July 18, 2007

CHARTER SCHOOLS AND THE $800,000? What is it all ...

House Bill 1-A is New Hampshire’s state budget for Fiscal Year 2008 and Fiscal Year 2009. (For schools, the fiscal year is July 1, 2007, to June 30, 2009).

The “total appropriation for Education (budget category 04) is:
$1,458,949,429 for FY 2008, and
$1,470,180,444 for FY 2008.

The “education” portion of this budget tome begins on page 449. And on page 468 we find the line item attracting so much attention: Line Number 04 03 03 01 27 (a section on curriculum & instruction, which seems rather inappropriate for an entire school program) 97 (Charter School Supp. Grants. And line 04 03 03 01 27 97 includes $400,000 for FY 2008 and $400,000 for FY 2009.

Ah, but there is an asterisk—a foot note. And the foot note says: *The State Board of Education shall develop criteria for the eligibility for and disbursement of supplemental grants to charter schools which have exhausted their federal start-up grant funds, giving priority to elementary level charter schools in the distribution of supplemental grants. Such criteria shall be submitted to the fiscal committee of the general court for review and approval. Upon approval, the commissioner of the department of Education shall disburse the supplemental funds to eligible charter schools.

What are the details, here?
1. First, three schools advanced a request for transitional grants—2 charter high schools and 1 charter elementary school. The charter elementary school had political favor. The charter elementary school did the most lobbying about its situation. And so the budget note suggests the one elementary school be favored.

2. Unlike what the papers said, and what the legislators described, the $400,000 for FY 2009 was not relocated to the FY 2008 budget. All the reports suggested that all $800,000 available for charter school grants over the 2 years was repositioned into the first year, FY 2008.

3. A “change” is that the last budget considered this line item for “seed grants.” The budget committee was committed last year to re-instituting these grants to show state support for new charter schools, and budgeted $100,000 per new school to assist with start-up costs. But this budget committee has renamed the grants “SUPP GRANTS” which must mean “Supplemental grants” or “Support Grants.” Either is a good start at fixing charter school funding. The system needs: 1) state aid, fairly distributed as with other schools, and 2) a supplemental grant to make up for no local revenue because state-authorized charter schools are theoretically the charter schools that are NOT tied primarily to one school district.

4. There is a section of charter school law that governs these grants. The first sentences in statute related to these grants states: State funds shall be provided in addition to any other sums provided by the state. Grants under this section shall be administered and determined by the state board of education which shall have the authority to develop a grant application, written procedures and criteria used to determine eligibility for grants, and procedures for the administration of grants by recipients, including reporting requirements. (RSA 194-B: 11). So far so good.

5. The footnote mentions authority for disbursing grants by the state board of education and the statute gives authority to the state board of education. No conflict here.

Another part of statute states: The total grants provided under this program shall not exceed the amount of money appropriated in the budget, or transferred, or provided by gift or grant to the state for this purpose (RSA 194-B: 11). This section implies that the total grants awarded cannot exceed the appropriate (currently $400,000) but suggests money can be transferred. So: 1) will the $400,000 from FY 2009 be transferred into FY 2008, or 2) would there be another source of transfer that brings in enough grant money for ALL schools that lost federal funding this year.

Because on June 27th, the same date that this budget was signed, at least 3 other schools learned on that very day that they also would lose approved federal grants because New Hampshire’s Department of Education could no longer be a provider of the approved federal grant funds.

Now what do you think about all of this?