R.I. governor signs three-year ban on charter schools into law
PROVIDENCE — No new charter schools will be approved to open in Rhode Island until at least 2029, after Governor Dan McKee, a longtime charter advocate, signed a bill that places a three-year moratorium on new charters and permanently lowers the cap on the total number.
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The bill was a major priority of public-sector teachers’ unions, who argued the funding situation at traditional public schools has become dire. Tuition at charter schools is paid by the sending school district where the child lives. Overall enrollment declines have also decreased funding to public schools.
“There are some circumstances that we need to address,” McKee told reporters after signing the bill on Thursday. “There’s been about a 10,000 reduction in students since I’ve been governor. …There’s a funding formula that we need to address, and this pause — the moratorium — is going to give us a chance to really work through those issues, and also continue to make sure that the charter schools are delivering.”
The legislation will block De La Comunidad Bilingual School, which already had preliminary approval from the state, from opening next year. The school’s leaders had met with McKee Wednesday to ask him to veto the legislation.
McKee had been urged by business leaders and the editorial boards of both the Wall Street Journal and The Washington Post to veto the bill.
“My goal is to meet or exceed Massachusetts levels by 2030 and we are on the way to do it,” McKee said. He said he has always been a “public school advocate,” not just a charter supporter.
McKee built his political career in part by supporting charter schools, even as many Democrats distanced themselves from the alternative public schools, which are often nonunion and have long faced opposition from traditional teachers’ unions.
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As mayor of Cumberland, he backed the Blackstone Valley Prep charter school and championed the creation of “mayoral academies,” charter schools whose boards of directors are chaired by municipal leaders. In 2009, the National Alliance for Public Charter Schools honored him as one of its “Champions for Charters.”
He remained a steadfast supporter of charter schools during his early campaigns for statewide office, and groups such as Democrats for Education Reform spent tens of thousands of dollars to help boost his successful runs for lieutenant governor. After becoming governor in 2021, he threatened to veto a similar bill that would have imposed a moratorium on new charter schools.
McKee still describes himself as a supporter of charter schools. But as governor, he has also forged a close political alliance with public-sector unions, many of which backed the moratorium legislation, placing him between two constituencies that have often been at odds over education policy.
His challenger in this September’s Democratic primary, Helena Foulkes, told the Globe in April she opposed the charter moratorium.
Asked what changed since he previously threatened to veto a moratorium, McKee said it was primarily the drop in public school enrollment.
“The circumstances have changed,” McKee said.
This is a breaking news story and will be updated.
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