Financial conflicts over charter schools

The value that seems to be the primary issue with charter school funding is equity. Both charter schools and public schools across the nation claim that the other has an unfair advantage in funding. It is interesting to see that in different areas of the country, one group or the other seems to claim unfairness. For example, in Los Angeles protesters claim that charter schools do not get enough funding to purchase facilities to have their schools. This article related to this area can be found at http://articles.latimes.com/2008/jun/06/local/me-charter6. Examples of public schools claiming funding inequity can be found as well. In Georgia Gwinnett Schools are suing over charter school funding. Gwinnett recently lost $850,000 in local funding to a charter school. Gwinnett argues that it is not fair to use local money to pay for charters. They may have a strong case because in many states only state or federal money is used to fund charter schools. The link to the article about this case is http://www.ajc.com/news/gwinnett/gwinnett-schools-suing-over-136047.html. Another case in which public schools are suing over the use of local funds to pay for charters is taking place in Louisiana. A description of this case can be found at http://www.2theadvocate.com/news/65960542.html?showAll=y&c=y. It seems in this equity debate that in general, supporters of charter schools argue that they do not get enough funding for facilities while public schools say it is unfair for charters to get funds raised by local taxes.
Another interesting document I found on the Internet was a description of how charter schools in California should go about getting funding for their facilities. It is called Charter School Finance 101 and can be found at http://www.frbsf.org/publications/community/investments/0405/article4.html. Funding for facilities is an issue of quality for charter schools. In many cases they use closed public schools or businesses as their school buildings so there are a lot of expensive maintenance issues. In some cases they cannot afford to purchase or rent a building. I am not sure where I stand on this issue of funding facilities expenses for charter schools. Some states increase the per pupil allotment for charter school students above that of public school students to help pay for the costs of facilities. Is it this additional funding enough or too much? I will decide after I do more research.
President Obama is a proponent of charter schools so he has proposed an increase in funding for charter schools in the FY 2010 Education Budget. Obama supports charter schools because he believes they give students a choice in their education especially when they live in an area where the school is underperforming. Details about his budget proposal for charter school funding can be found at http://www.reuters.com/article/pressRelease/idUS292454+26-Feb-2009+PRN20090226.