The Fairbanks North Star Borough Assembly has passed an ordinance authorizing administration to lease a vacant building to the in-limbo charter school at the center of an ongoing court battle.
The Assembly voted at a tense special meeting Wednesday to allow the borough’s deputy chief of staff to negotiate and enter into an agreement with Pearl Creek STEAM Charter School, though there are some significant prerequisites baked into the ordinance.
The school’s organizing committee wants to operate the charter out of a 63,000 square-foot building once home to Pearl Creek Elementary. The board for the Fairbanks North Star Borough School District decided to close the former neighborhood school last year amid a projected budget deficit. Control of the building shifted from the school district to the borough in December.
Heidi Wood, chair of the Pearl Creek academic policy committee, told Assembly members Wednesday they should put aside feelings about charter schools when voting on the lease authorization.
“Tonight’s decision is not about whether charter schools are good or bad. It’s not about the ongoing litigation or political disagreements,” she said. “It is about whether an empty public building should remain empty, or if an ordinance should be passed that would allow it to be used to educate children.”
Under the draft terms, the lease would last five years, and the charter school would pay no rent. But the school would reimburse the borough for maintenance and operational costs, which borough administration estimates at about $400,000 annually.
There’s a big “if” included in the ordinance, though. The borough can only execute the agreement if Pearl Creek finalizes a contract with the local school district.
“And if these contingency requirements are not met, then there is no lease,” said Borough Deputy Chief of Staff Amy Gallaway.
The charter school is currently stuck in a protracted tug-of-war that’s worked its way up to the Alaska Court System, starting with the local school board voting to turn down Pearl Creek’s charter application in October. In a written decision the next month, board members cited what they saw as an insufficient plan for a school facility as one reason for their denial.
The charter school committee appealed to state Education Commissioner Deena Bishop, who decided Pearl Creek’s application met legal requirements. The governor-appointed Alaska Board of Education then overturned the local board’s decision in April and granted Pearl Creek final approval.
The Fairbanks school district in May appealed to the court system, where the state and Pearl Creek notched a pair of early losses that are set to prevent the school from opening in August, as its committee had planned. The overall case is still in superior court; for now, though, the charter school doesn’t have a contract with the district.
But if Pearl Creek does open, some Assembly members said it would make sense to lease a building that’s designed to be a school to a group that wants to use it that way. That’s especially true if the alternative is paying for upkeep of an empty building, said Assemblymember Kristan Kelly, one of the measure’s three cosponsors, along with members Tammie Wilson and David Guttenberg.
“I think it’s important that we keep our focus on the dollars and cents of this. And to me, this seems like a very logical step to take,” Kelly said.
Fairbanks School Board President Bobby Burgess was present at the Assembly meeting to represent the board’s interests. He said the district currently estimates operating Pearl Creek would cost the district about $2 million annually, and that the school board would likely ask the Assembly for an increase in the borough’s local contribution by that amount in the event Pearl Creek opens. The Assembly in May approved a record $65.7 million contribution to the school district for this fiscal year.
Burgess also said the ordinance looks like an attempt to sway the legal dispute to the state’s benefit by improving the charter school committee’s facility plan.
“What’s the public perception when we have the most friendly-to-education Assembly that we’ve seen in years working hand-in-hand with the state administration that is probably the least friendly to education that the state has ever seen?” Burgess said.
Kelly objected to that characterization, saying the measure is fiscally responsible and responsive to local concerns.
Much of the discussion at the meeting also focused on an amendment put forward by Assembly Presiding Officer Scott Crass. It directs borough administration to offer to return control of the building back to the school district if the court rules in favor of the state and Pearl Creek STEAM Charter School.
He said the amendment doesn’t get rid of the option for the borough to execute the agreement with Pearl Creek if the district still doesn’t want to be a part of it.
“But it allows – it opens the door, in the future, for the school district to say, ‘OK, we’ve been ordered to operate this charter, so we will go forth and do so in the way that best serves the public,’” he said.
Crass said the school district managing the building could open up better state capital funding opportunities than if the lease goes through the borough. He was concerned, for example, that Pearl Creek would lose out on Alaska Department of Education capital project grants if the building is controlled by the borough instead of the district.
That amendment passed 6-2, as did the overall ordinance. Assemblymembers Nick LaJiness and Garrett Armstrong were the two no votes both times. Assemblymember Liz Reeves was absent.