First, a thank you to everyone who made calls and sent emails to members of the K-12 Education Finance Committee members in support of the compromise language to the Peterson Amendment.
Your calls and emails made an impact… so much so that an amendment to delete the entire Peterson Amendment was adopted by the Committee on an 11-9 Roll Call Vote. (The amendment to delete the entire Peterson Amendment was authored by Rep. Mark Buesgens.) The result was beyond expectations, but this is probably not the last time that the essence of the Peterson Amendment will be on the table during this legislative session - we have a very long way to go …. it is only March 12th and the session does not end until May 19th.
An amendment to undo the compromise on authorizer fees was also defeated on a Roll Call Vote, and the amendment on lease aid related to schools that have affiliated building companies was withdrawn – we promised to work with the author of that amendment to find an appropriate resolution to his concerns. We will keep you updated on this issue as the discussions progress.
The final action of the Committee on Tuesday was to layover the bill for consideration into the Omnibus Education Bill, which is normally the last bill enacted in the session.
Last Friday morning the Senate K-12 Education Subcommittee on Charters held a 3 hour hearing and heard five bills related to charter schools, including the MACS Bill, authored by Senator Linda Scheid.
A bill by Senator David Hann that would give charter schools a first offer to lease or buy through non-affiliated building companies excess public schools building raised a lot of discussion and questions about the general state policy regarding the use of vacant public buildings by other public and government entities.
On another bill, there was very disturbing testimony about the MN Internship Center Charter School in Minneapolis by four former teachers, a couple of whom were also former board members. These individuals made serious allegations about the governance, administration, personnel practices, and leasing arrangements of the school. There was a strong implication by these testifiers that these problems are the norm in charter schools and that the legislature needed to take action to protect teachers when they blow the whistle on violations of the law or report unethical behavior.
NOTE:
MN Statute 181, which is the general employment law for all employers other than traditional school districts and a couple of other exemptions, has been added in H.F. 935 to the list of required laws that charters must follow. We support this inclusion as this law already applies to charters, given that charters are employers - even though it is not currently explicitly stated in MN 124D.10. MN 181.932 provides whistle blower protection to an employee who reports a good faith violation of law to proper authorities. I would strongly encourage every charter school board to become familiar with MN Statute 181- remember, ignorance of the law is neither a defense nor bliss.
Latest Update
Yesterday afternoon Senator Saltzman released her subcommittee’s version of its charter reform and accountability bill ----- from a technical point of view it is a rather poorly crafted piece of legislation and from a content point of view it is a devastating piece of legislation that would fundamentally change the direction of Minnesota’s charter school law.
We will have more out to you later today on all of the components of the proposal and the first steps that need to be taken.
Eugene Piccolo