Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger's 2007-08 California budget included $43 million to help charter schools in low-income areas pay rent on classroom space.

As the Legislature's dominant Democrats reconfigured his budget in May and June, they lowered the appropriation to $18 million and then shifted it from the budget bill into one of the 15 "trailer bills" that accompany the budget.

Trailer bill Senate Bill 92 contains extra verbiage by Assembly Speaker Fabian Nuñez and is vaguely described in the Assembly's budget synopsis as "various changes regarding the state's regulation of statewide-benefit charters."

There is nothing vague about the words' effect, however. They would virtually eliminate statewide charter schools and appear to be aimed at the Green Dot system of charter schools that is revolutionizing high schooling in poor Los Angeles neighborhoods with smaller, more focused schools.

Current law allows the State Board of Education to approve statewide charters in addition to those granted by local authorities. SB92, which cleared the Assembly but is hung up in the Senate due to a broader budget impasse, would limit such charters to three years and prohibit renewal. Since no one would found a charter school for just three years, the effect would be to eliminate statewide charters.

While Green Dot is not specifically mentioned in the legislation, it would inhibit or block the expansion that founder Steve Barr wants to pursue. Green Dot filed an application for a statewide charter last year, then withdrew it for modification.

Why would Green Dot be targeted? Barr is a one-time fundraiser for the state Democratic Party and a co-founder of the Rock the Vote movement who has made improvement of education for the poor a crusade, but he's earned the enmity of the powerful United Teachers of Los Angeles.

It's not because Barr is anti-union, but because he's invited Green Dot teachers to form their own union, Association de Maestros Unidos, which has a contract that's more flexible than UTLA's contract with the Los Angeles Unified School District.

Earlier in the year, Assemblyman Mark Leno, D-San Francisco, carried a bill that was amended to repeal the State Board of Education's charter-school authority altogether, but the measure stalled. SB92, in effect, revives its thrust.

Nuñez maintains a very close political relationship with UTLA, but his spokesman, Steve Maviglio, insists that Green Dot is "not particularly" being targeted; rather, he says, the bill's aimed at the board's broad interpretation of its authority to grant charters and is meant to spur negotiations on the issue with the Schwarzenegger administration.

Barr said that he was warned that the money for charter schools in poor neighborhoods would be used as leverage on the battle over statewide charter-school policy.

Pairing the $18 million appropriation for charter schools in poor neighborhoods with the extra language would create a carrot-and-stick dilemma for Schwarzenegger. If he were to sign the bill, it would stunt the growth of charter schools statewide, but if he were to veto it, the lack of funds would stunt their operation in poor areas.

And who really loses in all of these machinations? Poor kids, of course.

— Dan Walters writes for the Sacramento Bee. He can be reached by e-mail at dwalters@sacbee.com. Back columns available at www.sacbee.com/walters.