Charter Schools May Get Access to School District Bond Proceeds Under Measure Cleared by Senate Ed Committee

The state's 150 charter schools may find it easier to share school district bond proceeds if a bill cleared Thursday by a Senate committee becomes law.

Under current law, public charter schools have no voice in the process by which the state's school districts decide on the facilities priorities to be financed by the issuance of bonds.

SB 176 would change that by requiring school districts to include charter school representatives on facilities planning committees.

Sen. Nancy Spence, R-Centennial and the lead sponsor of the bill, says this provision will give charters a "shot at a place in the cue."

"When bond issues are discussed, charter schools aren’t even on the radar screen," she said. "School districts probably have a monthly meeting of the facilities planning committee and charter schools can begin to become aware of the needs of the entire district with regard to buildings, the typical stuff that’s on the bond call."

The measure would also require districts to place charter schools within their boundaries on the priority list for new facility construction or repair or remodeling of existing facilities on the basis of the criteria set forth in state law for traditional public schools.

Stacy Rivera, a spokesperson for the Colorado League of Charter Schools, said the provision requiring that priority be given to charter facilities meeting the criteria of last year's Building Excellent Schools Act might make it hard for some fast-growing, newer charter schoolsto gain access to bond proceeds.

"I think that is a concern, and I’ve heard from some charter school parents that feel that this is not the solution for them," Rivera said.

But Spence thinks the use of the BEST criteria for inclusion in bond offerings is necessary to assure that charters in the most need of improvements to guarantee safe and functional facilities have access to capital.

"Up until now there wasn’t standard criteria for accessing capital money," Spence said. "I know there are charter schools that are in storefronts, sometimes in warehouses, and I think the needs of these charter schools are the same as the districts. It at least gives them some base for explaining their needs.”

Rivera said that one potential continuing concern with SB 176 is that it does not include any incentive that would encourage school districts to include charter facilities in their list of capital projects financed by bond proceeds.

But Spence said she is hopeful that the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act, the massive federal stimulus bill signed into law in Denver by President Barack Obama last month, will provide some money for charter school construction.

"I think we might see that down the road," Spence said. "We’re meeting with the governor on Wednesday to hear what he has in mind for some of that stimulus money."

The Senate Education Committee held the bill over after a Feb. 26 hearing in order to seek greater consensus on its provisions.

Advocates for traditional public schools were uncomfortable with the original version of the bill, which essentially required the districts to include charters in their bond offerings.

Spence decided to change the mandatory nature of the bill into the process-oriented measure that was approved Thursday.

Rivera said that charter school advocates had engaged in lengthy discussions with representatives of school districts and school executives before the first hearing on the measure.

“I got the impression that day that, literally, the different organizations that have been at the table on this bill were making changes up to the eleventh hour,” Rivera said.

Despite those discussions, representatives of the Colorado Association of School Boards and the Colorado Association of School Executives opposed the bill at the February hearing.

The bill now heads for the Senate floor.

Controversial Measure Giving Some Immigrant Kids In-State College Tuition Eligibility Advances in Senate

A controversial bill that would allow immigrant kids who have spent three years in Colorado to pay resident tuition rates at the state's colleges and universities cleared a Senate committee Thursday.

SB 170 would not permit students who entered the United States in violation of federal immigration laws to receive Colorado Opportunity Fund grants, as other students who pay in-state tuition rates can, and specifies that those students would not be eligible for state-awarded financial aid.

College Opportunity Fund grants provide $2,000 vouchers that can be used to pay in-state tuition.

Nevertheless, Republicans on the Senate Education Committee attacked the measure as one that rewards illegal behavior and deludes immigrant kids into believing they have a future in the United States.

"Your bill fosters false hope," Sen. Keith King, R-Colorado Springs, told sponsoring Sen. Chris Romer, D-Denver, during the five-hour hearing. "It doesn’t matter if they have a four-year degree or not. They are going to be deported."

Sen. Nancy Spence, R-Centennial, said the bill amounts to "creeping amnesty."

But Democrats argued that a college education is valuable no matter where an immigrant child ends up living and that offering educational opportunities will reduce crime, substance abuse and other socially destructive behaviors.

"I think you build great societies by offering hope," Romer said. "When you offer people hopelessness, they do hopeless things."

Senate president Peter Groff, D-Denver, also argued that the bill ensures that the state is not punishing children for the crimes of their parents.

He said the bill involves a "moral issue."

Romer modified his original proposal to require beneficiaries of the bill to file an affidavit stating they would apply for U.S. citizenship before the committee approved SB 170 on a 5-3 party-line vote.

Despite opposition from GOP legislators, Romer's proposal has support from several prominent Republican businessmen. Colorado Rockies co-owner Dick Monfort testified in support of the bill, as did prominent energy industry executive Alex Cranberg.

