Charter schools have hit a brick wall in the state legislature, so much so that legislators will risk forgoing up to $700 million in new federal money until something is done about the issue of charter and New York City district schools sharing space.

Yesterday's New York Times (here) mentioned this issue by quoting Assembly Speaker Sheldon Silver who made clear it that charter placement in district buildings has become a contentious problem to the point where, as he put it, "[legislators] who were supporters of charters previously have become anti-charter." No one should assume the Speaker is spinning. That's not his style.

More Anti-charter Bills Proposed
The response of several legislators to the co-location issue is to try and stop new chartering altogether. State Senator Bill Perkins and Assemblyman Keith Wright, for example, recently introduced similar bills that would place localized charter caps in areas where more than 5 percent of of the community's students are enrolled in charter schools, among other malevolent provisions.

Similarly, Assemblyman Ron Canestrari of Albany and Senator Antoine Thompson of Buffalo proposed a bill that would require the local school board to approve new charters and renewals of existing charter schools. What is particularly obnoxious about this bill is that there is no space-sharing problem outside of New York City, so Messrs. Canestrari and Thompson are simply showing their true colors in protecting failed districts that will not fix themselves, thereby relegating thousands of young people to inferior opportunities. This is hardly a progressive act by these two.

All these efforts are designed to deny charter school opportunities to families and communities, and to protect the system--and the adults connected to that system--that is cheating those same families out of a quality public education, which is the very reason so many such families have sought charter school opportunities.

The Real Answer - Facilities Aid for Charters
What can be done, particularly about the co-location issue in New York City? This is clearly the major hurdle in the current charter school stalemate.

First and foremost, charter schools should be provided funding for facilities. Charter schools do not get facilities aid. This inequity in New York has rendered charter school students as second-class citizens and should not be tolerated any longer. For all the acrimony in the legislature toward the Bloomberg administration for placing charter schools in district buildings, the Mayor and Schools Chancellor Joel Klein are merely trying to overcome the absence of facilities funding for charters that the legislature has refused to appropriate after 11 years.

And what of the teacher unions and their letterhead organizations they finance like Alliance for Quality Education? For years they've demanded fiscal equity for New York City schools and urban areas with acute educational needs, yet they are perfectly at ease to see charter students in those same cities get far less funding from the neglect of facilities aid.

If the legislature can provide some funding stream for charter facilities, charter schools would be less dependent on the City for district space. It's as simple as that. Rather than trying to deny new charter school opportunities to students, policymakers should be focused on enabling those schools to put their own roof over their heads. It's a win-win solution: charters would have equitable funding to be less dependent for space; and the facility quarrels in Harlem and elsewhere would dissipate.

Can NYS "Afford" Charter Facilities Aid?
The natural question arises, can the state afford to fund charter facilities in these challenging fiscal times? The answer is, in fact, yes - beginning with competing for Race to the Top funding from the federal government and putting some of it toward charter facilities. Over time, the state can assume a greater responsibility for this as the economy improves and the state's finances recover.

Finally, I am not at all dismissive or disrespectful of the local pressure on legislators resulting from contentious disputes over district facilities. But charter students and others that want charter schools are constituents, too, and they deserve equality of resources. Rather than denying a better public education that charter schools can bring more urban families (many of whom are on charter waiting lists), we should lower the volume and work together to find facilities funding that would benefit charter and district students alike.

Peter Murphy
for The Chalkboard
(see me Twitter @ "PeterMurphy26")