Incendiary e-mails backfire on charter school foes

A controversial e-mail exchange between two legislative foes of charter schools not only has infuriated education reformers of both parties in the General Assembly but also has emboldened them to push back. They say they now plan to use a pending Senate bill that originally reined in charters to advance charter schools instead.

The e-mails between Senate Education Committee Chair Sue Windels and House Education Committee Chair Michael Merrifield, both Democrats, were sent last December but first disclosed this week on the blog www.facethestate.com.

Missives, which convey Merrifield’s contempt for organizers of charter schools by wishing them a “special place in hell," prompted his announcement today that he is stepping down from his committee chairmanship. 

Meanwhile, Windels’ e-mail to Merrifield reveals that both were planning a bill early on to eliminate outright the state’s power to authorize charter schools through the Charter School Institute. That conflicts with their claims later on that they only wanted to improve communications among charter schools, school districts and the institute. Their effort eventually was introduced as Senate Bill 61.

“I feel we were deceived,” said Assistant Senate GOP leader Nancy Spence, who also is the ranking Republican on Windels’ Education Committee. “Sue touted SB 61 as establishing a ‘good-neighbor policy’ among the state, charters and local school districts. But her e-mail shows she was trying to stop state-chartered schools entirely.”

Windels told Merrifield in her December e-mail that she was drafting their pending bill

with a title broad enough so that, “…it would allow a full repeal to be added by a strike-below amendment.” That would allow the bill to be introduced without controversy and then later turned into what she called a “full repeal” of the 2004 law that established the institute.

Before the law, only local school districts could authorize charter schools. Two Denver Democrats, Senate President Pro tem Peter Groff and Rep. Terrance Carroll, authored the law with overwhelming support from Republicans across the aisle as an end-run around local school boards that were refusing to permit the popular charters in their districts. There are now well over 100 charter schools in Colorado.

Windels’ e-mail indicates she is unsure whether Gov. Bill Ritter would support a repeal of the state’s chartering authority – something that remains unclear even as members are now planning to expand charter options through SB 61.

The bill, originally hostile to charters, stopped short of a full repeal. It then was watered down in the Senate by Republicans and dissenting Democrats including Groff, and actually turned into a bill that expanded the state's ability to use charters to address at-risk kids. That provision was stripped back out in the House by Merrifield. The bill has since returned to the Senate, where it awaits further action and likely will be assigned to a conference committee to reconcile differences between the two chambers.

Now, Spence said she and Groff will push for that key provision – which lets the state establish up to three charters statewide that are modeled on Pueblo’s highly successful Cesar Chavez charter school for at-risk kids – into the bill in the conference committee.

Spence said she and fellow Republicans, as well as key members across the aisle, are angry and feel betrayed. In the wake of Merrifield’s resignation under fire, Republicans in the Senate demanded public reassurances from Windels.

“I want Sen. Windels to say she is going to protect the thousands of Colorado kids who are in charter schools,” said Republican Sen. Mike Kopp, who also sits on the Education Committee. “I don’t want her to take out her personal animosities on them.”

Republican Sen. Ted Harvey of Highlands Ranch called on Gov. Ritter to say exactly where he stands on the issue.