Results tagged “assemblyleadersilver”

According to the Daily News, Assembly Leader Sheldon Silver "unveiled a proposal to renew mayoral control over the schools before a largely skeptical group of fellow Democrats." The Legislature is set to decide whether Mayor Bloomberg can continue mayoral oversight of the public school system, which is the country's largest. Many lawmakers are skeptical because mayoral control leaves little opportunity for parents and community members to offer their insights. The News explains Silver's plan still gives the mayor "control of the 13-member Panel for Educational Policy, but at least two of his eight appointments would have to be parents of city schoolchildren... The schools chancellor would no longer be chairman of the body and would be required to visit each school district every two years. The chairman would be voted on by panel members. The panel, which would be required to meet once a month and in each borough at least once a year, would vote on all policy decisions, capital spending plans and budgets," according to sources. Previously, PolitickerNY has suggested that Senate Majority Leader Malcolm Smith, who supports mayoral control, could side with Republicans in order to pass it.

Mayor Bloomberg didn't appear in public after Assembly Leader Sheldon put a nail in congestion pricing's coffin. But Bloomberg did issue an angry press release. The full text is after the jump (and he does thank many politicians who helped), but here's where he lets loose, after noting that while Washington D.C. was willing to give NYC $354 in federal funding, the State Assembly lacked leadership and courage in accepting new ideas:

"If that wasn't shameful enough, it takes a special type of cowardice for elected officials to refuse to stand up and vote their conscience- on an issue that has been debated, and amended significantly to resolve many outstanding issues, for more than a year. Every New Yorker has a right to know if the person they send to Albany was for or against better transit and cleaner air. People know where I stood, and where members of the City Council stood. They deserved at least that from Albany."

Yes, the question of whether a vote should have been held (Silver claimed there wasn't enough support for a vote) will be brought up again and again. But now, as the Sun says, the relationship between Bloomberg and state lawmakers is "in tatters."