Commentary: We can do better with public charter school facilities

A few months ago, I was in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania attending a wedding.  Whenever I find myself in a capital city, I always make a point to visit the capitol building.  After a brief tour, I walked around the city and wandered into a small indoor mall a few blocks away.

The building had clearly seen better days.  Most of the commercial spaces were vacant, and the walls displayed hallmarks of vandalism that the city had attempted to paint over.  Fake plants coated with a thick layer of dust dotted the interior, and a few presumably unhoused persons were sleeping in an area that was once a food court.

My attention was soon drawn to a few occupied storefronts in close proximity.  Adjacent to one another, sat a Department of Revenue office and a casino operated by the state lottery.  While I appreciated opportunity for oversight created by this arrangement, I was less enthusiastic to see a public charter school located just down the hall.

The school was housed in a single room, packed with little round tables and chairs, and a few cubby holes in a corner.  A small shelf in the back of the room contained a meager selection of children’s books.  Just outside the classroom sat a graffiti laden restroom, smelling heavily of cigarette smoke, with some smashed alcohol bottles for good measure.

I found myself a bit emotional after the experience.  I kept asking myself, “How could anyone let this happen?”

Then my thinking turned to Tennessee.  Surely, we can do a better job than this.

While Tennessee lawmakers have made some great efforts in recent years to create a more permissive environment for public charter schools, we still find ourselves amid a worsening crisis, with barely half of public charter facilities needs being met by traditional funding sources.

To make ends meet, many public charter schools in Tennessee are forced to locate in suboptimal commercial spaces not unlike the one I saw in Harrisburg.  Our students deserve better.

Thankfully, there are several solutions to this ongoing challenge.  The Tennessee General Assembly is currently considering a bill that would provide public charter schools a fair opportunity to lease or purchase vacant and underutilized school district facilities.

To most, this legislation would appear to be a no-brainer.  School buildings are a public good, intended to be used to educate our students.  If a building lies empty or is being used for storage, or something other than actual classroom instruction, it stands to reason that we should make every effort to allow another public school to use the facility for its intended purpose.

Yet opponents of this measure continue to levy misinformed attacks, framing the legislation as a “land grab” or claiming the bill would somehow compel districts to sell property after bringing it up to building standards.

This could not be further from the truth.  The bill would only require districts to catalog vacant and underutilized properties and grant public charter schools the opportunity to lease or purchase them at fair market value.  Providing a right of first refusal to public charter schools in these transactions protects the facilities from becoming victims of an actual land grab, in which commercial entities could routinely outbid nonprofit charter operators with slender resources.

Further, districts would only be required to provide capital maintenance in lease transactions with public charter schools, not in purchase agreements.  This obligation is no different than any other landlord-tenant contract in Tennessee.

To those opposed to this legislation, I encourage you to visit some public charter schools in your neighborhood.  Talk to the students, parents, teachers, and administrators.  Explain to them why the children do not deserve to go to school every day in a high-quality facility.  Explain to them why the empty building down the street is not meant for them, that the decaying 1970s office building is where they belong.

Reflecting on my experience in Pennsylvania, I have reached a conclusion.  We can do a better job here in Tennessee.  This year, our state faces a choice that could impact over 40,000 public charter school students.  If our lawmakers decide to make these students a priority, I am confident that a bright future is within reach.

The Tennessee Firefly is a project of and supported by Tennesseans for Student Success.