The measure is also supported by the Colorado Education Association and Colorado Association of School Executives.

Approval of SB 170 came one day before the House Appropriations Committee approved another bill that would grant in-state tuition eligibility to armed forces veterans.

Romer's bill now heads to the Senate floor, where a partisan fight is expected.

Ten other states have enacted similar legislation.

House Gives Preliminary Nod to Teacher Identifier Pilot Project

Some of the state's teachers and principals will be assigned a tracking number, and the academic achievements of their students correlated with those educators' years of experience and other personal information, under a bill given preliminary approval by the House Tuesday.

HB 1065 would create a pilot project, to be employed in at least three of the state's school districts, that would aim to use information about educators' training, experience, and professional continuing education affect their performance.

The bill is not controversial, at least not publicly. It was recommended by the Quality Teachers Commission in a report issued last summer.

According to that report, the identifier program should not be used to punish a teacher or principal or play any role in their job evaluations. HB 1065 includes language stating that "the data obtained from the pilot program shall not be used to negatively sanction individual educators."

The Quality Teachers Commission is to recommend whether to expand the program to all of Colorado's school districts and make it permanent by the end of 2010.

The Quality Teachers Commission was created by the legislature in 2007.

HB 1065 is sponsored by Rep. Debbie Benefield, D-Arvada, and Sen. Nancy Spence, R-Centennial.

Senate Says "Yes" To Bill Requiring New School Buses to Have Seat Belts

Students on the state's school buses may soon have to buckle their seat belts.

A bill passed by a Senate committee today mandates that new additions to Colorado's fleet of school buses would have to be equipped with seat belts.

SB 29, sponsored by Senate majority leader Brandon Shaffer of Longmont, cleared the Senate Transportation Committee with two GOP members joining the Democrats in support.

Shaffer secured committee approval of his bill after easing a provision that would have required buses purchased within the last five years to be retro-fitted with seat belts.

As amended, the bill applies to all buses purchased after June 30, 2010. On June 30, 2014 a requirement that all buses purchased after June 30, 2004 have seat belts installed in them would take effect.

The committee action came despite opposition to the bill from the Colorado Association of Secondary Schools and the Colorado Association of Elementary School Principals.

Kevin Schott, the principal of Basalt High School, told the committee that the bill would raise school district expenses and that the results could be a reduction in the number of available school bus routes and the capacity of each bus.

The committee also heard testimony from the mother of the last child to die in a school bus accident in Colorado.

Rose Swemby said that her son, Kevin, would likely have survived a 1989 crash in which several dozen other students were injured if the school bus in which he had been riding had been equipped with seat belts.

The measure would require school bus drivers to attend training in the use of safety belts and to instruct students riding on buses how to use the seat belts.

The GOP's Nancy Spence, a veteran Centennial legislator who is often a leading Republican voice on education issues, voted "no" on the bill.

SB 29 now heads to the Senate floor.

Kevin Swemby was 11 years old when he died in that accident.

Charter School Bill Killed by Senate Committee

A bill that would have opened the door to several innovative ways of financing charter school construction was killed by a Senate committee Tuesday.

SB 155 was shot down on a 4-3 party-line vote despite the sponsor's acceptance of an amendment that removed controversial provisions that would have allowed metropolitan districts to build schools.

The Senate Local Government and Energy Committee shot down the measure proposed by Sen. Keith King, R-Colorado Springs, after hearing testimony against it by Jane Urschel of the Colorado Association of School Boards, Aurora Public Schools superintendent John Barry and Bruce Caughey of the Colorado Association of School Executives.

The metropolitan district provision of the bill would have allowed the organizations formed by developers to pay for subdivision infrastructure, which collect property taxes, to build charter schools on land donated by developers to school districts but which the districts do not want. The metropolitan districts would have been given permission to contract with charter school operators to run the schools.

King said his proposal was "innovative" and that it would help school districts avoid the need for new bonds to pay for necessary schools. King argued that some districts are approaching their bonding limits and cannot afford to build schools at a pace fast enough to keep up with rising population.

But Urschel told the committee that the state's school boards did not want to see their authority lessened and that state law already provides enough opportunities to build additional charter school facilities.

Barry said that opening the door to charter construction authority by entities not under the control of his district would compromise "long-term planning."

Two other bills affecting charter school construction, SB 89 and SB 176, are still being considered.

According to Education News Colorado,

The issue of funding charter school facilities will surface again Thursday, when the Senate Education Committee considers Senate Bill 09-089, and yet again on Feb. 18, when that panel hears Senate Bill 09-176.

