Philly Chief Executive Officer/Super, Dr. William Hite (Broad Academy, 2005), put it all on the line Thursday when he called out both the mayor and city council promising a nuclear threat - Give us $50 million (or at least commit to it) or - your children won't have schools to attend on September 9th.
In March 2013, the district announced a $304 Million deficit. Hite had been on the job nine months - barely long enough to incubate a baby. He'd accepted the position following the tumultuous three-year term of Arlene Ackerman, less affectionately known as "Queen Arlene" for her oft-times arrogant administrative style. (Ackerman passed away in early 2013.)
The State responded to the deficit - since 2001 Philadelphia Public Schools have been remanded to the control and custody of the PA Governor who appoints the majority of the five members who compose the district's governing body, the School Reform Commission - in June with a cobbled together package of $104 Million devised in the Harrisburg Legislature who recessed before many of the details were finalized.
Now 14 months into his contract, Hite is prepared to drop the nuclear bomb - He will not open schools as scheduled on September 9th without a solid commitment for the funds needed to provide enough adults in his facilities to ensure that his students will be safe while in the custody of the Philadelphia School District.
Hite's fighting for the $50 million that will be generated by a 1% hike in the City's sales tax. The state wants the funds to go to the city's schools. But, the Philadelphia City Council led by Council President Darrell Clarke wants to split those funds between the education and the pension fund.
Despite the stalemate and the less than adequate finance package offered by the legislators in Harrisburg, Hite hasn't been idle. He's laid-off thousands of teachers, assistant principals, aides, and other who are necessary to operate schools - efforts to reduce the projected deficit. But, the net effect of reducing the number of adults on the payroll has resulted in a substantial decrease in the adult presence actually within the schools themselves, creating a safety issue for students and staff alike.
Hite's hands are tied. He has to bridge the deficit. But, that bridge means unsafe and understaffed schools and this casts Philadelphia as the city that can't afford to educate its children. And this isn't the first time.
In 1975, Pennsylvania provided 55 percent of school funding statewide, in 2001 it provided less than 36 percent.[15] An analysis determined that increased district spending was limited by a state system which relies heavily on property taxes for local school funding. As a result, wealthier school districts with proportionately more property owners and more expensive real estate have more funds for schools. The result is great disparities in school system expenditures per student. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/School_District_of_PhiladelphiaFormer superintendent David Hornbeck threatened to close the city's schools in February, 1998. The issue at hand was an accusation that the state was not providing enough funds to balance the district's proposed budget. His threat was not welcomed. On April 21, 1998, Harrisburg responded to Hornbeck's threat with a Act 46, a school funding package that include a takover plan.
In 1997 and 1998, both the City and the District filed lawsuits to address funding inadequacies. The first suit contended that Pennsylvania did not provide a "thorough and efficient" education and was quickly dismissed by the state court. The second case, a civil rights suit filed in the Federal District Court, argued that the state's funding practices discriminated against districts with significant populations of non-white students. Then-mayor John Street would later put this litigation on hiatus when he negotiated a "friendly" state takeover of the district that promised additional state funding.
With financial pressure mounting, Hornbeck resigned in 2000. In the wake of his departure, the superintendency was eliminated for a model that split the responsibility between a Chief Academic Officer and a Chief Executive Officer. In 2001, the district faced a crisis when it was unable to make payroll and owed roughly $30 million to vendors. Governor Mark Schweiker, under Act 46 as passed in 1998, in conjunction with Mayor Street who temporarily suspended the civil rights suit, took control of the district - the state takeover of the fifth largest urban school district in the nation was then viewed as the most radical education reform effort yet attempted.
The "friendly" takeover was anything but... negotiations stalled over the governance of the district. The state wanted the City to anti-up some additional funding to help bridge a $216 million budget gap while the city fought for the right to appoint two of the five members of the soon-to-be-created School Reform Commission and to retain control of the employees within the district administrative office.
In the end the City won the two appointees and coughed up $45 million for the schools. On December 21, 2001, Secretary Charles Zogby of the Pennsylvania Department of Education signed a Declaration of Distress, the mechanism created to invoke state control of the district.
The Next Move? It's anyone's guess in this saga of cat and mouse games played with children's futures.
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