Governor Andrew Cuomo offered few specifics when he pledged to "save charter schools" at a massive rally on Tuesday, beyond promising "financial capacity, physical space and the government's support."
But as Mayor Bill de Blasio begins to follow through on his promise to rethink co-locations and free rent for charters, Cuomo is actually in a position to help them significantly, as long as he's willing to spend some political capital to do so.
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The politics wouldn't be simple. The governor would have to get the Legislature to go along with his ideas. And while he'd be pleasing the donors to Eva Moskowitz's Success Academies who have contributed heavily to him, the governor would further alienate union-aligned activists like Billy Easton of the Alliance for Quality Education, who blasted him for "severely underfunding public schools."
State budget and education experts told Capital that Cuomo can help charters by maneuvering more money in the state budget towards the city's schools, and then stipulating that some of that money be used for charter revenue.
Parrott called that the "easiest option" for Cuomo, even though, he said, "it does represent a new level of state intervention regarding New York City."
Budget deals could hypothetically include additional funding for charters bartered for flexibility on teacher evaluations, sources say, or for myriad other non-education related priorities for members of the Senate and Assembly.
Shapiro quotes David Bloomfield saying that without Cuomo brokering an actual deal on charter funding himself, his talk at the Eva rally on Tuesday remains nothing more than talk.
I find it unconscionable that Cuomo would use "flexibility" over APPR in NYC to get extra money toward Eva and Company.
He's been saying that he will brook NO CHANGES to APPR no matter the problems with the evaluation system or the CCSS tests, but now suddenly "flexibility" is fine so long as Eva Moskowitz gets free rent?
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