Governor Andrew Cuomo wants to be known as the Democratic governor who didn’t raise taxes. He wants to be in the same league with the rightwing governors who boast that they created jobs by having a business-friendly climate with low corporate tax rates. The last thing he will do is equalize funding for education or–heaven forbid–actually spend more for education.
Read this interview in Crain’s, a business magazine, where he not only boasts of his aversion to taxes, but says this about education:
“Advocacy groups say you’re underfunding education.
The educational groups [saying] we don’t spend enough money [are] funded by the teachers’ union, which has a vested interest in making the answer “It’s about more money; it’s about more salaries and more benefits.” That’s not what it’s about. [They have names like] the Blessed Virgins for Education, the Good Citizens for a Better Tomorrow. [They] should be called Lobbyists for the Teachers’ Union. Otherwise it’s misleading.”
Cuomo apparently thinks that parents don’t care about class size, or budget cuts, or layoffs, or loss of funding for the arts in their schools. No, he alone is the “lobbyist for the students,” (as he once boasted), not their parents. Anyone who wants more money for schools must be fronting for the teachers’ unions.
He doesn’t care that the tax cap that he installed is harming school districts across the state, since it requires a vote of 60% (not 51%) to raise the cap. Costs rise, but taxes stay flat. Something’s got to give.
In various studies (see here and here), Bruce D. Baker of Rutgers has identified New York as one of the nation’s least equitable states in funding education. High-spending, but inequitable.
The students’ lobbyist? No.
Diane Ravitch's blog 
Cuomo is full steam ahead, despite detractors in the NY legislature. Things are heating up…http://www.longislandpress.com/2014/02/05/pols-call-for-common-core-delay-cuomo-urges-patience/
Here in KS, Brownback is giving the corp. as well as Koch all the tax breaks and taxing poor and middle class. Taking away safety nets for disabled, poor children, defunding schools and colleges. What has happened? More jobs lost than gained and KS is sliding to the bottom of many lists.
Anything for the non virgins Andrew?
You should more like a lobbyist for a lobbyist or a shyster for a shyster.
Cuomo and Christie: two vultures of a feather.
The two governors have one thing in common: both presidential aspirations are doomed.
Linda: thanks for the comment; at Fordham Institute, Checkers Finn calls us “marriage wreckers” and he says we are all “acolytes” of Diane Ravitch. I haven’t been a union member since 1968; worked in places where they didn’t even have unions but I have formed my opinions ( and I think separately and critically from membership in any group)…. but they will dismiss us with name calling….
Not sure why Mr. Finn’s opinion is one I should value. Telling it like it is and not looking to make friends with self serving politicians. As if they have one ounce of respect for teachers. Back to grading.
Don’t insult vultures – they, unlike Christie or Cuomo, serve a useful purpose.
Typo sound more, not should, darn autocorrect!
I am so tired of parents being accused of being shills for the unions. is it any surprise that what a parent demands for their child happens to be the same things that teachers know their students need?!
Whatever in the world is wrong with teacher’s unions seeking better wages for their membership? Wall Street survives on getting a larger piece of the pie: why should teachers be excoriated for attempting the same.
As a teacher and taxpayer in Northern NY, all I can say is Gov. Cuomo is killing our rural district. Killing it. There are no alternatives in Tupper Lake. No parochial, private or charter schools.
According to the article, his big plan is to bring casinos to upstate NY.
Education cuts and casinos. My, what a visionary. What has happened to NY?!
In CT under Malloy we have Keno as a money maker, what visionary leaders.
And our kids aren’t career ready, but they are?
http://www.ctnewsjunkie.com/archives/entry/lawmakers_question_keno_as_revenues_soar
How ridiculous to say that only teachers’ unions want more money for public schools.
Parents want more money for public schools.
Students want more money for public schools.
Taxpayers want more money for public schools–better to spend more on schools now, and less on prisons and public assistance later.
6 TRILLION DOLLARS. That, according to the Cost of War Project at Brown University, is the committed cost of the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq. And what did you get for those? A tiny fraction of that would have protected against “turrurist” activity here at home.
