School Board Jeopardizes District’s Finances by Approving New Corporate Charter

At last night’s meeting of the Sacramento City Unified School’s Board of Education, the seven-member elected board continued to put the District at financial risk and further contribute to the District’s declining enrollment by approving a new independent, private, corporate charter school for an elementary school in the Rosemont area.  The board’s vote came just two weeks after the District staff presented a detailed assessment of the charter’s application in which it found a number of deficiencies that would have merited rejection of the charter.  In days, apparently with the District staff’s cooperation, the charter petitioner’s miraculously fixed its petition paving the way for the charter’s approval.   Only Board members Ellen Cochrane and Diana Rodriguez voted against the charter.  Darrel Woo made the motion to approve the charter, seconded by Board President Christina Pritchett.  Woo and Pritchett voted to approve, joined by Jay Hansen (who according the BEE received $30,000 in contributions from the Charter School association in his last election), Gustavo Arroyo and Jessie Ryan.  The new charter will begin operations in 2017, and is expected to begin with approximately 200, the vast majority who will be students already in the District.  The means a net reduction of approximately $2,000,000 in lost ADA based on an estimated $10,000 per pupil the District receives.