Mayor and City Council Breaks Promise to Kids

In 2007, the Mayor of NYC and the City Council agreed to a $2.2 billion increase over a four-year period for educational funding to reverse what has been labeled as a chronic, multi-generation lack of funding for all NYC public schools. It was inclusive of the five boroughs of NYC and the Long Island community as well. However, on May 1st, 2008, the Mayor and the City Council in one of the most flagrant displays of backpeddling by city officials broke their promise to the kids and reversed $450 million of that budget.

The governor and the state legislature, despite facing huge budget deficits already, increased their educational commitments to the children when the state recently appropriated nearly $600 million in new education funds for NYC and Long Island schools despite opposition from various state officials.

A coalition of parents, educators, and elected officials from across the region gathered together in opposition of the $450 million in educational budget cuts that would see the elimination of various programs and services for the City’s schools. The coalition also announced plans of an advertising campaign wherein the Mayor and city officials would be urged to put the $450 million back into the education budget.

Various representatives of the “Keep the Promises” coalition are involved in the fight to leave the proposed educational budget where it originally stood before the Mayor and city council meddled in the affair. According to coalition officials, the ad campaign will do more than just ask the mayor and city officials to leave the budget as it had been originally laid out. Part of the advertising will hold the City accountable for not keeping their promise to the kids.

The overall appearance of the move made by the mayor and the city officials is that they have gone back on their word and reneged on their promise to the school kids by removing 20% of the original proposed budget. Taking away the funding will cause the elimination of necessary programs and services for school children. Schools with high needs, as well as those that are suffering academically, stand to be the ones that will be hurt the most by this budget cut.

The state capital in Albany kept its promise when they approved a $600 million addition to the budget for NYC schools, and despite the fact that Governor Pataki and the NYS Board of Education officials encountered some serious hear for this, they went ahead and approved the measure anyway.