I’m a life long Democrat. Voted for his father three times. I wouldn’t vote for him again if I was paid. The first time around I thought I was voting for a Democrat not a DINO. Andy you don’t have to shift to the right, Hillary will get the nomiation.
And I suppose names like “Students First” and “Teach For America” are NOT disingenuous? My experience: parents want what’s best for their kids and can separate teacher’s alleged “greed” from students’ real “need”…
Thank you for bringing attention to this issue. The tax cap and other funding gimmicks are decimating NY’s schools. Cuomo’s actions prove he’s really a lobbyist for corporations.
Wow. He must be feeling pretty comfortable in his skin. Watch carefully for downstate endorsement when he strokes UFT with settled contract and giant (well timed) retro money…he’ll be a hero. Then an endorsement from them for you know what for being a champion for the students, an unprecedented deal maker…after working behind the scenes to cripple community schools and undermine union leadership statewide. See that picture of him behind a podium with his finger pointing up? No fool, he tests the wind, watches the crowd, then pretends to lead.
The areas that are going to be able to vote out the property tax caps are those that have wealthy people who want a better education over all else. Areas of people who don’t have children, many of the elderly (not all), people on fixed or low incomes, can’t afford to do it. His cap breeds inequity on a year to year basis and we never even got a tiny bit of the campaign for fiscal equity lawsuit money and this ensures we never will.
Cuomo is the apple the fell from te tree, rolled down the hill and trned rotten. He is no Democrat.. he is against public service employee unions, he attacks our hard earned negotiated benefits, he tries to over ride collective bargaining and he is more of a bully than Christie.
Mario needs to take Andy boy out to the woodshed, because f he doesn’t te parents of children will.
Andy needs a primary challenge from a real progressive.
I recall the members of the local teacher’s union I belonged to voting overwhelmingly to accept a lower pay increase to keep class sizes capped at 34 when the district threatened to raise the class size limit.
There were other similar concessions teachers in that district made over the years to keep programs that benefited kids that might have been cut if the teacher’s had demanded higher pay.
I wonder how often teachers of other llocal union branches make decisions like these.
Perhaps Governor Cuomo is unaware of the fact that Buffalo, NY. teachers have not had a raise in 11 years. Is this fair? I’d bet that the governor and the people in Albany have had several raises since eleven years ago, or for that matter since they were elected. Maybe we should be more careful of who we vote for in Albany from now on.
That’s right Cathy. The disparity between salaries in Buffalo and the affluent suburbs is about $20,000 a year. (And you didn’t mention the three year wage freeze.)
And that’s not the only inequities. Suburban districts offer more electives and enrichment than the city schools. There is only so much an urban school can do when staffing has been cut into the bone. All things are not equal. And with the vast diversity and poverty found within Buffalo, these schools need more, not less than the surrounding districts.
So the teacher’s unions are to blame for why there is no money for education! Seems if schools were not mandated to spend money on Common Core materials….. The UFT has not had a contract in 5 years, and every contract that has been signed in the past 2 decades has had givebacks. Pearson made $8.7 billion last year on education. So why are districts broke! He needs to go, run for Governor Diane!
Who is allowed to live in NYS then? Apparently not conservatives, whom he insulted last week and now not the working middle class.
What a disrespectful jerk. What is his problem.
His problem is ego, narcissism and vacuity. He is the consummate bloviator, looking to find places to see his name in print regardless of what it is associated with or how untrue or damaging the related elements of the story.
Another loud-mouthed politician who thinks he can tell school staff and parents how to run their schools while he hypocritically sends his own children to private schools. Apparently the public schools in Westchester County are not good enough for his progeny.
Unfortunately, we are preaching to the choir. Most parents are with us, but the average voter is very anti teacher. They feel we are overpaid and underworked. A TFA is just as good, in their eyes, as a veteran teacher. Don’t expect any sympathy from them.
Cuomo also sees the big picture. In his eyes, the state is throwing good money after bad, without favorable results, especially in the urban areas (many which are funded by NYS). He doesn’t want to hear excuses, he wants to see results.
That is why it is important that all affected parties speak out. Our legislatures are listening when they call for a moratorium on testing. Now we need to reach Cuomo’s ear. If it is politically expedient, especially in an election year, he will take heed.
