Florida education officials say Broward Public Schools owe about $80M to charters
Miami Herald | By Jimena Tavel and Ana Ceballos | March 27, 2024
Top Florida education officials determined Wednesday that the Broward County School Board is currently breaking state law and owes about $80 million to local charter schools — an issue that could potentially lead to traditional public schools in South Florida losing funds.
After the state’s commissioner of education recommended it, the State Board of Education accused the local school board of not being in compliance with a statute that requires the school district to proportionately share funds it collects from a discretionary tax with charter schools, which are schools financed by taxpayers but managed by private entities.
During a board meeting in Winter Park, the Florida Department of Education’s general counsel Andrew King said the Broward school district failed to correctly distribute money it collected via a 2018 voter-approved referendum.
In the August 2018 primary elections, Broward County voters put in place a property tax rate of .50 mill to increase compensation for teachers and other staffers, improve school safety and other initiatives.
At the time, the school board decided to give charter schools with an enrollment of at least 900 students enough funding for one school resource officer out of the referendum dollars. Then-Superintendent Robert Runcie estimated it amounted to about a dozen charter schools in Broward in 2018.
But some charter schools sued the district over that process.
“The law and the facts here are abundantly clear. Broward currently owes charter schools in its district around $80 million collectively,” King said. “And because it has yet to pay this money it is currently not in compliance with state law.”
The district could be sanctioned by the state if it fails to show how it will start complying with the revenue-sharing requirements by April 17 — a timeline the district said would be difficult to meet.
“It would be very difficult to come to a conclusion by April 17,” the Broward school district’s lawyer, Marylin Batista, said. “There are 87 schools so we need to enter agreements with each and every one of them … so while we are planning on taking steps and hopefully having the mediation before the 17th, there really is not a practical way in which we see that all 87 agreements will be entered into by [then].”
Broward County School Board chair Lori Alhadeff and superintendent Peter Licata speak during a press conference at the Kathleen C. Wright Building on Tuesday, Nov. 14, 2023, in Fort Lauderdale, Fla. MATIAS J. OCNER mocner@miamiherald.com
Despite those concerns, Florida Education Commissioner Manny Diaz said the state will expect an update on how it has tried to resolve the issue by April 17.
“The best case scenario is that a resolution is reached,” Diaz said. “Obviously, the parameters of that resolution and how they are worked out is between the Broward County School Board and the charters, and that is within their purview.”
Superintendent Peter Licata, Broward School Board Chair Lori Alhadeff and Batista traveled to Central Florida to defend the School Board. They also recruited an outside counsel to help.
And Batista said the board reached out to U.S. Sen. George Lemieux to mediate the issue with charter schools.
Broward County School Board chair Lori Alhadeff and superintendent Peter Licata speak during a press conference at the Kathleen C. Wright Building on Tuesday, Nov. 14, 2023, in Fort Lauderdale, Fla. MATIAS J. OCNER mocner@miamiherald.com
Speaking in front of the state board, Licata said that the School Board met March 20 and authorized him to negotiate with charter schools “expeditiously.”
For her part, Batista sent a letter to state board members on Tuesday saying that the district is in “full compliance” with state law based on the 2022 referendum, and that it is also trying to resolve the legal issues resulting from the 2018 one.
Ahead of the 2018 referendum expiring in June 2023, the Broward school district asked voters to renew it in August 2022. They did and doubled it to 1.0 mill. But they applied a 2019 law that the State Legislature passed requiring school districts to share the referendum profit with charters. That state law applied to that 2022 referendum renewal.
“All funds generated from the 2022 referendum and collected in the current fiscal year are being shared with charter schools consistent with Florida statutory and legal obligations, as currently interpreted by the courts, and will continue to be so shared in the future,” she wrote.
“The District is also doing everything possible to quickly resolve any issues related to revenues received by the District during the fiscal years that the 2018 referendum was operative,” she added.
