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Goldson: Sorry about that.
A day after threatening to close schools in the neighborhoods of some budget-cutting alders, Board of Education members sought forgiveness from the same alders — along with more money.
On Monday, the Finance & Operations Committee asked Superintendent Carol Birks to look at closing six elementary schools, including a top-performing magnet and a successful turnaround. On Tuesday, Darnell Goldson, the Board of Education’s president, issued an apology — and a $5 million ask — to Tyisha Walker-Myers, the Board of Alders’s president.
In a letter emailed Tuesday afternoon, Goldson said he took “full responsibility” for any “misunderstanding” that made it look like certain alders were targeted.
“I sincerely apologize for the confusion surrounding the release of that list,” Goldson wrote. “In our desire to be as transparent as possible, we erred by mislabeling the list [as school closures and consolidations] and not adequately and more clearly explaining its meaning. Additionally, any appearance of targeting certain areas, groups or individuals was merely coincidental and again was the result of our mishandled rollout.”
At the finance meeting, the committee reeled from finding out that alders intended to reject Mayor Toni Harp’s request for a $5 million increase in school spending and instead flat-line funding for next year’s budget.
Having just voted to close one high school and consolidate three alternative schools, Goldson said he was “surprised” to hear that alders wanted even deeper cuts.
Over several hours on Monday, the committee members strategized how they could come up with an additional $6.8 million on top of the $13.2 million in cuts they already had planned.
In one surprise measure, Jamell Cotto, the committee’s vice-chair, amended the agenda to request that Birks look at closing Barnard Environmental Studies Magnet in Walker-Myers’s Ward 23 (and Augusta Lewis Troup right next door in Ward 2), Wexler-Grant Community in President Pro Tempore Jeanette Morrison’s Ward 22, West Rock STREAM Academy in Majority Leader Richard Furlow’s Ward 27, Edgewood Magnet in Finance Committee Vice-Chair Adam Marchand’s Ward 25, and Quinnipiac Real World STEM Magnet in Legislation Committee Chair Rosa Ferraro Santana’s Ward 13.
At the meeting, Cotto didn’t offer any explanation for why the schools were targeted.
After adjourning, Goldson said that the schools had failing test scores, but that was true for only three of the six; Cotto said that the schools were so racially segregated that they risked state sanctions, but again, that was true for only one of the six.
Asked whether she felt Wexler-Grant had been targeted, Morrison said, “I’m going to take the high road and say I hope not.” She added that she still wants an assurance that the Board of Education plans to restart the discussion of school closures with a clearer idea of “who, what, where and why,” like she felt Birks laid out with the shuttering of Creed and consolidation of alternative schools.
Marchand said that announcement of schools had been “abrupt.”
“I think it’s really on the Board of Education to explain themselves and what their process is,” Marchand said. “I think residents and parents are going to have really good questions for the board about how they plan to proceed and how they bring up topics for discussion at a meeting — topics that aren’t even on the agenda.”
In his apology to Walker-Myers, Goldson said that the Board of Education really wanted to look at data for every single school in New Haven, but had mistakenly decided to start with a small group.
“The schools were part of a much larger list, which would eventually include ALL schools in the district. The original goal was to begin to collect information on all of the schools in the district, with an eye towards determining where we might want to focus reductions,” Goldson wrote. “The chair thought it was more prudent to request the information in smaller groups, as not to incite anxiety in the public. It obviously had the opposite effect.”
After saying sorry, Goldson pointed out that the Board of Education is still facing a major fiscal crisis and needed every dollar of the $5 million that Harp had requested, which was half of what the board originally wanted.
If the school board didn’t get the money, school closures were still on the table, he added.
“The $5 million is not a request for a wish list of items, it actually funds existing fixed costs such as rising energy costs, contractual responsibilities, etc., which have to be met,” Goldson wrote. “The result of not granting the increase will be catastrophic. We will undoubtedly have additional layoffs and perhaps school closings. We will make cuts as far away from the classrooms and students as possible, but there are no guarantees based on this current BOA finance committee recommendation.”
Goldson argued that a $5 million increase was a “modest” increase of 2.6 percent. In fact, it was similar to the raise that alders had just awarded to Mayor Harp.
“We have made structural changes towards reducing our deficit. We intend to do more. Our staff, particularly those in the classrooms — our teacher and assistant teachers — deserve to receive the tools needed to teach. We need to make sure our schools are secure and safe for students and staff, and that too has a cost. We have books in our schools declaring Bill Clinton as the current president. We have dated computers which essentially serve as paperweights. We actually have schools which have no budgets for supplies; teachers are buying their own and are raising money through crowdfunding,” Goldson concluded.
“We have to structurally fix the system to correct these problems. But our jobs become much more difficult if the BOA does not adequately fund education. On behalf of the BOE I respectfully request that the BOA make education the number-one priority, return the $5 million to our budget and work with us to reform education to better meet the needs of our New Haven families.”
In response to Goldson’s plea, Marchand stressed that the city is facing difficult financial circumstances and has limited cash to spread around. He said that the committee’s decision to flat-fund schools wasn’t meant to spite anyone.
“We are in very difficult circumstance. It’s not like the board decided in the Finance Committee to say no to that request [for a $5 million increase] because we wanted to punish anybody. We’re in a tight spot, and we have to make some really hard decisions that require some sacrifices from lots of different parts of our government,” he said.
Marchand added that he was open to hearing proposals for increasing school funding before the full board votes on the budget next Tuesday.
“I know there’s going to be lots and lots of conversation, and I can’t predict how that’s going to go,” he said. “If people have other ideas and proposals to deal with the challenges we face, I and others will be more than happy to hear those, but there’s not going to be a single easy decision to make in this budget process.”