It will take more then the teachers. NYSUT is speaking out too little, too late. It will take a large movement and the battle will be like swimming upstream with our hands tied behind our backs.
Win or lose – we need to give it our all.
You can’s solve the defense problem by throwing money at it.
Let them hold a bake sale.
So, Gov. Cuomo, this is what I see as I “sub” around in NY Upstate districts: teachers struggling with the Common Core mandates, teachers being often times evaluated by admins with mysterious motives (yes, even gender bias), very short family leaves because two people have to work, choices “not to have any more” because they can’t afford it, teachers caring for elders, a lot of sleep deprivation and intermittent illnesses, no fancy cars in the parking lots unless someone has married well, wonderful young people subbing because they can’t get a full time job, ……And, I also see their professional expertise, intelligence, dedication and kindness… Thank heaven there are unions….do not these people deserve affirmation and protection!?
I won’t vote for you anymore, Gov.
The more I see and hear, the more I think that this is about the degenerating sense of local responsibility that corporations have to their communities/states/countries.
It’s all about paying the least amount in taxes. Corporations that were allowed and encouraged to flourish via US laws and benefits. With the condition and expectation that those corporations would return the investment in the form of jobs and taxes.
This is not happening, now. Off shore tax havens shelter billions or trillions of dollars that would be so well put to work in this country. States advertise low taxes in hopes of attracting companies that will more than happily pull up stakes if the financial incentive arises.
There’s no sense of commitment to the community or our nation, in general. From what I understand, the tax havens are illegal. But our leaders won’t address the problems.
Someway. Someday. Something’s gotta give. It’s not right. It’s not confined to education. It’s everywhere. We’re being sold out and there has to be a way to bring the people who are doing this to justice.
And so more money goes to teachers. If the governor, along with his other state colleagues are upset about declining school performance as compared to other foreign countries, he might look at the compensation schedules in foreign countries with high test scores — all pay teachers well. No one would disagree that quality teaching begins with attracting the best and the brightest into the field and maintaining their presence in classrooms. When you review teacher salary schedules throughout the country it is clear that of all the professions, teaching, from a monetary standpoint, is the least attractive. You can’t attract or sustain high level professional personnel with salary schedules that require working second jobs, supervising several extracurricular activities, and the coming home to grade papers all night.
Yeah,Welcome to the “NEW” New York….
Having Bloomberg gone is big. It’s no coincidence that the reform movement gained so much momentum during his 12 year tenure as head of the largest school system in the USA. He’s very active and instrumental in the movement against public education.
Unfortunately, we’ve obviously got a governor who’s good hostile towards our union and is going to be spreading propoganda. He and King will push the national privatization and milked down standards agenda, claiming it to be more “rigorous”. But I believe that DiBlasio will do what he can to make changes in NYC. And those changes (even the proposed ones that are rejected) will have a ripple effect.
Edit:
Nothing “good” about his hostility.
PropAganda
From: http://www.nonprofitquarterly.org/policysocial-context/23577-republican-gubernatorial-campaigns-play-the-charter-school-card.html
” New York Governor Andrew Cuomo may have scored a $10,000 campaign donation from the state’s largest teachers’ union in the past few months, but charter school advocates have given the governor much more, including $40,000 from Bruce Kovner, a billionaire among the 100 richest people in the U.S. who is a well known financial backer of Brighter Choice Charter Schools in Albany; $25,000 from StudentsFirst NY, the New York State affiliate of Michelle Rhee’s pro-charter political arm; and $14,000 from the pro-charter Democrats for Education Reform. ”
What else do we need to know?
And what about what about those fronts for corporate interests who claim that they are motivated by minority students and cry about civil rights when they are really just worried about their bottom line. There were great quotes from that lobby last week when De Blasio stated his plan to use what would have been funds directed to charters and redirecting it to PreK,
Okay Cuomo.. no more money for education…. well how about putting money toward eradicating the horrific and debilitating long term poverty that so many public school students are faced with (and parents and their parents too)????
Even next year’s hike in the NYS minimum wage to $9/hour is not enough to support a family as two full time workers would make $36,000 for a combined 80 hour work week. A living wage of $15 would go a long way toward eliminating the debilitating effect of generational poverty.