Charter schools do not educate their fair share of high-needs students and that must change before Gov. Andrew Cuomo pushes through any increase in the number of charters operating in the city, UFT President Michael Mulgrew told a crowded press conference on Jan. 29.

“I would like people to ignore the governor’s call for raising the charter cap,” he said, until charters comply with a 2010 state law that says they must enroll proportionate numbers of high-needs students. Otherwise, he said, “you’re just rewarding bad behavior.”

The governor, who received more than $2 million in contributions from the charter sector to his re-election campaign, called for raising the statewide cap on charter schools from 460 to 560 in his State of the State address on Jan. 21. By lifting geographic limits on all charters, as many as 250 more charter schools could open in New York City.

Yet “in school after school, district after district, many charters do not enroll appropriate numbers of English language learners, the poorest and highest-need special ed pupils and homeless children,” Mulgrew said, citing a new report and extensive documentation released that day by the union.

The solution, Mulgrew said, is to change admissions policies at charter schools so that some preference is given in lotteries based on student need. District superintendents also should be able to “backfill” at charters, replacing students who leave midyear, he said. And, he said, charters should have to account for high numbers of student suspensions that would trigger an investigation if they occurred at a traditional district school.

Mulgrew was flanked by more than a dozen teachers from schools co-located with charters. They told reporters that the charters not only have lower-needs children but they too often got more space, better facilities and nicer amenities than the schools that were hosting them.

“We have three times as many high-needs students as the charter, but we are constantly shortchanged,” said Brenda Shufelt, a librarian at PS 30 in Manhattan, which is co-located with Harlem Success Charter 2. The charter took over the school’s library, its computer lab and science classrooms, which it does not share, while P.S. 30 students get physical therapy in the hallway. “It affects them. They notice this,” Shufelt said of her students. “Segregation of children is always a result of these co-locations, and it is ugly.”

A teacher at IS 303 in Brooklyn told a similar story. Sally-Ann Bongiovanni said students at the co-located charter in her building get catered, organic breakfast, lunch and snacks. “Our students see this. They are upset,” she said.

At IS 281 in Brooklyn, according to Chapter Leader Theresa Cardazone, the co-located charter school is eyeing their dance studio. “It’s just so frustrating,” she said. “They snoop. It’s like, ‘Oh, it’s not a shared space — yet.’”