After months of internal debate, the politically influential Council of Baptist Pastors of Detroit and Vicinity is expected to announce on Monday it will urge its congregations to vote against the voucher proposal in November.

The council is the largest group of Baptist clergy in the city and is the second influential Detroit organization, after the local NAACP, to oppose vouchers. About half of Detroit residents are Baptist.

The voucher proposal "does not take into account that we have struggled here in Detroit to reform the school district and this would be a blow to all we have done in that regard," said the Rev. E.L. Branch, president of the council. And, Branch added Friday, Proposal 1 does not help families with money for transportation or other costs associated with attending private or parochial schools.

"It was a very difficult decision," said Branch, pastor of Third New Hope Baptist Church. "We have a number of our local Baptist churches that have our own schools, and we could see how it would be beneficial in that regard. And a number of our pastors have been working with the Kids First! Yes! program from the early stages of it."

Organizers of Kids First! Yes!, the organization sponsoring Proposal 1, were disappointed.

"Because all of their concerns can be addressed as being factually inaccurate or simply not plausible concerns, this announcement is really sad news to the 200,000 children who are trapped in institutions who are failing them," said Greg McNeilly, spokesman for Kids First! Yes!

Proposal 1 would amend the Michigan Constitution to allow the state to provide private school tuition vouchers to students who live in seven school districts, including Detroit and Inkster, which graduated fewer than two-thirds of their students last year.

The proposal would allow other districts to become voucher districts if voters or the local school board approve the change. It would require teacher testing and would set a minimum level of funding for school districts.

The council's decision means that no major group in Detroit so far has endorsed the plan, which backers say is designed to give poor children a choice between failing public schools and private or parochial schools.

"The one group that could have been effective in supporting the vouchers in the community is now turning against it," said Otto Feinstein, professor of political science at Wayne State University.

The Rev. Edgar Vann, the council's immediate past president and pastor of Second Ebenezer Baptist Church, predicted Proposal 1 won't carry Detroit -- and he said he didn't believe it would win without Detroit.

"There won't be an African-American group, there won't be a city group ...to support this," Vann said. "Except the Catholic Church."

McNeilly, however, said the support of parents is more important than the support of an organization. "We have the endorsement of 127,000 parents in Detroit who signed this petition to put this proposal for school reform on the ballot and we stand with them," McNeilly said.

Meanwhile, U.S. Sen. John McCain spoke at a rally in an Oakland County Catholic church on Friday, urging his listeners to vote for Proposal 1.

McCain, R-Ariz., stopped in at Our Lady of LaSalette Catholic School in Berkley on Friday morning to do what virtually no other high-profile politician from either party has done in Michigan: endorse the voucher proposal.

McCain told reporters and students at LaSalette that the ability to choose a child's school should not be restricted to parents who can afford to move or pay private school tuition.