Coalition kicks off R-55 signature drive

Referendum 55 will repeal charter school legislation

State Rep. Joe McDermott, a Seattle Democrat, helped kick off the signature gathering drive to defeat charter schools -- again -- in Washington.

Parents, educators, and concerned community leaders gathered in Seattle Wednesday to kick off a drive to put Referendum 55 on the November ballot. The measure will repeal a law passed in the final hours of this year's legislative session allowing charter schools.

To qualify for the Nov. 2 general election ballot, referendum supporters will have to collect 98,867 valid signatures from registered Washington voters by June 9. Opponents of the charter school law contend that the legislation is an expensive, potentially open-ended experiment that will pull limited resources from existing schools.

"The voters have already spoken twice on this issue," said Liz Pierini, past president of the League of Women Voters of Washington. "I regret it’s necessary to remind our legislature again: don't mess with our public schools!"

Two statewide initiatives to create charter schools have failed to win voter support in the past eight years: Initiative 177 in 1997, and Initiative 729, in 2000.

WEA President Charles Hasse helps spread the word on KIRO radio: Reject the state’s expensive experiment with charters.

"Charter schools can be created outside the oversight of locally-elected school boards," noted Seattle School Board member Sally Soriano. "That means parents, and all taxpayers, can lose control of many schools in their own communities."

As passed by the legislature, the charter schools law only allows a few new schools to be started every year; however, there can be an unlimited number of conversions of existing schools. Furthermore, charter schools could be started in a school district by petitioning directly to the state Office of Public Instruction, thus circumventing locally-elected school boards.

"This is not the time to take money out of our existing public schools," noted Christy Perkins of the Washington Special Education Coalition. "This is not the time to be experimenting."

"What will happen to the funding of our regular public schools?" agreed Liz Pierini of the League of Women Voters.

The WEA, representing 76,000 teachers and other school employees in this state, is "strongly opposed to this flawed law," said WEA President Charles Hasse. "We are very pleased to have other concerned organizations like the League of Women Voters of Washington and the Washington Special Education Coalition joining us to place Referendum 55 on the ballot in November."

Seattle School Board member Sally Soriano urges voters to sign R-55 to defeat the charter experiment.

The coalition forming to oppose charter schools includes the Washington Education Association, The League of Women Voters of Washington, the Washington State Democratic Party, Operating Engineers Local 609, and the Washington State Special Education Coalition.

"We should not be distracted by expensive experiments with charters," said WEA President Charles Hasse.

Related link:

• WEA Online: Charter schools: Bad idea, bad timing