Jacob Ogles
After an effort to increase Schools of Hope funding died before Sine Die, the House appears to be making a new push.
The latest offer from the House PreK-12 Budget Subcommittee includes $6 million in recurring general revenue for Schools of Hope, something first noticed by Seeking Rents independent journalist Jason Garcia. That would deliver more money to a long-controversial plan to fund privately run charter schools in direct competition with failing public schools.
The program was first approved by lawmakers in 2017, a priority of then-Speaker Richard Corcoran, who went on to become Gov. Ron DeSantis’ Education Commissioner and now serves as President of New College of Florida.
For the moment, the Senate PreK-12 Education Appropriations Committee doesn’t have any funding in its proposal for additional Schools of Hope. But the idea has been put on the table for the second time this year.
The House Education & Employment Committee and the House Education Administration Subcommittee, during the regular Legislative Session, put forward a Committee bill (HB 1115) that would have required surtax revenue shared with school districts to be redirected to charter schools, including Schools of Hope.
The bill passed in the House on an 84-19 vote, with only Democratic votes against it. However, the Senate declined to take up the bill as part of an education package that included the controversial language. It passed its version unanimously and kicked it back to the House, which then again had a party-line vote to put the original language, including the Schools of Hope back in place.
But as a failure to reach a budget deal, the bill was withdrawn from consideration on May 3 and died with all policy bills at the scheduled end of Session.
Lawmakers extended the Session to address budget issues, which allows the funding of Schools of Hope to be unencumbered by the rest of the policy bill to which it was attached.
