Philadelphia Schools to Lose $139 Million They Don't Have to Corporate Charters?

Rule 1: When you want to know facts about about charter schools, don't ask the people put in charge to run them, or any of their Wall Street and foundation patrons who have made a new art form out of lying to promote their corporate ideology at all costs.

The most recent case is Philadelphia, where the ALEC-owned governor and state legislature have taken a meat ax to education spending in the poorest areas of the state.  Earlier this year, parents and teachers protested the strangling of public education by the corporatists who run the State:  

The Philadelphia School District says the plan would reduce funding to city schools by $293 million, a 10 percent reduction compared to the previous year.

Philadelphia school officials say the proposed budget would also eliminate state funding for full-day kindergarten, after-school remedial programs and college classes for gifted high school students.

Now we learn the lawyers and Junior Leaguers on Philly's School Reform Commission, none of whom have public school experience, have finally got around to asking how much their already approved charter school expansion plan is going to cost Philly Schools, which can't even make payroll now.  

As a good lawyer, Commissioner Dworetzky obviously knew that charter chief Darden was lying through his teeth when he was finally asked how much will it cost:

The charter school expansions approved by the School Reform Commission so far this year could cost the nearly insolvent Philadelphia School District $139 million over five years - a full $100 million more than officials said at a public meeting Friday.

The School District faces a budget deficit of as much as $282 million for the 2012-13 school year. If left unchecked, its five-year shortfall would be $1 billion.
When Commissioner Joseph Dworetzky on Friday asked the district's charter school chief, Thomas Darden, about the cost of the expansions approved this year - including two expansions OKd at Friday's meeting - Darden said the figure was $38 million.

Dworetzky, who had done his own calculations, was skeptical. He said his own estimate was "many, many times higher."
Later, officials said that an error had been made and that $139 million was the true cost over five years.

The district hopes to reduce the figure to $119 million through an agreement with Mastery Charter Schools, which would forgo up to 600 seats that its Lenfest campus is entitled to.

Each new charter seat costs the district about $7,000 annually . . .