Alan Singer says it is time to protest the inequitable conditions in East Ramapo, NewYork, where Orthodox Jews control the school board. The school board starves the public schools of resources, but is very generous to the private religious schools their own children attend.

He writes:

“Nine thousand Black and Latino children attending East Ramapo, New York public schools are warehoused in over-crowded, under-funded failing schools because a school board controlled by a White religious group is using public school dollars to subsidize their own children who attend religious schools. District school budgets have been defeated four of the last five years and eight of the last eleven, the highest rate of budget rejection in New York State. Meanwhile Andrew Cuomo, the Governor of New York State, Merryl Tisch, the Chancellor of the State Board of Regents, the governing body for education in New York, and John King, the Education Commissioner, have all remained silent. That is why it is time to march against racism in East Ramapo…..

“The district is now bankrupt because of all the money channeled to private religious schools despite major cuts in public education spending…..”

The state-appointed monitor, Hank Greenberg, “Prior to delivering his report to State Education, Greenberg told reporters he did not believe the East Ramapo school board acted “out of base or venal motives.” Rather, their concern about the children from their own religious group had “blinded them to the needs of the entire community.” This is surprising language from a lawyer given that Greenberg’s job was to investigate legal and financial impropriety, not determine whether the school board was moral but blinded by good intentions. However, I am not a lawyer. Greenberg found the district’s funding pattern to be “unique” in New York State and charged the faction in control of the East Ramapo school board of “abysmal” fiscal management and noted the district was teetering “on the precipice of fiscal disaster.” This is an example of institutional racism, whether school board members think they are acting in good faith to meet the needs of children from their own religious community. That is why it is time to march against racism in East Ramapo.

“Since 2009, the non-venal majority in control of the East Ramapo school board has eliminated 245 public school positions, including special education teachers, guidance counselors, social workers, and elementary school assistant principals. It replaced full-day kindergarten with half-day, eliminated instrumental music for younger children, ended transportation for field trips, reduced athletic and extra-curricular activities by fifty percent, closed the summer school, and depleted the district’s emergency reserves, money it is legally required to maintain for insurance, liability and unanticipated costs. That is why it is time to march against racism in East Ramapo.

“Meanwhile, district spending on programs benefiting private religious school students have increased substantially. From 2006-7 to 2013-14, district spending on transporting private school students specifically increased nearly 77 percent. From 2010-11 to 2013-14, the cost of providing special education for students enrolled in private religious schools increased by 33 percent. More than 23,500 students are transported daily to private religious schools in East Ramapo, 18,000 by private companies that are essentially subsidized by the school district. Special education students receive services in forty different religious schools, which are also essentially subsidized by the school district. These subsidies to families that send their children to private religious schools make up over one-third of the district budget.”

The state may be reluctant to intervene because it has poor record of taking over entire districts (e.g., Roosevelt in Long Island), but the state should take over to protect the children from a school board that doesn’t care about them.

Meanwhile, unbeknownst to Alan Singer when he wrote about the district, the East Ramapo board sold a closed school for use as a religious school at what appears to be less than its fair market value. The state did not object.