Wednesday’s New York Times ran a front-page story on some Harlem public schools that are responding to pressure from charters by aggressively marketing themselves. Such marketing typically includes school tours for prospective parents, augmented by postcards and brochures, with most campaigns [amounting] “to less than $500, raised by parents and teachers….”
The Times story told how prospective parents touring P.S. 125 with its principal, Rafaela Espinal, expressed appreciation for the low number of students they saw in each classroom and the school’s impressive physical amenities, which include a rare swimming pool. But some parents, according to the Times, still weighed sending their child elsewhere. Keep reading →
Categories: Schools · charter schools
Tagged: charter schools, Harlem Success Academy, Kansas City, Mo, NY Charter schools, NYC public schools, nyc schools, school closures, school marketing
Two Event Notices from 250+ Friends
(with apologies to Ogden Nash)
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Categories: Events
Tagged: 250+ friends of NYC parks, Events, parks, The Bronx
Some of our readers may wonder why we repeatedly worry about giving the mayor any additional powers. It’s because we believe that our current system of government tends to select city-wide leaders who support the interests of Manhattan’s finance and real estate industries — to the detriment of other boroughs and other industries. As important as finance and real estate are for the city’s financial solvency (right now, they’re still crucial), they don’t tend to create middle-income jobs, which can leave us in a vulnerable place in an economic downturn, as in 2008-2009. Simply put, we’ve placed too many of our eggs in one or two baskets. Keep reading →
Categories: 2010 NYC Charter Revision
Tagged: 2010 charter revision, bloomberg charter, Borough Presidents, charter revision, Citizens Union, Community Boards, Development, economic development, land use, Mayor Bloomberg, Michael Bloomberg, Michael R. Bloomberg, New York City Charter, New york Community boards, NY charter commission, NY charter revision, ny charter revision 2010, NY City Council, NYC charter, NYC public schools
Well, actually, only about 12,000 of NYC’s 43,000 intersections are “signalized.” The borough with the most traffic lights is Brooklyn, with over 4,000. One report has it that the first red-green light in NYC was installed in 1930.
By the Giuliani administration, the numbers were in the thousands, and the city’s Department of Transportation needed 34 months to evaluate whether an intersection needed one. Giuliani saw the lights as an easy way to curry favor with constituents, so he instructed Transportation Commissioner Christopher Lynn to eliminate a 600-light backlog and cut the study time. Lynn reduced the study time to 12 weeks. During his regime, the number of traffic lights installed went from 56 in 1995 to 169 in 1996, and to a a planned 222 in the first five months of 1997. By early 1997, the city’s traffic lights totaled 10,687. By January, 2006, after Michael Bloomberg had been in office for four years, the number had increased to 11,871. Keep reading →
Categories: Government 101
Tagged: Janet Sadik-Khan, Michael Bloomberg, new york city traffic lights, new york city transportation, new york traffic lights, ny traffic lights, NYC Government, nyc traffic lights, nyc transportation, Rudolph Giuliani
Elizabeth Benjamin reports that billionaire businessman Ron Lauder, principal sponsor of the 1990s referendums that restricted NYC elected officials to two 4-year terms, has declined to serve on Mayor Michael Bloomberg’s anticipated 2010 charter revision commission. If confirmed, Lauder’s withdrawal may mean that he expects the Bloomberg commission to seek to ratify last year’s City Council legislation that extended the limits to three consecutive terms—or maybe even to try to eliminate term limits entirely.
Categories: 2010 NYC Charter Revision
Tagged: 2010 charter revision, charter revision, Mayor Bloomberg, Michael Bloomberg, New York City Charter, NY charter commission, NYC charter, Ronald Lauder
Michael Duffy photo: the Lo-Down
In a revealing interview with NYC Department of Education charter schools head Michael Duffy, Ed Litvak of the Lower East Side news blog The Lo-Down questions Duffy about how the NYCDOE used a recent public hearing on the proposed expansion of a Lower East Side charter school. Duffy’s response won’t surprise anyone who has sat through a charter school hearing:
“It definitely provides a forum for people to speak out, and I think that’s a good thing. It helps to get good information out there… I think, for my part, in a couple of hours of comments, I didn’t hear anything new from the public that wasn’t already known prior to the start of the hearing. I know it’s important that people have a chance to speak their mind, but I don’t think there’s anything that wasn’t known to the Department prior to the proposal…” Keep reading →
Categories: charter schools
Tagged: charter schools, girls prep charter school, lower east side, Mayor Bloomberg, Michael Bloomberg, Michael Duffy, Michael R. Bloomberg, New York charter schools, NY Charter schools, NYC public schools, the lo-down
Sometimes, the best ideas come while driving in heavy traffic. Although we don’t talk or text while behind the wheel, we do tend to obsess about city government. We also do that in other inappropriate situations.
Our latest episode happened while driving up Brooklyn’s Coney Island Avenue. Our tires kept on banging into one manhole depression after another. The 5-minute ride felt as if we were on an IED-pocked road in Afghanistan, not a major thoroughfare in America’s largest and most vibrant city. “Why can’t the city even pave the streets right?” we asked.
But, of course, we already knew the answer: Coney Island Avenue had been paved by a low-bid contractor, working under the oversight of private engineering consultants. They, in turn, had been supervised by civil servants who may have lacked the tools to impose useful sanctions if either the consultant or the contractor screwed up. Could efficiency improvements — which Mayor Bloomberg’s 2010 charter revision commission may try to implement — solve this? Keep reading →
Categories: 2010 NYC Charter Revision · Government 101
Tagged: 2010 charter revision, DDC, Department of Design & Construction, Mayor Bloomberg, municipal contracting, New York City government, New York potholes, NY bad streets, NY government bids, NY potholes, NYC bad streets, NYC contracts, NYC potholes
Wednesday’s New York Times ran a front-page story on some Harlem public schools that are responding to pressure from charters by aggressively marketing themselves. Such marketing typically includes school tours for prospective parents, augmented by postcards and brochures, with most campaigns [amounting] “to less than $500, raised by parents and teachers….”
Frustration grew to a boil near the end of a March 5 public hearing by the NYS Assembly’s Standing Committee on Cities at 250 Broadway. The committee, chaired by Assemblyman James Brennan (44AD), was hearing comment on proposed bills to amend the State’s 
