Governor holds education bill decision to secure school provisions he wants

Gov. Mike Dunleavy says he has 15 days to consider whether to veto a major education funding passed by the state House and Senate, and that his decision will hinge on legislators passing two priorities for the governor left out of Senate Bill 140.

One is retention bonuses for teachers. A second is a provision allowing new charter schools to be approved by the state Board of Education.

The charter school issue is troubling for local school boards. Charter schools are now approved by the local school board, which is an elected body.

The state school board, in contrast, is appointed by the governor. Critics fear this would politicize the charter school process, taking the decision away from local elected officials.

This is a high-stakes question. If the Legislature does not do what Dunleavy wants school districts could lose out on a major increase in school funding included in the pending bills.

"We need to fix a couple of things in that bill. We need to make sure that we're addressing the teacher retention issue. We need to make sure that the reading component in the bill... actually incentivizes good outcomes in reading. We need to work on the charter school part so that we can ensure that anybody that wants to attend a charter school can do that," said Dunleavy. "We got half the job done. But if it's just going to be about money and nothing else, I'm not interested in having this bill become law."