Yesterday we told you about the referendum petition approved by the D.C. Board of Elections and Ethics regarding Mayor Adrian Fenty’s school takeover legislation, which recently passed the U.S. Senate. The petition was filed by D.C. resident Mary Spencer, who is seeking to put Fenty’s school plan on a special election ballot so that D.C. residents could vote on the issue directly. Today, the WaPo’s David Nakamura clarifies an issue that was speculated about in our comments: if Congress and President Bush already approved the bill, can DCBEE’s actions actually delay Fenty’s takeover of D.C. schools? The answer appears to be yes.

Fenty has already said he will challenge the Elections board’s decision in court, but should their approval be upheld, the referendum would interfere with Congress’s approval of the charter change and even a signature from Bush because of the nature of the Home Rule Charter amendment.

The Home Rule Charter amendment is separate from a standard 30-day congressional review of the takeover legislation approved by the D.C. Council last month. That review is set to expire about June 12, officials said. If no one objects, and assuming Bush has signed the charter amendment, Fenty would then win control of the school system.

But the Fenty administration expressed concern that if the referendum goes forward, neither the mayor nor the school board may be legally empowered to run the school system until the vote is conducted.

The article quotes at least one attorney who believes the school board would remain in charge of D.C. Schools should a referendum go forward, but no one from the city has officially given word one way or another. All of this is of course assuming that the Elections board decision is upheld, and that Spencer and her cohorts at LetMeVOTE.org could actually collect 20,000 verifiable signatures in about a week — no small feat, especially when you consider how tough it’s been for others to gather signatures in this city in the past.

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