A tie vote at the Statehouse means the first day of school is a decision left to your local school board. Oldenburg Senator Jean Leising’s bill would have forbidden schools from kicking off the school year before the first Monday in August. Senators deadlocked 25-25. That would have meant Suzanne Crouch’s first tiebreaker vote as lieutenant governor. But Crouch is absent due to the death of her mother, and it was the last day for the Senate to pass its bills.