State won’t ask for charter school funding to be returned

The state’s nine charter schools won’t have to return the nearly $1.8 million they’ve already received from Washington state, according to the state Office of the Superintendent of Public Instruction (OSPI).

The state Supreme Court on Thursday declined to reconsider its September ruling that declared the voter-approved charter school law unconstitutional. Monthly payments had been flowing to the schools while requests for reconsideration were pending with the court.

Whether the charters will also receive the more than $700,000 in funding for November is still up in the air, and it’s unclear when state payments to the schools will cease altogether, said OSPI spokesman Nathan Olson.

He said clarification on that issue could come next week.

Maggie Meyers, spokeswoman for the Washington State Charter Schools Association, said her group’s legal experts are analyzing the Supreme Court ruling and waiting for the justices to issue a formal mandate to the originating King County Superior Court. That court would then issue a final order.

“Until an order is issued by a lower court, we believe these remain public charter schools and as such are entitled to their public apportionment dollars,” Meyers said.

In addition to the enrollment-based funding already paid to the schools, the state has sent more than $20,000 to the Spokane School District — the only district in the state that volunteered to become a charter school authorizer. Spokane has two charter schools.

The state has also paid out more than $120,000 to the Washington State Charter School Commission, the appointed body which authorized and oversees the state’s other seven charter schools, including the three in Tacoma.

The Supreme Court ruled Sept. 4 that the charter school law approved by voters in 2012 was unconstitutional, primarily because the schools are governed by boards that are appointed rather than elected.

Several parties asked the high court to reconsider its decision, including the state charter school association, state Attorney General Bob Ferguson, a bipartisan group of 10 legislators and four former state attorneys general. But a slim majority — five of the court’s nine justices — rebuffed that request on Thursday.

Charter advocates are now focused on the legislative session that begins in January, where they’ll ask lawmakers for changes they believe would allow public funding for the privately managed charter schools to pass the constitutional test.

This story was originally published November 20, 2015 at 7:39 PM with the headline "State won’t ask for charter school funding to be returned."