New Battle Lines On Mayoral Control As Rochester Considers School Changeover
Robert Duffy, Assembly Democrats, Senate GOP and local union enter fray
Mon, 15 Mar 2010 13:16:00
Rochester Mayor Robert Duffy surprised his city when, in his second inaugural address this past January, he announced plans to take over the city’s school system.
“There is no way that the city government and the school district can maintain the status quo and succeed as separate organizations,” he said.
Even as a bill is still being drafted by the governor’s office and the Assembly is outlining the nuts and bolts, the teacher’s union has already come out against the plan.
This push by Duffy to control the district of 32,000 students comes amid a larger movement toward more centralized school systems across New York, with interest expressed in Syracuse and Buffalo as well. Mayoral control was spearheaded in 2002 by New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg’s overtaking of schools there, which was renewed last year after initial resistance from the Senate.
“We do the same things over and over again,” Duffy said in an interview. “Everybody agrees that the system is broken. The issue is, who has the courage to change it?”
Republican lawmakers have not yet taken a position on the unfinished bill, but say they have felt excluded by the mayor through the process.
“I’ve had one brief meeting with him, which was a monologue from Mayor Duffy saying how he was going do it, why he was going to do it, and that he was going to do it,” said Rochester Sen. Jim Alesi. “He didn’t ask for any contributions from the senators.”
As Rochester awaits the announcement of the final legislation, major players have already begun to take sides. In something of a role reversal from what transpired in New York City, where Senate Democrats expressed skepticism of the renewal of mayoral control legislation, the biggest supporters have been two Democratic Assembly members from Rochester, David Gantt and Joe Morelle.
“Fifty percent of kids graduating is not good enough for me,” said Gantt. “I’m willing to try something different, therefore I support the upcoming educational reform.”
Local unions view the move as a power grab by the mayor in an effort to control the schools’ $119 million budget and feel it would disenfranchise voters by relinquishing their ability to elect a school board. The local business community and 19 college presidents have come out in support of mayoral control, arguing that anything is better than the current situation.
Though Duffy has so far declined to hold public hearings on the plans, the Rochester school board held their own at the beginning of March. Meanwhile, the Center for Governmental Control and Metrix Matrix, a local opinion research firm, are conducting a survey of 2,000 homes in Rochester to gather the public’s feelings about the issue. The surveys are due March 17.
Duffy said he has been taking his cues largely from Bloomberg, whose own takeover of schools he praised. But it is unlikely that he would get the kind of absolute power possessed by Bloomberg. The City Council in Rochester will probably have to endorse any school board members that the mayor wishes to appoint. Another possible change would allow Duffy to appoint five of the nine-member board, with the rest appointed by the members of the City Council.
In Duffy’s eyes, his most formidable opponent is not the state legislature, but the local teacher’s union led by Adam Urbanski, who has vowed to oppose the takeover, which he says the mayor is pursuing without basis.
“I think his plan is to be in charge,” Urbanski said. “I frankly consider this not only an affront on public education, but also an affront on civil rights.”
The mayor said if the governance change occurred, his first order of business would be to compile a group of experts to do an assessment of the system in an effort to consolidate services. This would likely lead to downsizing Superintendent Jean-Claude Brizard’s office.
Brizard said he was preparing for this, in light of the support mayoral control has received elsewhere.
But still, Brizard said, he thinks the plan could get scuttled from a lack of detail in the bill.
“Getting [the bill] past Albany is going to be an uphill battle,” Brizard said. “I think a lot of people are looking forward to this kind of public discourse about exactly what he’s looking to do.”
“There is no way that the city government and the school district can maintain the status quo and succeed as separate organizations,” he said.
Even as a bill is still being drafted by the governor’s office and the Assembly is outlining the nuts and bolts, the teacher’s union has already come out against the plan.
This push by Duffy to control the district of 32,000 students comes amid a larger movement toward more centralized school systems across New York, with interest expressed in Syracuse and Buffalo as well. Mayoral control was spearheaded in 2002 by New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg’s overtaking of schools there, which was renewed last year after initial resistance from the Senate.
“We do the same things over and over again,” Duffy said in an interview. “Everybody agrees that the system is broken. The issue is, who has the courage to change it?”
Republican lawmakers have not yet taken a position on the unfinished bill, but say they have felt excluded by the mayor through the process.
“I’ve had one brief meeting with him, which was a monologue from Mayor Duffy saying how he was going do it, why he was going to do it, and that he was going to do it,” said Rochester Sen. Jim Alesi. “He didn’t ask for any contributions from the senators.”
As Rochester awaits the announcement of the final legislation, major players have already begun to take sides. In something of a role reversal from what transpired in New York City, where Senate Democrats expressed skepticism of the renewal of mayoral control legislation, the biggest supporters have been two Democratic Assembly members from Rochester, David Gantt and Joe Morelle.
“Fifty percent of kids graduating is not good enough for me,” said Gantt. “I’m willing to try something different, therefore I support the upcoming educational reform.”
Local unions view the move as a power grab by the mayor in an effort to control the schools’ $119 million budget and feel it would disenfranchise voters by relinquishing their ability to elect a school board. The local business community and 19 college presidents have come out in support of mayoral control, arguing that anything is better than the current situation.
Though Duffy has so far declined to hold public hearings on the plans, the Rochester school board held their own at the beginning of March. Meanwhile, the Center for Governmental Control and Metrix Matrix, a local opinion research firm, are conducting a survey of 2,000 homes in Rochester to gather the public’s feelings about the issue. The surveys are due March 17.
Duffy said he has been taking his cues largely from Bloomberg, whose own takeover of schools he praised. But it is unlikely that he would get the kind of absolute power possessed by Bloomberg. The City Council in Rochester will probably have to endorse any school board members that the mayor wishes to appoint. Another possible change would allow Duffy to appoint five of the nine-member board, with the rest appointed by the members of the City Council.
In Duffy’s eyes, his most formidable opponent is not the state legislature, but the local teacher’s union led by Adam Urbanski, who has vowed to oppose the takeover, which he says the mayor is pursuing without basis.
“I think his plan is to be in charge,” Urbanski said. “I frankly consider this not only an affront on public education, but also an affront on civil rights.”
The mayor said if the governance change occurred, his first order of business would be to compile a group of experts to do an assessment of the system in an effort to consolidate services. This would likely lead to downsizing Superintendent Jean-Claude Brizard’s office.
Brizard said he was preparing for this, in light of the support mayoral control has received elsewhere.
But still, Brizard said, he thinks the plan could get scuttled from a lack of detail in the bill.
“Getting [the bill] past Albany is going to be an uphill battle,” Brizard said. “I think a lot of people are looking forward to this kind of public discourse about exactly what he’s looking to do.”
