001good afternoon thank you for joining the committee on education we are hearing one bill and we are in room 225 it is now 4:15 p.m. and the bill is hcr1 166 HD1 Charter School commission develop governing process so this is to urge the charter school commission to work with stakeholders to develop and adop um why administrative rules governing the negotiation process between commission and public charter schools first to testify Ed no you have testimony Ed afternoon good afternoon chair I was say members of the committee but just so hello everyone thank you for the opportunity to provide testimony we do stand on our written testimony that existing rules do already exist um for Provisions such as this so we are definitely open to hearing more about um questions that you might have around this bill
002so uh you're saying that the charter schools already have rules in place administrative rules does that that include the appeals process yes there is uh notice of proposed rul making cont of hearings commission actions even even emergency rule making It's all under chapter 503 under the Hawaii administrative rules title 8 and then the last section there is petitions for adoption Amendment or repeal of rules and that is already in your administrative rules also correct now be section 510 as well okay members questions um so why is it that the public charter school network has a lot of concerns um well there are always decisions that maybe not aren't always um favorable and so just wanting to make sure that there was a mechanism for the ability to appeal as I'm fairly new in the position
003I'm still learning what those issues are and wanting to work with all the charter leaders and their governing boards I've been making every effort e to visit all the schools before the end of the school year just so I can understand a lot of what the um issues might be because they say in their testimony our Network and its member schools have raised seriously concerns regarding Charter School contract 4.0 and previous versions are concerns Encompass the following issues violations of statutory or regulatory Provisions excessive exercise of Authority or jurisdiction by the commission unlawful procedures arbitrary or captious actions conflicts with or contradicts National best practice does not outline the roles and responsibility of the commission School leaders have unanimously expressed their dissatisfaction with the contract um they go on to say your support urging the
004commission to develop administrative rules could begin the process of bringing Monumental change to a rogue state agency with overreaching authority and they go on for several Pages have you read this yes and um I of course respect um everyone's opinion on different matters um however um there was a lot of a lot of contion that our AG weighed in as well and from what I read I believe we're well within the role as the state agency as the authorizer um we also are part of the National Association of charter school authorizers and we actually have a very favorable um ranking Nationwide in terms of existing Charter administrative rules that are in place so all I can say is we want to get better of course and whatever we do I'm some of the opinions there
005are of course I want to get more to the bottom of what um what was that the core of those complaints and that's what again my all my visits to the schools have been centered around so reading the be resolve in these in this resolution um that wouldn't hurt you guys in fact if anything would help to strengthen the process yeah again always open to to improve and saw this has an opportunity to also just highlight the fact that there are rules in place so wanted to build on those I know the last some of these last revisions were in 2018 so if they're needed to be or is that 16 um 18 then then we could revisit them I just is urging the charter Commission to work with the Board of Education public charter
006schools and advocacy organizations to develop and adop administrative rules or could improve your administrative rules including rules governing negotiations between the commission and public Char schools be further resolve in developing the administrative rules the state public charter SCH commission consider providing an appeals process before the Board of Education addressing complaints regarding the commission's execution of administrative R including rules governing Neo yeah and again as far as I can tell through the kind the documents that are on our website um because we do capture all the minutes from the all the different meetings that there is precedence of an appeals process and this is most um and we highlighted those in our in our testimony with links to our website okay but you said how new are you uh two months tomorrow two months tomorrow so
007I don't know that that gives you whole lot of background is to the have been so thank you so Ed if you already have the process in place and this um bill would not hurt you at all resolution I'm sorry the resolution I think again it just will strengthen us as an organization okay great members further questions thank you okay anyone else here wishing to testify this measure not members the recommendation of the chair would be to pass this present unamended unamended terrible Sor recommendation to pass HCR 166 HD1 unamended hi members presentation aded thank you that was the only U matter we had before us this meeting is adjourned e