State has paid millions to charter schools since SRC suspended the code
by Dale Mezzacappa on Dec 13 2013 Posted in Latest news
The Pennsylvania Department of Education revealed today that it has directly paid more than $3.7 million in disputed per pupil allotments to six Philadelphia charter schools this fall. That's $3.7 million in expected state aid the School District won't be receiving.
The state's payments to charters appear to defy an August decison of the School Reform Commission, suspending the part of the school code that required the state to make such payments when there is a disagreement between a charter and a district about how much the district should pay them.
The SRC action was designed to allow the District to control charter growth -- to impose enrollment caps -- so it could plan financially. But the issue of whether the District can limit a charter's enrollment has long been the object of legal and political wrangling between Philadelphia and its charters.
When the state pays charters directly in a dispute over students, it withholds an equal amount from its subsidy to the chartering district. Districts pay charter schools on a per pupil basis, and Philadelphia was anticipating paying $675 million to charters this year, not counting transportation costs.
According to a spreadsheet obtained from PDE, the state has directly paid more than $5.1 million to 10 charters this year because of disputed enrollment numbers. Nearly $1 million of that was to reconcile underpayments from the 2012-13 school year. Another $516,000 was paid in July and August to Walter D. Palmer Leadership Learning Partners Charter, which has been the most aggressive in seeking direct payments as a result of disputes with the District. Palmer has taken the District to court, and so far has prevailed in most legal rulings in the ongoing