Is a publicly funded charter school truly a public school?

The Zoning Commission has a hearing scheduled for May 11th, at 6:30 p.m. on a proposed text amendment to the Zoning Regulations that defines a charter school as a public school related to zoning regulations. See Case 06-06, Charter Schools -- Text Amendment, which was initiated by the Office of Planning.

Public schools are for the most part "matter of right" land uses, which means that few if any opportunities for the public to weigh in on the matter are provided through the zoning or building regulations.

I have to presume that the intent of the public school treatment of "matter of right" in zoning regulations has to do with the fact that public schools have a publicly elected school board and a generally public process (if contentious) for dealing with school administration and site matters. There are ample opportunities for citizens to weigh in on decisions of the DC Public School System.

This is absolutely not the case for Charter Schools.

1. The DC Public Charter School Board is not elected by the Citizens of the District of Columbia. This Board (as well as the DCPS School Board in some situations) has oversight over charter schools, and sanctions the creation (or dissolution) of the majority of charter schools operating in the city.
2. Each individual charter school is a private, albeit non-profit corporation, with a privately appointed board of trustees.
3. While for the most part (but not completely) charter schools are funded by public funds and enjoy access to lower cost municipal bond funding, the buildings are considered to be owned by the nonprofit corporation, not the Citizens of the District of Columbia, who for the most part have no legal call on the assets of these otherwise private, but publicly-funded institutions.
4. DC citizens do not have voting rights with regard to the nomination or selection of trustees of individual charter schools.
5. There are no mandated public reporting and meeting requirements for charter school creation and provisioning outside of what is normally required under zoning regulations or the normal chartering process.

While creating and extending educational opportunities is good public policy, allowing fundamentally private institutions to enjoy the matter of right provisions earned by government agencies that for the most part are open to public scrutiny is a mistake and should not be approved.

This further privatizes public functions and takes away from citizens involvement and participation in some of the most basic aspects of civic life--monitoring the practice and spending of local government.

Index Keywords: zoning; civic-engagement