Many of you have read about an important change we put forward that would be on the ballot this November and I wanted to take a moment to explain in detail the thought process here.

The proposal that moved forward would give voters the right to decide on who they want to hold accountable for the Board of Education – whether it is the mayor/council via an appointed board or whether it is a direct election for BOE members.

Under any other circumstances I would argue that a direct election is best, but clearly the process today with a direct election isn’t working. Over the last 3 years on the elected Board of Education there has been 5 members resign midterm, 1 member indicted for bribery, 1 member defend anti-Semitic comments, 1 member living in China for the year while serving, 1 member with ethics charges and many other issues. Clearly there is a great deal of dysfunction and the people that suffer are the students, parents, taxpayers, teachers, and staff, as there is currently a $200 million budget gap in our schools.

While often people come to the City Council and Mayor to push blame on the schools, the reality is that we have no ability to make decisions. At the same time, there have been no solutions from the elected board for their issues outside of huge tax/rent increases for residents, coupled with stagnation on facility plans or curriculum improvements. Again, my belief is what is happening today with the elected board is not working largely because the elections have low candidate information around them which allows special interests to dominate.

So this past week, the City Council has put the Board of Education on notice that at the end of this year the voters will decide how to proceed. There is no question that our Board of Education has become a national embarrassment and if need be, we are asking for the tools to fix it.

When I came into office, the city budget was increasing by double digits each year, autonomous agencies were present with no accountability, fire companies were closed every night putting people in danger and the police department was poorly staffed. We corrected all of that and I believe if given the tools we can do the same here.

Let me clarify a few things as I noticed much misinformation on social media:

Some have said the council has given the mayor control of the schools. That is false The council did not vote to give me the control of the schools. The truth is that the City Council voted to give the public a choice on who they hold accountable. The voters will solely decide during an election in November. We can all agree that the current board is not working for our schools, so it makes sense to give the power back to the voters, most of whom are parents of these very students.

Some have said this is a power grab. This is false. There is actually zero personal benefit for me to engage in this discussion other than doing what is right for the City. This is a temporary way to fix an otherwise broken system and I sincerely believe that we can fix our school system. Prior to the election in November, we will strengthen the pay to play laws to the schools to avoid influences and set clear, transparent criteria of who would be important.

The vote on Wednesday put the current school board on notice. The City Council can reverse the referendum at any time if the BOE works productively over the next year towards solutions. Today, their only solution has been a massive tax increase, which would also mean a rent increase to residents. There is no doubt that taxes are part of the equation, but they have showed no innovation or willingness to make tough decisions. Whether it is facility issues or curriculum issues, it is hard to argue things are moving forward in the schools.

My hope is that the current Board of Education makes the tough and productive decisions this year on budgets, taxes, facilities, curriculum and more, and then a referendum is not needed in November. If they don’t move forward, then the voters will have a choice to go in a different direction. I know if given the chance, we can improve it for students, teachers, staff, parents, taxpayers – but we need the tools.

So now the next step is with the Board of Education. They need to make strong and productive decisions over 2020.