Bloomberg Increases Tweed Budget Even As He Lays Off Teachers

Another outrage from the fiscally responsible Mayor of Outside Consultant Corruption:

The Bloomberg administration plans to dole out $20 million extra for the Department of Education's Tweed headquarters - even as it prepares pink slips for 4,100 classroom teachers, documents show.

That's a 7% increase over this year's $293 million budget for Tweed.

The agency's field offices also are slated to get a 1% budget boost - another $3 million - in the coming fiscal year.

Some parents and watchdogs are calling for the agency to redirect the cash from the administration to classrooms.

"I wish they would prioritize in a manner that would save teachers," said Ric Cherwin, PTA president of Manhattan's Global Learning Collaborative. He said parents and students are "very worried" about the city's threat to lay off beloved instructors.

The largest budget jump at Tweed would go to the agency's legal team, which would get a 300% increase - $7.4 million - over this year. Its labor relations division budget would jump to $2.3 million, up $1.3 million. And spending for its technology division would climb to $20 million, up $6.4 million.

"There's nobody who's a parent who feels there should be an increase at Tweed and cuts to the schools," said Councilwoman Gale Brewer (D-Manhattan).

"We need teachers."

The message from Bloomberg - we don't need teachers, we need more outside consultants, we need more lawyers, we need more technology spending and we need more central office bureaucrats.