Another week, another million for charter school initiative

As the election nears, the campaign to bring charter schools to Washington state reported another $1.5 million in donations from Paul Allen, founder of Vulcan, Inc. and co-founder of Microsoft. Allen has been a major supporter of past charter-school campaigns, too, along with his fellow Microsoft co-founder Bill Gates.

With $1.6 million in total in donations, Allen is now the third largest contributor to the Yes on 1240 campaign, behind Gates and Walmart heiress Alice Walton.

The second-largest contribution to the pro-charter group in the past week was $100,000 from Kemper Holdings, owned by Bellevue developer Kemper Freeman.

The total for the pro-charter campaign has now reached $10.8 million.

The anti-charter side has yet to hit $1 million. The bigger of the two anti-charter groups, People for Our Public Schools, has now raised $668,000. Recent large contributions included $10,000 from the Washington state chapter of the American Federation of Teachers, and $5,000 from SEIU Local 925.

The other group, called No on 1240, has raised $20,000.

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Comments | More in Charter schools, Politics Northwest | Topics: American Federation of Teachers, Bill Gates, charter schools

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Politics Northwest is the go-to blog for politics in our region. The blog explores national, state and local political news and issues. Reporters from Washington, D.C., to Seattle City Hall to the state capital in Olympia contribute. Editors are Richard Wagoner and Beth Kaiman.

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