Michael Bloomberg has personally donated a quarter of a million dollars to a committee supporting lifting the cap on Massachusetts charter schools. Again.
The former New York City mayor had already donated $240,000 to Great Schools Massachusetts, a ballot measure committee supporting Question 2, which would allow twelve new charter schools per year, back in August.
The latest donation wasn't the only one to come less than two weeks before the election. In just the first four days of November, supporters of Question 2 donated a combined $1.3 million to Great Schools Massachusetts.
Families for Excellent Schools, Inc., a New York City-based nonprofit organization and which does not disclose its own donors, donated over $800,000 to Great Schools Massachusetts in the first few days of November, bringing its total donations toward lifting the cap on charter schools to more than $15 million.
Over the same period, Save Our Public Schools, the ballot committee organized to oppose Question 2, received just over $600,000 in contributions, mostly from the American Federation of Teachers, the Washington, D.C. based arm of the national teachers union.
The ballot measure, which individuals, nonprofits and corporations can spend unlimited money supporting or opposing, was already the most spent-upon ballot initiative in Commonwealth history.
Save Our Public Schools, the only ballot committee opposing the measure, has raised around $15 million, largely from state and federal teachers unions.
Several groups opposing the measure have raised a combined $24 million, much of it from large donations from individuals and organizations based outside of Massachusetts.
Great Schools Massachusetts, the recipient of the most recent donations, has itself raised over $20 million and spent over $15 million, largely on television ads.
