Gov. Jim Doyle and state Assembly Speaker John Gard said Friday they wanted to push a deal raising the cap on Milwaukee's voucher program through the Legislature within the next two weeks, a deal that would bring some long-term stability to the city's precedent-setting and still-controversial education program if it wins approval from lawmakers.

But it was clear that both of them have some serious selling to do within their own parties. Some Republicans balked at an increase in funding of the state's class size reduction program called SAGE, and some Democrats complained because the agreement does not include property tax help for Milwaukee residents or because they opposed the plan's proposed changes to the voucher program.

Doyle, a Democrat, and Gard, a Republican, announced the agreement at a news conference that attracted many major voucher supporters to CEO Leadership Academy, a voucher school on the north side.

But within three hours, at two separate news conferences, Milwaukee Mayor Tom Barrett and a group of Democratic legislators criticized the plan for not including property tax help for the city, while leaders of the Milwaukee and the state teachers unions criticized the plan in its entirety.

If it is approved, the agreement will put to rest the heated debate over what to do about the program exceeding its legal enrollment limit, as well as some other long-simmering disputes affecting education in Milwaukee.

Both Doyle and Gard said they wanted to act before Monday, when the state Department of Public Instruction was expected to notify voucher schools of the number of seats they would be allotted for next year. Doyle said it was important to stop thousands of students from being forced out of their current schools, a possible outcome of a rationing plan to deal with the program reaching its cap.

The compromise clearly has some bi-partisan support. But a handful of lawmakers from both parties also criticized the deal on Friday - including Rep. Annette Polly Williams (D-Milwaukee) and state Sen. Glenn Grothman (R-West Bend).

Gard and Doyle said they are confident that the package will make it through the Legislature.

"It's not an agreement between (just him) and I," Gard said. "It's going to pass the Legislature without a doubt."

But state Sen. Scott Fitzgerald (R-Juneau), co-chair of the powerful Joint Committee on Finance, said, "I think there's going to be a huge blowup in the Legislature next week once people find out what's in it."

The deal would:

• Increase the cap on the Milwaukee Parental Choice Program by 7,500 students, to about 22,500.

• Increase funding for SAGE by $25 million statewide over two years - or about $12.5 million a year - but not starting until the 2008-'09 school year. About a third of that money would go to Milwaukee Public Schools and about two-thirds to schools elsewhere in the state.

• Require all schools participating in the program to get accreditation from an outside group, such as the North Central Association, the Wisconsin Religious and Independent Schools organization, or Marquette University's Institute for the Transformation of Learning.

• Require all voucher schools to administer a standardized test and report the scores to the Legislative Audit Bureau and for use in a proposed longitudinal study of the program.

• Change the eligibility requirements for the voucher program so students can remain in the program if their family income rises somewhat above the current limit, and eliminate the requirement that meant that some students can participate only if they previously attended an MPS school.

The choice program allows low-income families to send their kids to private schools using state-funded tuition vouchers. If the package becomes law, it will provide significant breathing room to a program that has already hit its cap of about 15,000 students. The program provides schools up to $6,351 per student currently, with more than $90 million in voucher payments expected this year.

Doyle said he and Gard "worked through some very difficult issues to come to this point." He said the package addresses many of his chief concerns, including greater accountability in the program, making sure current students aren't kicked out, and some financial relief to public schools in the form of increased SAGE funding.

Gard called the compromise an expansion of "hope and opportunity."

He said both sides "gave on things to try to help find the greater good."

Failing to reach a compromise would have been a political liability for both, given that thousands of families might have been kicked out of their current schools, and some long-established schools would likely have lost dozens, if not hundreds, of seats.

Showing that there will be at least some bipartisan support for the plan, lawmakers from strikingly different political persuasions stood behind Gard and Doyle at the announcement. They included State Rep. Leah Vukmir (R-Wauwatosa), a consistent advocate for lifting the cap, and state Rep. Christine Sinicki (D-Milwaukee).

Sinicki, a former Milwaukee School Board member, said she'd support the plan because of its accountability provisions and that the deal was the only realistic chance to get improved accountability.

Leaders of the Wisconsin Education Association Council and the Milwaukee Teachers Education Association deplored the compromise at their news conference.

"Vouchers are bad public policy," said Dennis Oulahan, president of the MTEA. "More and more, it (the program) is taking money away from the children who need it most."

Oulahan called the accountability provisions in the agreement "hollow promises" and said the agreement did not call for voucher students to take the state's standardized tests or for such steps as requiring that all teachers in voucher schools be licensed by the state or that the schools meet federal No Child Left Behind requirements.

Stan Johnson, president of the Wisconsin Education Association Council, called it "a sad day" and said, "We adamantly disagree with this proposal." He said the SAGE money is not guaranteed, and he objected that it does not go into effect until the 2008-'09 school year.

Michelle Nate, chief financial officer for Milwaukee Public Schools, echoed those concerns. "There does not appear to be anything in this deal that immediately benefits MPS students," she said. "The additional funding for SAGE is a promise, and that promise will not be realized until the next state budget."

GOP objections

Criticism came from Republicans for very different reasons.

Fitzgerald said he was not in favor at this point of approving the agreement because of the increase in SAGE spending, and he said he has a lot of doubts about SAGE.

Grothman said, "It's too bad we have to give the public schools another $12.5 million a year as a bribe for the governor to allow kids to go to the school of their choice."

The SAGE program provides extra state aid to schools with low-income students in exchange for agreeing to keep the size of kindergarten through third-grade classes at 15 students per teacher or less. The pact would increase the amount of money paid to schools from $2,000 per student to $2,250, a change sought by Doyle unsuccessfully in the past.

Howard Fuller, the director of the Institute for the Transformation of Learning, said the compromise "gives people like me an opportunity to spend time working on improving the schools."

Barrett and about a half dozen Democratic legislators from Milwaukee criticized the agreement for not including any change in voucher funding. Barrett has said often in recent weeks that it costs Milwaukee taxpayers an extra $1,000 every time a student chooses a voucher school over an MPS school, due to the different ways the programs are funded.

"I support the choice program; I support the public schools," he said. "But I cannot support a financing mechanism that punishes the taxpayers of the City of Milwaukee."

Doyle said the issue came up in negotiations, but he "couldn't stand on that and let kids be told they can't go to their schools next year." He added that he wants to address the issue in the next state budget. Gard said he had told Doyle that the mayor had "legitimate concerns" that ought to be addressed at budget time.

Doyle added that he hopes the increased accountability would be a way to protect students in the program and ensure that taxpayers' dollars are well spent. North Central and Wisconsin Religious and Independent Schools are already accrediting agencies. Under this package, the Institute for the Transformation of Learning would also move into that role.

Greg J. Borowski of the Journal Sentinel staff contributed material for this report.