"It's not for us to say how many will be approved," said Wayne Kidd, an audit supervisor with the Office of the Legislative Auditor General, noting the growth of charter schools is a legislative decision. "We're not against growth. We're just saying there's problems with accountability. Let's handle that first."

But several board members, while acknowledging past weaknesses in the system, said they felt recent changes to the application process and increased training will eliminate a variety of concerns. Freezing the growth of charter schools is unnecessary, they said.

"If we had not done some of the things we're already doing I might agree with it to some extent," said Brian Allen, a state charter board member. "But we've already done a lot of the remediation and with the addition of staff the Legislature is promising, we're going to have the resources we need."

How easy it will be to comply with the recommendations is unclear. The 115-page analysis of charter school accountability, operation and finance issues, released Tuesday, contained myriad recommendations including improving applications for new schools by adding market analyses, along with more financial and facility planning. In the eight years charter schools have existed in Utah, the number has grown from seven to 51. Last year, lawmakers capped the number of new state-approved schools while multiple reviews of charter schools took place.

The Legislature should consider providing more direction on reasons to approve a new charter school, as other states do, Tuesday's audit recommends. Currently, the law only specifies the reasons a charter school cannot be denied.

The audit also recommends the state charter board "include language in approved charters that allows for a school's charter to be delayed or even repealed" when certain preopening goals aren't met.

"The staff director for the state charter board informed us that the preopening checklist would have helped this past year in delaying some charter schools from opening that were not ready," the audit states.

Having a cap can create something of a difficult dynamic, Allen said. It can create a pent-up demand and a sense that a certain number of schools should be approved.

"You may not have that many good applications," he said, observing that the quality of applications continues to improve. "We've raised the bar considerably."

The state was "too hurried" about the process in the past, said Scott Smith, charter board chairman, but things have changed.

"The growth should be as much as we can handle," he said. "What number that is we're not sure, but I think right now we're in a good position."

---

* Julia Lyon can be contacted at jlyon@sltrib.com or 801-257-8748.