MMA Board votes to oppose charter school question

On June 14, the MMA Board of Directors voted unanimously to oppose a state ballot question that would increase the number of Commonwealth charter schools that could operate in Massachusetts.
 
The question before voters on Nov. 8 would allow the state Board of Elementary and Secondary Education to approve up to 12 new Commonwealth charter schools annually or expand existing schools with a yearly new enrollment limit of 1 percent of statewide students (about 9,500 students). The question would give priority to charter schools seeking to locate in school districts that rank in the lowest 25 percent in performance measurements.
 
According to the Department of Elementary and Secondary Education, there were 81 charter schools operating across the state for the 2015-2016 school year, with enrollment of about 40,000 students. Seventy-one of these are Commonwealth charter schools, which are separate from local public schools. The rest are Horace Mann charter schools, which are part of local school districts.
 
These numbers do not include new charters approved for the upcoming school year or the expansion of existing charters. There are seven municipal and regional school districts that are closed to new students in fiscal 2017 due to existing caps, according to DESE calculations. A dozen or so others are listed as “near cap.”
 
The MMA Board opposed the ballot question and similar legislation that would expand the charter school program because none of the proposals would help to mitigate the financial impact on local public schools of the method for funding charter schools and none would make the system more accountable and transparent to municipal officials and local taxpayers.
 
The Department of Elementary and Secondary Education has projected that assessments on cities, towns and regional school districts in fiscal 2017 to pay tuition to charter schools will total $537 million. As in prior years, these transfers of public dollars to charter schools would occur off-budget and not be appropriated as part of the state budget or any local budget.
 
Under state law, municipalities and school districts are entitled to temporary mitigation payments to ease the transition to less school aid for local public schools. For fiscal 2017, the DESE has projected the full funding amount to be $134 million, but the Legislature has appropriated just $81 million, leaving a shortfall of more than $50 million.
 
The MMA Board’s vote to oppose the charter school ballot question was based on a unanimous recommendation from the MMA’s Fiscal Policy Committee.
 
The text and summaries of this [15-31] and other proposed ballot questions can be found on the attorney general’s website (www.mass.gov/ago/government-resources/initiatives-and-other-ballot-questions/current-petitions-filed.html).