More than a decade into the state's experiment with charter schools, debate and controversy over money and control continue to overshadow the program.

Although many of the 27 education laboratories are producing solid — even striking — academic results among their students, advocates of charter schools say they're doing it despite overwhelming disadvantages that boil down to funding and facilities.

Charters are schools supported by tax dollars and governed by the Board of Education, but many aren't provided all that is expected at public schools — buildings, buses, gymnasiums, cafeterias or well-stocked libraries.

But an even larger sore point in the local charter schools community is the contention they receive thousands of dollars less per student than Department of Education schools.

Greg Knudsen, spokesman for the state Board of Education, disputes there are funding inequities because of various factors, including that the DOE provides certain services for charters that aren't included in their per-pupil budget.

Nevertheless, funding levels are indeed a flashpoint.

"Every year people say it's (funding) getting better, but don't pretend to me we're supposed to be thrilled," said Laara Allbret, principal of Halau Lokahi Public Charter School in Kalihi. "This is the best year the charters have had but it doesn't mean it shouldn't have been this three years ago."

For the first time, the Legislature this year gave charters money for facilities and brought funding up to the level of regular public schools for the current DOE school year, said Rep. Roy Takumi.

"It's a step in the right direction, but it's not going to solve the problem," said John Thatcher, director of the Hilo-based Connections New Century Public Charter School and president of the informal Hawai'i Charter School Network that includes most of the charters. "You're still talking about two systems. The board comes up with a budget for the DOE and then for the charters. It's totally different.

"Until we get to the point where we say, 'This (dollar) number is exactly the same for both groups,' it's not equitable."

Despite a funding increase, the new legislation didn't change the overall funding formula, which ultimately dictates a level below DOE schools. While allocations for both the charters and regular schools go up each year, charters have been behind by as much as several thousand dollars per pupil per year.

Sen. David Ige, an early proponent of "student-based schools" as they were first called, said language in the law continues a funding pattern that "essentially guaranteed the charters would be getting less money."

The 2006 law specifically ties charter funding to "the most recently published department consolidated annual financial report." Currently, that's the 2004-05 report posted on the DOE Web site, and the 2007-08 charter schools budget is based on those numbers.

The charters maintain that without adequate and consistent support, they won't completely live up to their promise — finding new and better ways to teach children, especially those who have fallen behind in the public school system.

And now, with new disagreement over the charter budget for next year and the BOE's firing of Jim Shon, the executive director of the charter school office, the simmering anger and mistrust in the charter school community has been reignited. Shon was the second director in three years.

Many charter advocates have long questioned the BOE's commitment to their very existence, and now some are demanding legislative intervention.

"I would like to see the true intent of public charter schools honored," said Keola Nakanishi, director of Halau Ku Mana New Century Public Charter School in Manoa. "That would include equity in funding and facilities — and pulling us out from under the Board of Education and being independent from the BOE.

"Charter schools are meant to be innovative, community-based schools of choice, and being under the BOE is a threat to those things."

SEARCH FOR FACILITIES

Startup charter schools without facilities say not only do they receive less money per student, but they then have to use part of what should be educational dollars for rent.

For Nakanishi's Halau Ku Mana, that has meant four different homes in six years and a constant search for grants to pay for them.

"Every child deserves the same basic, safe, functional facilities, opportunities and resources at their school, whether it's charter or mainstream," Nakanishi said. "Our families pay taxes. We're a public school. It's that simple."

But school board member Garrett Toguchi said charters were never promised money for facilities. The law was clear on that from the beginning, he said, even though the 2006 Legislature gave charters almost $700 extra per pupil for facilities.

"If the charter school is meeting the unmet needs of the community then the board has a responsibility to consider things like facilities," Toguchi said. "But if it's in an area where you already had schools, I don't think it's fair to taxpayers to fund two buildings on the same street."

The Legislature is free to appropriate money for facilities each year, and the education committee chairmen in the state House and Senate say facilities funding should be included in the next budget request. But school board members have already taken it out of their proposed charter schools budget.

"I would propose we (appropriate money for facilities next year)," said Sen. Norman Sakamoto, who chairs the Senate Education & Military Affairs Committee. "About the same amount as the current year."

On a national level, facilities money is rarely included in charter school funding, said Bryan C. Hassel, an independent consultant with Public Impact, a national education policy and management consulting firm based in Chapel Hill, N.C.

"That would be very uncommon," said Hassel, noting, however, that "funding equity" with regular schools has been one of the most persistent issues for charter schools nationwide.

But locally, there are more than just disagreements over funding.

