Question arises on money spent on senator's kids

PITTSBURGH (AP) -- A suburban Pittsburgh school district is reviewing whether it should continue paying for U.S. Sen. Rick Santorum's children to attend a cyberschool even though the senator and his family live in Virginia.
Penn Hills has spent $100,000 educating the Republican senator's children at an Internet-based school since 2001-02, said Erin Vecchio, a school board member who requested the review. She also is head of the local Democratic committee.
"I'm concerned because [he is] taking away from my kid. That $100,000 ... could be going to my kids, a computer or something," said Vecchio, who has three children enrolled in Penn Hills schools. "I'm sick of this man saying that he lives in Penn Hills when he doesn't."
Santorum's spokeswoman, Christine Shott, said the Republican senator and his wife, who have six children, have divided their time between their Virginia home and the one in Penn Hills since they bought the Pennsylvania home in 1997. Shott wouldn't specify how much time the Santorums spend in the Penn Hills residence.
The Santorums bought the Penn Hills house for $87,800, and it was assessed for $106,000 last year, records show.
The couple's home in Leesburg, Va., was assessed at $757,000 this year, tax records show.
Pa. law
Under Pennsylvania's 2002 cyberschool law, the district in which a pupil lives must pay the cost of tuition for pupils enrolled in cyber charter schools. Virginia has no such provision.
Vecchio asked the school superintendent to conduct a formal review at a board meeting this week.
"As we would do in any case for any citizen if there is a question of residency, the staff is looking into it," Patricia Gennari, Penn Hills school superintendent, told The Associated Press.
Shott said the senator, now in his second term, is a resident of Penn Hills and pays taxes on the property.
Shott said Santorum was not available Friday to comment himself.
It is not unusual for U.S. senators to have homes in or near Washington. But at 46, Santorum is not your typical senator. He's currently the fifth-youngest member in a chamber where the average age is 64 and most of his colleagues don't have to worry about where to send their children to school.
Children travel
As part of his duties as a senator and head of the Republican Conference, Santorum is required to travel often; his children often travel with him, something made possible by their taking classes through the Pennsylvania Cyber Charter School, Shott said.
She added that Santorum has visited each of Pennsylvania's 67 counties every year since he went to the Senate in 1994.
The Penn Hills Progress, a weekly newspaper, first reported last month that the district was paying for the Santorum children to take classes through the cyberschool.
Editor Alan Wallace said local reaction has been mixed. He said several residents whose children attend cyberschool complained about Santorum's arrangement. Some people said they saw nothing wrong, he said, while others said they were glad the situation was publicized.
"I think some people have wondered for a long time about the residency status of Mr. Santorum, and this obviously bears on that," Wallace said.
Vecchio, who has been on the school board for eight years, said she has known for years the district paid for the children's schooling. She is the only member of the nine-member school board to request an inquiry.
Vecchio said a second board member is also upset about the arrangement, but she could not be reached to comment.
District budget
The district has a yearly budget of about $60 million, and spends about $1 million a year for pupils who attend charter and cyber charter schools, Gennari said. She said the costs per pupil are comparable: about $7,500 for pupils in the school district and about $7,000 per pupil attending charter schools.
Santorum lived in the Pittsburgh suburb of Mount Lebanon while working in the 1980s at a Pittsburgh law firm. In 1990, when he ran for Congress against incumbent Doug Walgren, he criticized the seven-term representative for living with his family in McLean, Va.
Santorum sold his Mount Lebanon home and moved to Virginia in 1995. His then-spokesman Mike Mihalke told The Associated Press that Santorum planned to buy a smaller home to replace the one he was selling, but the Washington-area residence would be his primary one.
"If he were not to have a more permanent arrangement in the Washington area, it would be difficult to see his family," Mihalke said at the time.
The Midland-based Pennsylvania Cyber Charter School, known before June as the Western Pennsylvania Cyber Charter School, was started during the 2000-01 school year. It has an enrollment of about 2,000 pupils.
Copyright 2004 Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.