RALEIGH — Much of the mainstream media has been quick to identify the shortcomings of North Carolina’s public charter schools. But when legislators, special interest groups, and state education officials undermine charter school operations or funding, it can be difficult to find a media outlet willing to cover the story. It is almost as if the media is complicit in a coordinated campaign to discredit charter schools. Nah, that would make me a cynic.
Of course, it is difficult to avoid cynicism when it comes to state government. Gov. Bev Perdue claimed that the budget made “critical investments” in public education, a claim that may be valid only if one excludes the state’s public charter schools. Indeed, Perdue signed a budget that makes “critical divestments” in public education by allowing school systems to withhold certain categories of funds from charter schools.
Then again, most people would not consider Perdue or the Democratic political machine in Raleigh to be charter school advocates. After all, they pushed a bill through the legislature that creates make-believe charter schools, sorry, “charter-like innovative, autonomous schools.” (Please accept my apology. It has been increasingly difficult to keep track of the charter-like schools in North Carolina. Our state’s application for federal Race to the Top funds also includes phrases such as “charter-like schools without charters” and “charter-like school settings” that presumably have meaning.)
Obviously, charter-like schools do not have the charter-likeness to be subject to the same punitive financial provisions that state lawmakers imposed on real charter schools in this year’s budget. According to state data, charter schools already spend an average of $1,100 per pupil less than the typical district school. This gap likely will widen in the new fiscal year.
What is particularly shady about the budget provisions is that legislative leaders did not explicitly mention charter schools. Instead, they targeted the “local current expense” fund. According to state statute, charter schools are entitled to an equal per pupil share of funds contained in the local current expense fund. The budget states that various sources of revenue are “not construed as a local current expense appropriation.” Therefore, these funds are off-limits to charter schools.
The fair distribution of local current expense funds was the subject of an important 2007 lawsuit, Sugar Creek Charter School et al. v. The Charlotte-Mecklenburg Board of Education. Plaintiffs alleged that the district withheld funds that it was obliged to allocate to charter schools within its jurisdiction.
Recently, a three-judge N.C. Court of Appeals panel ruled that the school system unlawfully withheld reserve fund balances, Hurricane Katrina relief funds, sales tax reimbursements, preschool program funds, donations for specific programs, and capital reimbursements to the tune of $1.3 million. By design, the new budget will keep this revenue away from charter schools statewide.
This is not the first (nor will it be the last) attempt to starve charter schools. Shortly after the unanimous appellate ruling in the Sugar Creek case, brazen officials representing the state’s Department of Public Instruction and Local Government Commission recommended that school districts use an accounting procedure to keep funds away from charter schools. They called it Fund 8. The budget passed by the General Assembly legitimizes their accounting trick. Perhaps Fund 0 is a more appropriate name.
A separate budget provision denies charter schools a share of funds from the N.C. Education Lottery. School districts will be allowed to use the projected $114 million in lottery funds, originally set aside for school facilities, to fund classroom teacher positions.
Charter schools do not receive funds for facilities, but budget writers excluded charters from receiving a portion of these lottery funds for classroom teachers. House Minority Leader Paul “Skip” Stam had this provision stripped out of the House budget, only to find it magically reappear in the final budget.
At this point, there is no reliable estimate of how much money budget writers blocked from charter schools. There are two ways to look at it. Either Perdue and the majority of legislators dislike charter schools because of legitimate public policy concerns, or they do the bidding of powerful special interest organizations like the North Carolina Association of Educators. Obviously, these perspectives are not mutually exclusive, but the cynic in me is inclined to choose the latter.
Terry Stoops is director of education studies at the John Locke Foundation.