Schools Chancellor Cathie Black joked that there's a simple solution to overcrowding in lower Manhattan - birth control.
"Could we just have some birth control for a while?" Black said Thursday night. "It would really help us."
Black earned chuckles for the joke at an overcrowding task force meeting, but downtown parents say the growing population of youngsters is no laughing matter.
"I always cringe when I hear that (joke)," said Public School 234 parent Tricia Joyce. "I understand the temptation to joke about it. But our situation isn't funny any more."
The problem, parents and advocates charge, is that the city offered incentives to developers to build without also increasing school seats.
Joyce was also upset that Black compared weighing the needs of different schools to the movie "Sophie's Choice."
"As we all know, one child dies (in the movie). This isn't optional," Joyce added. "We have a right to a public school seat."
A spokeswoman said Black didn't mean to make light of the important issue.
"Chancellor Black takes the issue of overcrowding very seriously, which is why she was engaged in a discussion with lower Manhattan parents on the subject," said spokeswoman Natalie Ravitz. "She regrets if she left a different impression by making an off-handed joke in the course of that conversation."
Amazing - joking about school overcrowding and telling people to "put a cap on it" as a solution.
That's one helluva manager of systems.
Not so good with people, but a helluva manager of systems.
Clearly Black does NOT take the problem very seriously, does NOT take parents very seriously, and does NOT take her job too seriously.
Which is great, because parents, students and teachers are quickly learning NOT to take her seriously either.
She is a joke - a very bad and very cruel joke.
I was just hoping you'd see the birth control remark and make fun of it! I chortled as I read it in the paper. I hope other people will pick up on it because actually I think Cathie's little joke should be rather offensive to parents in the district.Let's hope there are plenty of gaffes to come, so that she will embarrass the hell out of Mayor4Life.
ReplyDeleteHow many cocktails did she have before that remark?
ReplyDeleteIs it any wonder that our clueless and unqualified Chancellor is already putting her foot in her mouth.....More to come.
ReplyDeleteYeah, I think after the Birth control and Sophie remarks, I'm going to go heavier on the booze stuff. As somebody who has had a little experience with serious juicers, Ms. Black is a serious juicer.
ReplyDeleteYou don't get a face like that from botched plastic surgery alone.
Oh goody, Black's Birth Control and Sophie remarks were the subject of the lead story on CBS2 this evening. The media apparently had tried in vain to reach the DOE and Natalie Ravitch finally issued a statement defending Black.
ReplyDeleteI never realized how daytime value-added gin martini's are with Johnny Walker chasers! Sounds like a workshop model.
ReplyDeleteShe looks like she is tweaked. I vote for Meth head.
ReplyDeleteShe's def a boozer...got that radiated wino look...She has that eternal, morning after ugliest girl in the frat the morning after look...with that stupid S- - t eating grin on her face...after doing the last of the rugby team...
ReplyDeleteIt won't be long before Black makes every appearance with Walcott and Ravitz basically propping her up like a ventriloquist's dummy.
ReplyDeleteI thought that Petrilli's prediction of her ouster by April was his way of being dramatic, but it isn't implausible. Even putting aside the awfulness of what she just said, she is coming across as utterly clueless in these appearances. Non sequitur answers, not even a whiff of having gained any knowledge or perspective into what she's doing. It's like the first Sarah Palin-Katie Couric interview only it doesn't end.
Heckuva job, Steiner!
I am frequently referred to as a "bulbous liver-colored monstrosity of a uniform ugliness of which no two are alike."
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