Parents, educators urge Manatee County school board to restore sales-tax share for charter schools

Dozens of parents, educators and students on May 23 implored the Manatee County School Board to distribute part of the county’s half-cent sales tax to public charter schools, arguing the 2016 referendum was sold to voters as benefiting “all public school students.”

Speakers including former and current charter-school leaders, a high-school student and local educators described charter students as public school students and urged the board to reverse a 2023 decision that stopped additional sales-tax funding to charters. Commenters asked the board to make charter schools whole for the 2024-25 year and to include charter allocations in future capital budgets.

The remarks came during the board’s public-comment period and were repeated in the workshop that followed on the district’s capital budget and the sales-tax (surtax) revenue. Speakers said charter enrollment in Manatee County is roughly 20–21% of the district’s total and argued that excluding charters from some surtax-funded projects breaks a promise made to voters during the 2016 campaign.