CHICAGO – Most parents want as much school choice as possible.

But the school unions and their political puppets are dead set against it, and when they gain power or influence, alternative schools are in for trouble.

Everyone knows that’s current the case in New York City, where Mayor Bill de Blasio is trying to keep excellent charter schools from utilizing empty space in existing public school buildings. The mayor and his union allies know charters can’t afford to rent their own space, and their eviction from traditional school buildings could spell doom for many of them.

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As Carmen Farina, de Blasio’s school chancellor, recently put it, “They’re charter schools. They’re on their own now.”

That sort of attitude doesn’t sit well with Gloria Romero, a former Democratic state senator from California and a school choice supporter. She recently published a column in the Orange County Register, blasting de Blasio for denying quality instruction for poor and minority children.

“I predict this fight will prove to be de Blasio’s Waterloo,” Romero wrote. “Already he is being unfavorably compared to George Wallace, the former Alabama governor who pledged 50 years ago to stand in the schoolhouse door to block racial integration.

“Today, Mayor de Blasio is being caricatured as blocking mostly black, brown and poor kids from entering some of the most successful schools in New York. Why?  Because they are charter schools, which the teachers unions despise because charter teachers don’t typically belong to unions and don’t pay membership dues.”

Less publicized is the situation in Chicago, where numerous public school buildings sit empty, particularly after the city closed dozens last year due to low enrollment.

The city, under pressure from the unions and the parents who were upset by the school closings, refuses to make the empty space available to charter schools. The operator of one charter school, The Orange School, may not be able to open in the fall due to a lack of appropriate facilities, the Chicago Tribune reported.

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How many kids are on charter school waiting lists in Chicago? As many as 19,000, according to one estimate. We suppose they will just have to keep waiting, because the educrats in their city don’t know how to play nice and share.

Meanwhile, the Illinois education establishment is pushing an effort in the state legislature to kill a special commission created in 2011 to consider charter school applications that were denied by local school districts.

Those who established the commission understood that local school boards were blocking charters just because they didn’t want to compete for students. That selfish approach denied thousands of kids a lot of quality educational options.

But now the school boards and unions may win this battle and kill the only hope many charters have of opening their doors in Illinois.

A Chicago Tribune editorial addresses the special interest war on charter schools, and the sickening goal of keeping children of modest means trapped in their home school districts.

“The rhetoric against charter school expansion is so strong in some quarters, you’d think they were crack houses or strip clubs angling to come in and pollute a neighborhood,” the editorial said. “They are schools. Many boast a great track record of educating students, helping them to reach college. Some proposed innovative curricula focused on science and math, or the arts. Some find ways to help at-risk children stay in school and dropouts to earn a diploma.

“Yet there is huge resistance, and that has stifled the pace of change. Critics of charter schools present them as a threat to traditional schools. But for students, they are an opportunity, New York is having a harsh but needed debate. It’s time to bring the simmering battle over school schools in Illinois into the open.”