SB 09-089 is a general rewrite of laws affecting the state Charter School Institute, which oversees charters that aren’t under the jurisdiction of individual district boards. The bill would exempt the institute from some state purchasing rules, allow the institute to approve “alternative school” charters anywhere in the state and change the charter funding formula, including putting some money into a charter construction fund.

While the bill killed Tuesday was sponsored only by King, the institute bill includes two Democratic sponsors, including Rep. Karen Middleton, D-Aurora, as House prime sponsor.

SB 09-176 addresses charter construction funding more directly, and it contains lots of provisions that will spark opposition. It would require school boards to give their charters advance notice of possible bond issues, remove a district’s power to review charters’ bond requests, basically require districts to include charter projects in bond issues and removes the current requirement that charter buildings revert to a district if a charter closes or can’t pay its debt.

Its sole sponsor right now is Sen. Nancy Spence, R-Centennial. But Spence told EdNews Tuesday that Senate President Peter Groff, D-Denver, asked her to carry the bill. Groff, who represents an inner-city district, is a charter supporter who’s sometimes at odds with Democrats who hold more traditional views about education. Groff also sits on Senate Ed.

GOP Legislators Attack Salazar's Stand on Energy Development

Several GOP state legislators attacked U.S. Sen. Ken Salazar's positions on energy development on federal lands yesterday, calling on him to be more accommodating to Bush Administration plans for more drilling on the western slope and off U.S. coasts.

Salazar has been a vocal critic of those administration plans, calling on the Departments of Interior and Agriculture, who manage federal lands, to be give more consideration of environmental impacts and to give less weight to gas prices at the pump.

"Ken Salazar has missed a golden opportunity to become Colorado's quarterback for common sense energy policy," Sen. Mike Kopp, R-Littleton, said. "He could be genuinely helping families meet their budgets for gas and utility bills, but I guess he would rather be a punter than a quarterback."

Salazar has opposed development on Colorado’s Roan Plateau and the Vermillion Basin. He has also opposed allowing environmental rules to be established so the feasibility of commercial oil shale production can be determined.

The Republicans' criticism of Colorado's junior senator was included in a letter sent to Salazar Wednesday by, among others, Kopp, senate minority leader Andy McElhany of Colorado Springs, and senate assistant minority leader Nancy Spence of Centennial.

Teacher Merit Pay Program Added to School Finance Bill by Senate

The Senate, sticking to its guns on a bipartisan bill to implement performance pay for teachers in Colorado, added an amendment creating the program to the annual school finance bill Thursday, sending a rebuke to the House after a committee of that chamber killed an independent bill on the subject.

Sens. Nancy Spence, R-Centennial, Sue Windels, D-Arvada, and Peter Groff, D-Denver, convinced their colleagues to add the substance of SB 65 to HB 1388. SB 65 had been killed in the House Appropriations Committee.

The pay plan would establish a $2 million fund to help launch efforts by school districts to cultivate and retain teachers based on their performance.

SB 65 aimed to make $2 million available in seed money to all Colorado school districts for programs that those districts design to reward their teachers. The bill set some basic criteria, such as that the programs must be designed to help close the achievement gap between different groups of students. However, any district applying for some of the seed money would be free to come up with a specific program that best addressed its circumstances.

Denver Public Schools recently implemented a performance-pay program on its own, and Douglas County Schools also have such a plan in place.

Gov. Bill Ritter has indicated his support for Spence's proposal to implement performance pay programs for public school teachers.

House Clears Resolution Calling for Study of Merger of Departments of Education, Higher Education

The state's Departments of Education and Higher Education might end up being merged into one department if an interim committee created by a resolution cleared by the House Thursday makes it into the law books and the panel recommends that structural change to the executive branch.

HJR 1027 was approved on 56-6 vote Thursday. Opposition came only from two Republicans - Douglas Bruce of Colorado Springs and Ken Summers of Lakewood - and four Democrats - Anne McGihon of Denver, Karen Middleton of Aurora, Cherilyn Peniston of Westminster, and Nancy Todd of Aurora. Middleton is a former member of the state Board of Education and Todd and Peniston are former teachers.

The resolution now moves to the Senate. It is sponsored by Rep. Paul Weissman, D-Louisville, and Sen. Nancy Spence, R-Centennial.

Senate Passes "Textbook Affordability Act"

The Senate gave final approval Wednesday to a bill that would require the state's colleges to provide students information about the price of required textbooks and the amount of time expected to go by before the publisher revises the textbook.

SB 73 was approved on a 31-4 vote, with Republicans Bill Cadman of Colorado Springs, Nancy Spence of Centennial, and Tom Wiens of Castle Rock and Democrat Suzanne Williams of Aurora opposing it.

The measure now moves over to the House, where it is sponsored by Rep. John Kefalas, D-Fort Collins.

The Senate sponsor is Sen. Ron Tupa, D-Boulder.