Tish James Wants To Save The DOE Emails

It has been reported that the NYCDOE will be shredding evidence of their education reform crimes and burning down much of Tweed in late December before the next mayor takes power.

Tish James, candidate for Public Advocate, doesn't want that to happen:

CITY HALL — Councilwoman Letitia James wants copies of a colossal amount of Department of Education emails — to ensure they’re not deleted when Mayor Bloomberg exits office in January.

James has requested under the state’s Freedom of Information Law that the DOE provide her with all its employees’ emails that discuss key education policies.

The demand came just days after DNAinfo New York’s Sept. 17 story about the Bloomberg administration remaining undecided on an email-retention plan for various city agencies.

With a few months left in its final term, the administration is still mulling whether to preserve emails from the DOE, the NYPD, the mayor’s office and other major agencies or allow them to end up in a digital dumpster.

Barbara Sherman, an education policy analyst for James, said the councilwoman wants copies to help the next mayor understand the previous administration’s thinking.

“In order to move forward and have a smooth transition and understand how these transitions are made, they need this information,” Sherman told DNAinfo.

“I think for just the sake of continuity, there is something very strange for the [Bloomberg] administration to get rid of 12 years of correspondences,” she added.

James, a Democrat currently in a runoff election for Public Advocate, has asked for copies of all DOE emails discussing enrollment, testing, Common Core standards, audits and support services for students with disabilities.

She also wants emails in which Schools Chancellor Dennis Walcott and deputy chancellors discuss the truncation or closing of city schools. Her FOIL letter also requests emails in which they discuss school bus transportation, bus contracts and employer protection provisions for drivers and matrons.

  

“Education is quite important to the councilwoman," Sherman said. "She has been a champion of families whose voices have not been heard. This is just another area where the Department of Education is eliminating — not just stifling, but eliminating — this voice."

Clearly Bloomberg and Walcott intend to erase any evidence of their crimes and incompetence before they go.

They must be stopped.

Notice that Tish James is trying to stop them.

Not Dan Squadron (who, as Patrick Sullivan pointed out on Twitter last night, has never made it to a PEP to protest a school closure while James has been a regular fixture at those meetings.)

Nope - Tish James.

Something to think about before you vote on October 1.