Insurance on charters

There is nothing like a pending ballot initiative to spur legislators to do the right thing before voters beat them to it.

And so the Committee for Charter Public Schools is going full steam ahead with its drive to get a proposal to lift the current cap on charter school expansion on the 2010 ballot. The group announced yesterday it has already collected 70,000 raw signatures and delivered the first batch of 8,000 locally certified signatures to the secretary of state's office.

The committee has until Nov. 18 to collect the required 67,000 valid signatures.

Committee treasurer Jim Peyser called the ballot initiative "an insurance policy" in case the Legislature fails to act on Gov. Deval Patrick's bill to raise the cap at least for the state's lowest performing districts. Failing to pass the bill would also put a pool of much-needed federal "Race to the Top" grants at risk.

Lawmakers would be smart to move quickly on the charter school bill -- while they can still claim credit for getting the job done. But if not, it's quite likely voters will get the chance to have their say next year.