and update monthly the operating status of that nation’s school districts during the 2020-21 school year, tracking the number of days they are closed to in-person learning, providing hybrid learning, or providing an option for full-time, in-person instruction for all students.

Senator Capito has consistently urged all schools to safely reopen for in-person learning. She recently led a group of her Senate colleagues in highlighting the negative impacts of keeping schools closed, and spoke on the Senate floor on the topic.

# # #