Vacant-schools bill clears panel

Stodola, Poore oppose giving charters 1st shot at buildings

The House Education Committee advanced a bill Monday giving charter schools first dibs on vacant school buildings, after Little Rock School District Superintendent Michael Poore and Little Rock Mayor Mark Stodola spoke against it.

Senate Bill 308, by Sen. Alan Clark, R-Lonsdale, would give charter schools a right to access unused or underutilized public school facilities. Charter schools would be able to buy or lease the facilities at "fair market value."

The bill advanced on a voice vote. It heads to the House for further consideration.

Rep. Mark Lowery, R-Maumelle, who presented the bill, said it is aimed at requiring reluctant districts to let vacant schools be used by charters. There are school boards that refuse to sell buildings to charter schools because they are seen as competition, he said.

"Charter schools are public schools and the shame of it is this whole battle over facilities, and students, and all these things have created this oppositional warfare that shouldn't exist because they are partners in this educational process," he said.

Scott Shirey, executive director of KIPP Delta Public Schools, told the committee that he was able to buy a defunct local school from a district under state takeover, renovate the building and move his charter school out of trailer classrooms.

Other charter schools should be able to do the same, he said.

But opponents said the situation should be left to local control.

"It goes against the very thing that I think we've been trying to work on as a state and even as a nation," Poore said of the bill. "We're crafting legislation right now that's yanking out local control."

Little Rock is closing three schools. One has a use, Poore said, but he's not sure how the other two will be used. The bill wouldn't give him much time to figure out new uses for facilities, he said.

Under the bill, charter schools can give notice of their intent to use a building as soon as it's listed as unused or underutilized. A list would be published every year on March 1.

Stodola said that once a charter gives notice, a district is prohibited from otherwise disposing of a school for two years.

"Leaving a school building vacant for two years, first of all, is disastrous to the issue of its maintenance and its value," he said. "If a charter school has two years within which to make a decision ultimately to lease or to purchase it and then elects not to, it further delays the ability of that school district to be able to dispose of that."

A Section on 03/07/2017

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