In her debate during last year’s race for Governor, Democrat Kathy Hochul answered “yes” when asked if she supported lifting New York’s cap on charter schools. Last week she followed through with a proposal that would allow more charters to open, mostly in New York City. But she’ll have to spend political capital to get it through the state Legislature where unions hold sway.
In her budget proposal released last week, Ms. Hochul didn’t touch the overall cap of 460 charters statewide. But she did propose eliminating the regional charter caps. The bottom line is that New York City—which hit its cap of 275 charters in 2019—would have as many as 85 slots for new schools. Ms. Hochul would also reallocate slots now held by “zombie” charters that have closed, which would allow roughly two dozen other new charter openings.
These steps are modest but badly needed. They would also be popular. Last week Democrats for Education Reform released a poll showing that New York City Democrats favor lifting the cap by 51% to 27%. The margins for Hispanics (53% to 26%) and African-American New Yorkers (48% to 23%) are more than 2 to 1 in favor. Nearly two-thirds of parents (64%) support raising the cap.
The polling is a bitter reminder that the only reason there is a cap is because of the teachers unions. In January New York City parents were sold out by Mayor Eric Adams, when the city at the last minute killed plans to co-locate three Success Academy charters in vacant public-school building space in Queens and the Bronx.