Cape Coral may soon front more of the costs of running the city's charter school system — a departure from the ordinance that created the system 13 years ago on the premise that no local taxpayer money would support it.
The mayor and City Council came to a consensus Tuesday that the city should run the four charter schools' administrative services for six months to determine whether it should permanently stepin.
“The model is broken. It’s time to revisit that model,” City Financial Services Director Victoria Bateman said. The charter schools are "OK for the next fiscal year, but if the model doesn’t change, it’s going to be too late."
After the six months, the city will compare the cost of the city's assistance with that of the private sector and Lee County to determine which is cheapest and most effective to implement, Bateman said.
“There are certain best practices that we have in Cape Coral that we’d like to embed in the charter school system,” City Manager John Szerlag said, clarifying that those practices are specifically related to financial services, budgeting, record keeping, fleet and facilities, IT and human resources.
Tuesday's meeting was a nonvoting one, but Szerlag said the proposal will be on the agenda for an official council vote June 4 or June 18. He said the city would start consolidating fleet and facility services in July.
“We believe there’s a sense of urgency to manage that,” Szerlag said. He said he spoke with the fleet and facilities managers who “stressed the need for expediency in those two areas,” he said.
Charter Schools Superintendent Jacquelin Collins agreed that the model created 13 years ago is no longer feasible, adding that the student population has grown to about 3,100. She said the six-month trial period is a win-win for the city and the charter schools.
"Long-term, it's going to help us financially, and I think that's dynamite," Collins said. "We really need the help of the city's departments to further us along."
The charter schools have previously paid the city $311,00 annually for some financial and HR functions. City spokeswoman Connie Barron said the city did not charge the schools for that this year and that the city manager is proposing to do the same next year, instead waiting to see what the cost of increased services provided by the city would be after the six-month trial.
The charter school system will use its reserves to fund a deficit of about half a million dollars in the fiscal year 2019 budget. Projections for the next two fiscal years show shortfalls of $1.6 million and $1.7 million.
Charter schools are publicly funded and privately run. The Lee County School Board sponsors the Cape's city charter schools, whose operating budget is around $31 million.
The city conducted an audit of the internal funds activities and transactions from July 2014 to March 2016, which brought to light "significant weaknesses in the design and/or implementation of the internal controls over the charter school practices for internal funds," according to a February 2017 memo from the auditor's office.
The mayor and council largely agreed Tuesday that the model needs re-evaluation. District 4 council member Jennifer Nelson, who is also the council liaison for the charter school governing board, said the city's assistance would allow Collins to focus more on educating students.
“The bottom line here is: We can’t allow our kids to suffer,” Nelson said. “I’m not saying the sky is falling or planning an evil takeover of these schools, but we just have to look at doing things differently because what we’re doing isn’t going to work long term.”
District 1 council member John Gunter agreed that the city needs to change course.
“If we can subsidize Sunsplash and we can subsidize the golf course, we can surely subsidize education for our children,” Gunter said.
District 3 council member Marilyn Stout offered the most opposition to the proposal, specifically the idea of taking money from the general fund to support the charter schools, saying residents already pay taxes to support the public schools.
“This is not what our residents were promised,” Stout said. “That’s double taxation.”
District 6 council member Rick Williams said he agreed in principle with Stout's objections but said things have changed over the last 13 years. He said the council doesn't have a lot of choice.
"I don't like taking money out of the general fund to help run the school system," Williams said. "But I like a lot less the alternative of anything that could negatively affect the schools' ability to teach children."
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