okay stay with me...
If we have an activity at another school in the district we would be asked to pay a nominal fee.

If you are a "club" aka one of the Scout troops, 4-H, etc, you are asked to pay a fee. A small one but you are asked to pay a fee if you are asking for use of the facilities.

Now, PTO's are not charged and are considered apart of the school so there is now question BUT if we ask to use the *new* addition (Event Center) there are talks right now about how this will be handled in regards to wiether or not we own the school money.

But what makes this confusing is since we are a charter school (we have a contract with the school district) we have some room to do things different but much honor the district polices when we need the use of a district building.

Man I hope that made sense!

I just noticed the question about the principal support - We have a new principal this year who I think does not want to "step on toes". I keep hearing "The PTO is not part of the School" which really aggravates me. With recent district budget cuts, we just committed $4,000 for curriculum support; $6,000 to pay for field trips ($1,000 per grade K-5) and $3,400 for teacher assistance ($100 per teacher, including specials and Special Ed., reading recovery, etc.) This seems a little double sided. They have no trouble taking the money from us but then we are told we have to pay the fees because we are "not part of the school". Very discouraging.

We have custodians in the building until 11:00 each night. That is what makes it so difficult for us to understand. We do most of the clean up also, and use them very little. I could even understand paying them mabe 1 hour of overtime. However, we get hit with the whole event plus the 1/2 hour before and 1/2 hour after.

We also have scouts that use our facility for their meetings and events; a local jumprope team that practices at our school every day, and holds fundraisers there; and a town basketball league that uses the gym at two of our district school Saturday and Sunday all winter long. The scouts and jumpropers pay NOTHING. The basketball pays a "flat fee" for the whole season which is WAY below what we pay. I can absolutely understand paying the overtime for weekend events but to pay the $38/hour to have our monthly free movie nights or our bingo nights, dances, etc. seems crazy to me.

I have heard of charging non school related groups such as scouts, church groups, community groups but as far as a school group . Our district does that some and districts around us do as well. I have never heard of that as far as a PTO and I think if that was even suggested to our group we would fight it! just for referernce how does you principal feel about this

We do not pay ours (they are paid by school), we do most of the cleanup (especially if using school kitchen), they just check (maybe mop) after us and do assist. Our old faciltiy mgr (just moved to new school was fantastic). After really big events (Sock Hop, auction) we gave a stipend of around $100 or a new tool.

I'd check with the Union itself to make sure the District is not pocketing the $$$. That just doesnt soundright.

We do not have to pay the custodian for anything we do. If one has to be assigned for something special we are doing the BOE pays for it or switches around their hours to make it work out. However, we have had events in the past where the janitors did a ton of work for us and we personlly tipped them for helping us out.

I have heard of some districts charging, even for the parent groups to hold their meetings. I personally find it disgraceful but it does happen.
Unfortunately this is your situation and I don't think it should stop you from doing what you do.
If I were you I would factor the cost into whatever price you are charging the people to come to the event. Depending on how many folks are attending the fee you tack on should be nominal. If it is a free event that your not charging for then you may want to consider putting out a donation bucket and let the folks know exactly what you want the donation for.