House and Senate Republicans have revived a controversial school-voucher plan for the District and are aiming for final passage of the program this week.

The Senate has never voted on the plan, which would provide several hundred low-income D.C. public school students with federal tuition grants to attend private or religious schools. After the House narrowly passed the measure, Senate Democrats filibustered it last month.

GOP House and Senate negotiators have decided to put the vouchers provision -- and the $ 5.6 billion 2004 District budget to which it is attached -- into a larger federal budget bill that cannot be amended. That has set up a showdown in which the only way Democrats can block vouchers, or other controversial items in the broader spending bill, is to force a shutdown of many federal government operations.

Republican leaders expect a House-Senate conference committee to complete work on the omnibus spending bill as early as tomorrow, and hope to secure final floor passage before Congress adjourns Friday.

Senate Democratic leaders said that the GOP majority had not informed them yet of its specific plans and that they were still weighing their strategy. But Sen. Richard J. Durbin (D-Ill.), while criticizing the Republicans' parliamentary tactics, said it was "more likely" than not that the GOP effort would succeed.

Durbin, noting the senators' desire to adjourn this week, said it was unlikely that the omnibus bill would fall apart.

"Obviously, the proponents of the D.C. school voucher program were afraid of an open floor debate on this issue. . . . I think it's an indication of how shaky this proposal really is," said Durbin, a leading vouchers opponent. "Unfortunately, the Republican leadership in Congress is going to jam it through without debate."

Republican senators and pro-voucher lobbyists said that the GOP would have had the votes to pass the voucher measure separately if Senate Democrats had not resorted to stalling tactics.

Jeanne Allen, president of the Center for Education Reform, said passage is long overdue for a targeted experiment that is backed by a majority of senators, if not by the 60-vote supermajority needed to override a filibuster.

"It's about time," Allen said. "It's such a small amount of money that has been taken out of context. This is a modest attempt to give kids in the District choice in education."

The measure that passed the House in September included $ 10 million for vouchers and no additional funds for District public schools. The Senate was considering a $ 40 million plan that included $ 13 million for vouchers and $ 26 million for the city's regular and charter public schools.

Although details are being worked out, House Republicans tentatively have agreed to a bigger spending package that would be similar in scope to the Senate version. Aides to Mayor Anthony A. Williams (D), who has led the push for the voucher plan, said they hope the sum will be as much as $ 50 million. Williams has argued repeatedly that the vouchers initiative should be accompanied by increased aid for traditional and charter public schools.

A $ 13 million voucher plan would provide at least 1,700 District schoolchildren from low-income families with grants of up to $ 7,500 a year to attend private or parochial schools during a five-year pilot program.

The District experiment would be the nation's first federally funded voucher program, and congressional passage would give President Bush a victory on an issue that has been pushed by conservative education activists since Republicans took control of Congress in 1995.

Supporters of vouchers have said that poor, black families in the District deserve the same access to private schools as that available to affluent parents whose children have left the troubled D.C. public school system.

Opponents have said that vouchers are unproved and provide taxpayer subsidies to unregulated religious and private groups. They contend that the money should be spent instead on reforming the public education system.

Some voucher opponents said the GOP's parliamentary move could fail because of the ugly partisan mood in the Senate after last week's fight over federal judgeships, and because of disputes involving other parts of the omnibus spending bill.

Voucher critic Del. Eleanor Holmes Norton (D-D.C.) said that opponents would continue the fight using all means available. "We are working with senators to take full advantage of Senate rules in order to take vouchers out of our appropriation," Norton said in a statement relayed by her chief of staff, Julia Hudson.

Randall Moody, chief lobbyist for the 2.7-million-member National Education Association, called the Republican tactics unconscionable.

"We've encouraged the senators to filibuster it. . . . We'll be counting votes and asking our supporters to consider doing that to hold the thing up," he said.

Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist (R-Tenn.) reiterated his support for the voucher plan, including changes made to the plan this summer to win support from Democratic Sen. Dianne Feinstein (Calif.). Those changes include language that would bar the private and parochial schools participating in the voucher program from engaging in religious discrimination against students.

"Senator Frist still feels very strongly that D.C. Choice should be enacted and in particular the Feinstein language. He hopes that can be accomplished this year, and the omnibus hopefully will be enacted late next week," Frist spokeswoman Amy Call said in a statement Friday.

Other parts of the District budget bill remain in dispute. Williams has asked for line-item veto authority over District public schools spending, a change that city officials have said may not happen this year because of House opposition.

The Senate is seeking to overcome House GOP opposition to ending two prohibitions on the District's spending of locally raised tax dollars. One of those bans prevents the District from spending on drug-needle exchange programs to combat AIDS and other diseases, and the other bars lobbying of Congress for statehood or voting representation.
The Senate also opposes a House proposal that would force the District to drop its support of a lawsuit brought by several states seeking to hold gunmakers financially liable for the government costs of gun violence.