It appears that charter school growth won't be stunted any time soon.

The Senate on Wednesday removed a cap on charter school growth the House had passed a day earlier as part of the Legislature's main education funding bill, HB2.

House Majority Leader Kevin Garn, R-Layton, said Wednesday night that House Republicans agree with removing the cap -- an action that requires a vote during today's final installment of the 45-day session.

Several key lawmakers who originally pushed for the cap also say they're now on board with the expansion of charter schools.

House Budget Chairman Ron Bigelow, R-West Valley City, said he backed the original language, which would have prohibited charter school growth in 2010-2011. He said he wanted to make it clear to charter schools that they shouldn't count on all of their state funding until that money is officially approved by the Legislature. Now, the Utah State Board of Education approves new charter schools in the fall two years before they're scheduled to open and before lawmakers decide budgets for that fiscal year.

Charter schools are public schools often founded by parents or other groups.

The new version of HB2, sponsored by Sen. Howard Stephenson, R-Draper, would allow the state board to give new charters only preliminary approval in the fall. They would have to wait until after the legislative session to give final approval.

Stephenson also originally sought to slowly shift more funding for charters from the state to school districts but removed that part of the bill.

Bigelow called the ultimate language change a "better solution" than capping growth.

"We don't want to have a charter school think they're getting money and not get it," Bigelow said.

Stephenson said charters shouldn't be limited when other public schools are not.

Charter school supporters expressed relief over the change Wednesday.

"It's good for charter schools and education funding in general," said Brian Allen, state charter school board chairman. "We had a lot of people very disappointed that they might not get their schools."

Other parts of the $2.4 billion bill, however, might still face some scrutiny in the Legislature's final hours.

The new version of the bill takes $300,000 from a program that now pays some math and science teachers extra money and puts it toward a pilot performance pay program for teachers. If enacted, the change would likely mean slightly less extra pay for some math and science teachers.

That change comes after lawmakers decided, as part of HB2, to help balance the budget by axing the rest of what was originally a $20 million performance pay program passed last year.

Vik Arnold, director of government relations for the Utah Education Association (UEA), said the UEA would have preferred lawmakers hold off on new programs in this tight budget year, though UEA supports the concept of performance pay. HB2 would result in a net cut of about 6 percent to education with help from $298 million in federal stimulus money for one year only.

Arnold said school districts already worked hard this past year developing plans for the $20 million program that is now all but dead.

"Teachers get tired of jumping through hoops when there is no sustainable source of funding for these proposals," Arnold said.