Illinois abolished its charter commission on Friday, the body reviled by school districts but valued

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by charter promoters for offering a recourse to local disapproval of school proposals. As widely expected, Gov. J.B. Pritzker signed Senate Bill 1226 into law, close to the deadline for him taking action. The bill will dismantle the commission by July 1 and will hand off oversight of 11 schools, which the commission previously approved, to the state Board of Education next summer.

The state board will take over the responsibility of hearing appeals on charter school openings, closings and extensions. The state also will dole out funds it had collected to oversee the schools that the commission had approved. Once the state board takes over the commission’s role, the board will be able to levy a 3% fee on any state-approved charter school to help cover the cost of oversight.

Earlier this year, the commission approved two Chicago schools: the all-male Urban Prep, which the district had ordered closed, and the new citywide school run by Intrinsic, which wanted to replicate its highly rated campus.

Meanwhile, public bodies that work with the commission have been wrestling with the uncertainty. In the Chicago Public Schools budget for next year, the district notes that it expects to receive $4 million less funding than expected from the state this past school year because of “diversions to schools approved by the Illinois State Charter School Commission (SCSC) were higher than expected.”

https://www.chalkbeat.org/posts/chicago/2019/08/23/illinois-on-the-verge-of-abolishing-charter-schools-commission/

More reasons to be proud of my state!