ICYWW: HB7069 sends almost $23 million to Bill Sponsor’s Employer

$23 million is a lot of money.

Yesterday, the Florida Department of Education released this list. It contains the Local Capital Improvement Revenue (LCIR) for Eligible Charter Schools for the 2017-18 school year; a result of the passage of HB7069 last spring. As reported in the Tampa Bay Times, “Charter schools across Florida will get a combined $91.2 million from their school districts this year, as part of a new capital funds sharing program lawmakers created last spring.” This charter school capital funds sharing program was part of the infamous HB7069, a bill championed by Hialeah Rep. Manny Diaz Jr.

Manny Diaz works for Academica, one of Florida’s largest for-profit charter school management companies.

I cross referenced this FLDOE list with the list of  Academica Charter Schools.

If my calculations are correct, this year’s total Local Capital Improvement Revenue (LCIR) for Academica Schools is $22,852,055; Almost $23 million dollars of new annual revenue to Academica as a result of Rep. Diaz’ HB7069!

If you subtract the PECO money (Public Education Capital Outlay) coming from the state, you get the Charter School LCIR Allocation for Academica’s Charter Schools = 13,248,796; meaning over $13 million must be transferred from local school districts to Academica, a for-profit entity. Such a transfer of local property taxes will occur every single year.

For all eligible charter schools, the total LCIR is $139,643,791 per year, with a total Charter School LCIR Allocation (the amount of locally derived property taxes the districts are mandated to transfer to eligible charter schools)  of $91,205,898 per year.

That is a lot of money…

Academica must be so pleased with their employee.

Please learn more about Academica, and how it is profiting from real estate investing, public tax dollars and charter school law: “Academica: Florida’s richest charter school management firm.” (If you are a journalist and you are reading this, we feel this Herald article needs updating. A lot has changed since 2010-11, when Academica had 44 South Florida schools with about 19,000 students. They now have over 100 schools in Florida.)

The deadline for districts to start transferring the funds is February 1st. With lawsuits and talk of injunctions, watch for this story to develop.

Photo from: http://www.tbo.com/blogs/the-buzz-florida-politics/talk-of-fixing-hb-7069-way-too-premature-hialeah-lawmaker-says/2329436