We earlier reported that Massachusetts Governor Mitt Romney had vetoed a one-year moratorium on new charter schools, but that it looked like the General Assembly would have the two-thirds majority needed to overturn Romney's veto. (See Gadfly, Volume 4, Number 25 for more). We're thrilled to have been wrong. This week, in what the Boston Globe calls a "rare show of solidarity" with the governor, the Massachusetts House voted 78-77 to sustain the veto. According to the Globe, lawmakers were "swayed by a plan to relieve the financial burden that charter-school funding has imposed on traditional public schools." (Specifically, opponents of the moratorium worked out a plan whereby a charter school's per-student payment would be based on the actual cost of educating that child, rather than the current method, which bases charter school funding on a per-student average in the local school district, including special education and bilingual students. It's too soon to know whether that new formula will deal a grave fiscal blow to the Bay State's existing charters.) Now charter supporters in New England must hope that the Rhode Island General Assembly will follow Massachuetts's lead. Last month, lawmakers in the Ocean State successfully slipped a charter-school moratorium into the state budget. Governor Donald L. Carcieri vetoed the budget July 1. Now the ball is back in the legislature's court.
"Romney backed on charter schools," by Scott S. Greenberger, Boston Globe, July 21, 2004
"Rhode Island needs these experiments," Ron Wolk, Providence Journal, July 14, 2004 (registration required)
"Moratoriums on charters must go," by Julia Steiny, Providence Journal, July 11, 2004 (registration required)