Senate impasse leaves local ed councils in limbo

With mayoral control of the schools gone for now, school issues that normally come before CECs may have to join students on vacation for the summer.

By Kate Pastor

Marvin Shelton, District 10’s Community Education Council president, is in the midst of an identity crisis.

Now that both the Department of Education and the Community Education Councils have been officially disbanded and replaced by a revivified Board of Education, he and other Department of Education employees and volunteers are wondering not only where they stand, but what, exactly, their roles are.

The state Senate’s power wrangling, which allowed mayoral control of the city’s schools to expire on June 30 without extending, eliminating or tweaking the standing law, automatically resulted in a reversion to the old Board of Education. And while Chancellor Joel Klein may have gotten a new vote of confidence — the Board of Education quickly reappointed him as chancellor and encouraged state Senate to enact a bill that would renew mayoral control with some changes — the work of the CECs and other former bodies hangs in the balance.

“I don’t exist anymore. What about my office?” Mr. Shelton said, referring to the paid administrative assistant employed to help facilitate District 10 business.

Mr. Shelton also wonders whether the results of CEC elections would stand.

“Since our council wasn’t renewed are they going to take whoever was elected back in May and June? And when does that go into effect?” said Mr. Shelton, who was re-elected for a seat on the council.

Mr. Klein sent an e-mail on July 1 that urged the CECs, the Citywide Council on Special Education and the Citywide Council on High Schools to continue meeting despite their nonexistent regulatory status. It also said it would “continue to support the councils’ administrative assistants.”

Without the councils’ role in making school decisions, there is concern about how state Senate inaction may trickle down to neighborhood schools come September. Though the CECs have chiefly played an advisory role, they do have power to take some binding actions, like approving any zoning changes. In addition, their monthly meetings provide the primary forum for parents to voice their concerns about school matters large and small.

“It’s probably the worst thing that could have happened,” Mr. Shelton said of the reversion to the old system, last seen in New York City in 2002.

Still meeting

He still plans to hold monthly meetings throughout the summer and will even have the council elect its officers and decide its budget at the next meeting on July 16. Though he realizes these efforts may be in vain — with no funding or official body to elect officers to — he’s banking on the prospect that the boards will be reinstated and doesn’t want to lose time, he said.

Summer is an important time for the councils, said Mr. Shelton, who has in the past criticized the Department of Education for not giving them the teeth they need and for failing to seek council input, even when it’s required.

While Mr. Shelton said he expects work to continue on finding a site for the new school slated for Riverdale/Kingsbridge under the capital plan, he fears rezoning efforts will be among the issues put on hold.

Rezoning efforts

He said the council and the district’s superintendent were planning to come up with zoning priorities to bring before the former Department of Education’s Office of Portfolio Development this summer. There was to be a discussion on rezoning west of Jerome Park Reservoir, possibly in Riverdale and Kingsbridge. Until last week, council approval was required before zoning changes were adopted.

“It just puts us sort of like on hold and behind,” said Mr. Shelton.

Also put on pause while the council is in limbo is its consideration of three disputed PTA elections at local schools, as well as a council-generated capacity report which looks at school-by-school enrollment trends and is then handed off to the Department of Education. This report helps planners determine what space is available and what new programs or classrooms are needed.

This time around, “we can’t do that,” Mr. Shelton said.

What, if any, role community education councils will play once the legislative squabble has ended is uncertain as well. Critics of mayoral control have argued that the councils, which replaced school boards and have a primarily advisory role, reduced parental involvement.

Parents’ power

In the lead-up to the mayoral control debate, many families and other interested parties, such as Community Board 8’s Education Committee, were calling for councils, and thus parents, to be given more power under a new system of mayoral control.

“I’ve always said I’d like to see the community education councils have more of a role,” said Damian McShane, Community Board 8’s chairman, adding, “… their elimination is clearly a bad a sign.”

Meanwhile, Mr. Shelton said he will act as though mayoral control has been extended. His greatest concern, he said, is not whether they will be reinstated but what will happen in the interim while there is a vacuum of power.

“I’m fearful that this mayor and the department may take advantage of this opportunity where there is no legally mandated community input mechanism, that he could go ahead and move forward on some things even though I’ve been assured he wouldn’t do that,” Mr. Shelton said.

This is part of the July 9, 2009 online edition of The Riverdale Press.

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