Assemblyman Vows to Propose Bill to Repeal Mayoral Control of NYC Public Schools

Assemblyman Keith Wright announced at a town hall meeting on Friday his plans to propose a bill to repeal mayoral control of New York City public schools.

“People are up in arms. They are quite frankly tired of the dictatorial and despotic policies coming out of City Hall where they just arbitrarily and capriciously decide that they’re going to close schools,” Mr. Wright told The Politicker. “This is the Alamo as far as I’m concerned right now. This is the absolute Alamo and I’m not going to take it anymore.”

The Harlem assemblyman vowed to follow through with the legislation after the Department of Education announced its plan to close the middle school at Wadleigh Secondary School of Performing Arts.

And Wright may have plenty of bedfellows, as a number of New York City legislators have expressed discontent with Bloomberg's handling of failing schools, beginning with the Cathie Black appointment in November 2010, to the ongoing co-location of charter schools in public school buildings.

Assemblyman Hakeem Jeffries of the 57th A.D. in Brooklyn, also was once an outspoken opponent and challenger of Mayor Bloomberg’s sweeping co-location efforts.

In December 2010, Jeffries, along with one teacher and 13 parents filed suit over Black's appointment, then later filed another suit against her that called for a moratorium to block the city from closing any schools for at least one year. Both suits were later dropped with Black’s resignation in April.

However, Jeffries has stated before publicly that his contention was not with mayoral control of schools, but with the decisions made by Bloomberg and his administration.

“I understand the frustration expressed by my colleague about the education of our children, and have given voice to those frustrations on many occasions,” Jeffries told Bed-Stuy Patch. “Mayoral control of the Department of Education is designed to inject accountability into the school system that the previous structure sorely lacked. It should be given the opportunity to thrive under a new administration, which will be elected next year.”

Assemblyman Herman “Denny” Farrel said he would co-sponsor the bill and Councilman Robert Jackson, who also attended the meeting, said he would propose a Council resolution in support of the bill.

“I’ve had enough of this mayor in so many ways and I’ve had enough of mayoral control of our schools. So, you may see a bill coming out of my office to repeal mayoral control very, very soon.”