Cuomo Underfunds NYC Public Schools

Cuomo bragged during a phone "town hall" that he is keeping state spending lower than the last 10 governors.

Dunno where he got that stat - might have found it in the mashed potatoes Sandra Lee made for St. Patrick's Day - but given this story from Daily Politics, I can believe it:

City funding of the Education Department in 2015 will outstrip the state's contribution for the fourth year in a row, according to a new Independent Budget Office analysis -- something that wouldn't have happened if the state had made good on its promises in a major school-funding lawsuit.

The IBO reports Mayor de Blasio's preliminary budget projects city funding to increase by $548 million, bringing Gotham's share to 48% of DOE spending. State funding is only expected to rise by $234 million, making the state's contribution 43% of total costs.
The state would have continued contributing more than the city, as it usually did before 2012, if it had held up its end of the deal in the famous Campaign For Fiscal Equity suit. But state revenues tanked after the 2008 fiscal crisis and Albany didn't fulfill the promises it made regarding the case first filed in 1993, after a judge's 2006 ruling that the state needed to chip in nearly $2 billion more over four years to provide NYC kids a "sound, basic education."

Cuomo cuts state funding even as he ratchets up the state mandates, putting more and more pressure on localities.

Then he blames the unionized employees of those localities for bankrupting them.

Meanwhile he continues to find ways to cut state funding and force towns and cities to increase theirs.

If and when Cuomo gets extra funding for charter schools, that money will come out of the NYC public school funding.

That means even less funding for schools as Cuomo continues to throw on the mandates (CCSS, APPR.)

All part of the plan - claim he's fiscally prudent while putting much of the funding responsibilities back onto the localities, forcing them to cut back on public employees salaries, benefits and hiring.

Neoliberal to the core, that's our Sheriff Andy.