In last week’s post I expounded on the dangers to further transparency in government from a “Municipal Industrial Complex” exacerbated by continued privatization of our public services and infrastructure. One example that I brought up was from a Chicago Reader article by Ben Joravsky regarding the stonewalling of information by the United Neighborhood Organization (UNO) in response to Sun-Times reporter Dan Mihalopoulos’ Freedom of Information requests. Charter schools are a prime example of how privatization of our public school system is a huge deterrent to transparency and citizens’ rights to obtain full knowledge of how all of our schools are being run – not the least of which is knowing exactly how the money is being spent, as evidenced in the UNO case.

Now, comes yet another Charter bombshell. In a December 23rd Sun-Times’ exposé, Dan Mihalopolous tells of a rare instance of intelligent decision-making by CPS officials, who turned down an application by Concept Schools Inc. to operate two more charter schools in Chicago — the first and only one to date is the Chicago Math and Sciences Academy in the Rogers Park community. But that didn’t stop the politically well-connected Concept Schools from appealing to a “higher authority” — the little-known Illinois State Charter School Commission, the state agency created in 2011 by lawmakers including House Speaker Michael Madigan.

Madigan just happens to be an advocate of Concept and the faith-based Gulen movement from Turkey, to which the schools are connected. So how do you think the Commission ruled? If you guessed that they over ruled the CPS decision and gave the go-ahead to Concept then you’d be absolutely correct! But who knows? Maybe in some alternate universe there would be good reason for the Commission to overrule CPS that didn’t have anything to do with clout. Nah!

Regardless, if there is a transparency god in this universe we would know the minutes of the meeting, the decision process that went into the Commission’s ruling, who voted yea or nay, campaign contributions given and exactly how much money Concept will receive to run the two new schools. And that’s just for starters! Since there is no such transparency god and since Concept gets to hide under the auspices of a private corporation, you can be sure that little to any of this or any other information will become public — FOIA requests or not. Which is why, even for those who favor charter schools, we should be wary of their continued expanding existence. Like a political black hole, what goes into charter schools — meeting minutes, process decisions, detailed budgets, Commission votes, etc. — very seldom, if ever, see the light of sunshine.

However, there is some solace in the fact that there is information that we should expect to be given. Mihalopoulos points out in his article that “Turkey was the destination of 74 percent of all foreign trips Illinois legislators reported receiving as gifts during the five-year period [2008-2012].” Mihalopoulos adds that “The politicians and other guests on the trips have to pay for their travel to and from Turkey. Niagara and the Turkish chamber paid for meals and hotels, Madigan and the other legislators reported.”

All well and good, but as citizens and in the best interest of full transparency, we deserve to know exactly how much our legislators paid out of pocket and for what, how much was “gifted” to them, what was listed on their annual disclosure statements and what was reported to the IRS in each of those years.

In addition to our state legislators, we also need to know if anyone from our City Council, in addition to Alderman Moore, were the benefactors of these Turkish trips, since it appears that Concept has its sights firmly on the city for expansion. For Moore and anyone else in the City Council, please refer back to the previous paragraph for our expectations of transparency.

Finally, it shouldn’t require that a Sun-Times investigative reporter or any other watchdog have to file FOIA’s in order to get this information into the public space. As I have pointed out numerous times, “It is the duty of our elected representatives and of civil servants to act in such ways as to enable this transparency.” By definition, transparency is dependent upon these actions. What is missing today are the legislators in Springfield and in our City Council with the balls to execute those duties.

Always remember… The liberties of a people never were, nor ever will be, secure, when the transactions of their rulers may be concealed from them. — Patrick Henry, June 1788