A series of issues pit the charters against their governing board, including whether there should be multiple "authorizers" (overseers) than just the Board of Education, as occurs in other states; the advocacy role of the charter school office; whether the DOE "owes" charters back payments for services for special education students; the provision for and payment of substitute teachers; and, most recently, whether charters and the charter school office should be independent from the board.

"I think right now we're in a stalemate," said Steve Hirakami, director of the Hawai'i Academy of Arts & Science charter school in Pahoa on the Big Island.

EARLY SUCCESS NOTED

With 27 schools and almost 6,000 students — or about 3.3 percent of the approximately 180,000 public school students — charters form a small but vocal piece of Hawai'i's education landscape. And parents and educators alike say, in general, Hawai'i's charters are succeeding.

"We came with our questions and they were wonderful," Wai'alae Charter School parent Lisa Jensen said of checking the school out before enrolling her son six years ago in kindergarten.

"We've been there ever since, and Thor has been very happy there. Socially he's just thrived. He has all kinds of friends and he's at home with all kinds of different children and that's exactly what I wanted for him."

A steady increase in enrollment, waiting lists at most schools and improving performance on the state's standardized tests bear out the successes. Hawai'i charter school students have been doing as well or better on standardized tests as students at traditional schools. And a new study by Kamehameha Schools shows that Hawaiian students enrolled in charter schools are thriving and seeing healthy academic gains.

But for many charters, the successes come despite the inequities that abound compared with regular DOE schools, said Ku Kahakalau, director of the culturally-based Kanu 'o ka 'Aina in Kamuela on the Big Island.

"We don't have health aides and most charters don't have behavioral specialists," Kahakalau said. "And there's no busing for charters, and in rural communities that's a huge hardship on families."

At a startup charter such as Halau Ku Mana in rented facilities in Manoa Valley, there's been no field to play on, no cafeteria to eat in, no counselor to advise students and no bus to bring them in from distant Wai'anae or nearby Papakolea. There's no decent library, shops for wood or metal work, or even enough classroom space. Some classes meet in the lobby.

"I don't need what Farrington has," said director Nakanishi, "but we do deserve office and classroom space.

"We're juggling 12 grants just to meet operating costs."

With 85 percent or more of his budget going to salaries in some years, depending on the number of grants the school receives, Nakanishi said there's little extra money for something as crucial as library books. So the school must depend on donations, plus the few it can afford.

Textbooks also can be an issue for some schools, so the project-based learning style stresses real- world experience that enables the use of other sources of information from the community.

"I make sure there's money for textbooks," Nakanishi said. "Is it enough? Of course not. Sometimes we Xerox some copies. That's our only choice. Otherwise the kids would have to share."

None of the hardships have dampened the spirits of the students, who seem infused with feelings of friendship and focus as they squeeze into the school's single large room to join hands on a recent Friday afternoon to say goodbye for the week, chant a pule, share what they've learned and offer heartfelt words to live by.

"Let your actions do the talking," senior Kalani Aldosa, 16, tells his schoolmates. Aldosa, like a number of other 12th-graders, have been at the school six years, and have grown up with it.

"They teach you how to move forward," he said of his teachers, "but to make sure you look back and bring those behind you along, too."

FULL SUPPORT LACKING

From the beginning, some say the charters have lacked full support.

Interim executive director Maunalei Love said the 1994 law creating charters was purposely ambiguous to make the new schools palatable to all, while BOE member Breene Harimoto recalled that the board felt the new schools were being shoved down their throats by the Legislature after the 1999 authorization of "startup" charters with no designated facilities.

"The board felt like they were ramrodded into this," Harimoto said, "and they had to approve the charters with no understanding of what was going on. The board was charged with the authority and responsibility of (being) the charter 'authorizer,' but had no idea what that meant. It was all brand new."

Within 60 days of the law's passage the board was required to approve a flurry of startup charter applications, Harimoto said. It was a difficult time, with no staff to do the work or develop rules and the board has been playing "catch-up" since, even to the point there are still no administrative rules.

"We're desperately trying to get our infrastructure in place," Harimoto said. "The charters feel it's unfair there are no rules to govern them, and, after the fact, they're being told, 'Oh, you have to do it this way or that way.'

"I can understand the hard feelings. But one of the biggest misunderstandings is they don't understand what the true role of the authorizer is. They keep saying, 'You're not supporting us' and one of our primary roles is to hold the charters accountable to their charter. So while we're supporting them we are also the enforcer."

Love has carved out a formidable task for herself, mending fences and starting a healing process before a new executive director is named.

"The charters came in with high hopes and they have to fight every year just to survive," she said.

"You have a lot of hurt and mistrust on both sides and it's going to take all of us to make this work."

At honoluluadvertiser.com

Reach Beverly Creamer at bcreamer@honoluluadvertiser.com.