Fla. House OKs bill funneling $200M to charter schools

TALLAHASSEE — A package of education proposals tied to the state budget, including one creating a program to encourage charter schools to set up near academically troubled traditional schools, passed the House on Thursday amid heated clashes.

The most controversial bill, creating what Republicans call the “Schools of Hope” program (HB 5105), passed on a party-line vote, 77-40, after about three hours of debate. The program and the House’s budget plan for the year that begins July 1 would funnel $200 million toward qualifying charter schools.

The legislation is aimed at encouraging nonprofit charter school operators with track records of high performance among low-income students to open campuses in areas where traditional public schools have received “D” or “F” grades on state report cards for more than three consecutive years.

Supporters say the bill would help children and their parents escape failing schools that have proven incapable of turning around. But opponents slammed the legislation as part of a long-running trend toward giving charter-school operators greater influence in the state’s public education system. Charter schools are public schools operated by private groups that do not have to adhere to all the same rules as traditional public schools.

“This is not a school of hope,” said Rep. Barbara Watson, D-Miami Gardens. “This is a Band-Aid that has a sore festering underneath it.”

One critic — Rep. Patrick Henry, D-Daytona Beach — said the bill hearkened back to the “separate but unequal” days of legalized segregation. Democrats suggested the bill would only help those students who left the traditional public schools.

“We may save some of those children, but I guarantee you, you won’t save all of those children,” said Rep. Ramon Alexander, D-Tallahassee “So this is, in my opinion, the ‘Most Children Left Behind Act.’”

But Republicans argued that Democrats were in the thrall of the state’s main teachers union, the Florida Education Association, and were less interested in looking out for children and parents.

“They want an option,” Rep. Ross Spano, R-Dover, said of parents in the areas affected by the program. “They don’t care what it is. ... They just want education for their kids.”

So far, the Senate has not adopted the charter school legislation proposed by the House, instead alloc ating more money to the main formula for funding public education.

S e n a t e P r e s i d e n t J o e N e g r o n , R- S t u a r t , s a i d Wednesday that he is sympathetic to the House legislation, but said the Senate would also like to see some of its priorities considered by the House.