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TEXAS AFT LEGISLATIVE HOTLINE--WEDNESDAY, NOVEMBER 4,
2009
Call Congress Tomorrow for Real Health-Care Reform! In football terms, tomorrow begins the fourth quarter of the national battle to provide affordable health care for all. We're marking the occasion by kicking off a new campaign of phone calls to members of the U.S. House, who are poised to begin voting on the big health-care overhaul as early as Friday. We urge all Texas AFT members to call their representative in the U.S. House tomorrow via the toll-free line to Congress provided by the national AFL-CIO, 1-877-323-5246, or on the American Federation of Teachers' toll-free number, 1-866-327-8670. Just ask the operator to put you through to your representative. (Not sure who represents you? Go to www.fyi.legis.state.tx.us and plug in your street address to find out.) Your message should be quick and to the point: Just ask your member of the U.S. House to support: Vote for real health-care reform now! Real health-care reform means:
In Dallas ISD, members of our Alliance-AFT affiliate made unprecedented volunteer efforts in school-board races that had been delayed by six months thanks to a failed attempt by incumbent board members to extend their own terms. Alliance-AFT's endorsed candidates made good showings in three races, taking the lead going into two runoffs and coming in a strong second in a third contest against an entrenched incumbent. In Houston ISD, members of the Houston Federation of Teachers and the Houston Educational Support Personnel Union, our two HISD affiliates, teamed up to mount a forceful campaign, pushing the board president into a runoff for one seat and vaulting their endorsed candidate into the lead going into the runoff for an open seat. Upcoming hotlines will report additional results of yesterday's election from around the state, including the outcome of tax-rate ratification elections that have been required since 2006 when school districts want to increase their tax rate above a low threshold rate set by the legislature. Education Chief Claims Authority to Lift State Cap on Charters: Texas Commissioner of Education Robert Scott has a history of trying to stretch the scope of his authority beyond limits established by the legislature, and he's at it again. This time he claims the authority to waive a state cap on the number of charters that can be issued by the State Board of Education to operate charter schools. The cap is fixed at 215 by Texas Education Code Section 12.101(b), and legislation to change it was defeated in the Texas legislature just five months ago. But Commissioner Scott now contends that an "informal" advisory letter he has secured from the state attorney general backs the claim that Scott can waive the statutory cap at his own discretion. Texas AFT has obtained a copy of the letter, and it is a slender reed indeed for the commissioner to rely upon in attempting to depart from the plain language of state law. Clearly the commissioner has his own doubts; yesterday, after asserting this purported waiver authority, in his next breath Scott said he would hesitate to use it until the legislature has a chance to review the issue in its next session in 2011. In the meantime, though, the commissioner intends to change the way he handles requests from holders of some of the existing charters to expand their operations--and this too he refers to as "removing the cap" on charters. In this case, though, there is no cap to lift. State law already allows holders of charters to seek a revision of their charter to create additional campuses operating under the same charter, subject to the commissioner's approval. Hence this second version of "removing the cap" announced by the commissioner yesterday sounds more like a decision on his part to grant blanket approval, in advance, to expansion plans of charter operators whose existing schools meet his definition of "high performance." However, the commissioner may still be constrained more than he thinks by requirements of existing law that govern the alteration of existing charters. It's worth noting here that last May the bill to ease charter expansion failed in part because it included a controversial amendment to state law authorizing charter holders to expand without prior approval of the commissioner. One motivation for the commissioner's awkward attempts to remove limits on charter expansion is clearly coming from the federal level. U.S. Secretary of Education Arne Duncan has proposed rules for issuance of so-called "Race to the Top" grants that would make states ineligible if they have caps on the number of charter schools. Texas AFT has objected to that proposed eligibility requirement, as has our national affiliate, the American Federation of Teachers, because the weight of the evidence tilts strongly against the idea that charter proliferation delivers educational improvement. Only a minority of charter schools nationwide have excelled; a large percentage, nationally and in Texas, have performed less well than traditional public schools. If Commissioner Scott feels the need to tell the feds that Texas should be eligible for "Race to the Top" grants because the state doesn't cap charter schools, he doesn't really have to twist words in state law to do so. He can just point out his power to approve additional campuses operated by holders of existing charters. And he can point out that there really is no limit at all under state law on the number of one kind of state charter--namely, charters held by public institutions of higher education. The cap of 215 does not apply to these. |
