The Governor made a lot of news on education over the long weekend, however, revealing plans to use School Aid to force action on teacher evaluation.

Initially, it was reported that the Governor would propose holding up School Aid increases for districts which failed to implement new teacher and principal evaluation procedures by December 31, 2012.

By itself such a proposal would only increase pressure on school districts to compromise with their local unions under a law which the Governor has said, “protected the teachers union at the expense of the students and instituted a system that was destined to fail.”

There had to be more to the plan.  Today’s New York Post and New York Times provide more details.

The Post reports,

Gov. Cuomo will give New York’s teachers one month to agree to a statewide performance evaluation plan — or he’ll write his own educator-rating scheme into the budget for legislative approval, The Post has learned.

In the ultimatum — which Cuomo will level at the United Federation of Teachers and New York State United Teachers as he presents his budget today — the governor will also insist the state union drop its lawsuit challenging certain provisions of the evaluation system, a source close to the administration said.

The governor would have up to 30 days to present a budget amendment that spells out the details of a teacher-rating system, something he promises to do if the unions don’t sign on.

Districts would then have until early next January to get the new system up and running or else the state would withhold a 4 percent increase in school aid, sources said.

 

Governor Andrew Cuomo has reacted to the news with a statement harshly critical of school districts, local unions, and what he refers to as “the Assembly-led legislation” creating the evaluation system.

The USDE cited two concerns – delays in implementing new student data systems and new teacher and principal evaluation systems.

U.S. Education Secretary Arne Duncan said,

“New York made significant progress through Race to the Top over the last year but has recently hit a roadblock that not only impedes Race to the Top but could threaten other key reform initiatives as well.  New York has a chance to be a national leader or a laggard, and we are only interested in supporting real courage and bold leadership.”

The State Education Department issued a statement saying of the report,

“It’s disappointing but not discouraging.  We have to get this done, and we will.  The RTTT report is a reminder that the federal government will hold us to the commitments we made in our RTTT application, just as we will hold districts and educators to the commitments they made.

This afternoon, Governor Cuomo issued a statement.  He said

Secretary Duncan’s report saying New York is on the watch-list for failure is yet another warning that the inability of school districts across the state and their unions to come together has jeopardized the quality of our kids’ education. New York State’s students are now in danger of losing hundreds of millions of dollars because of the failure to devise a teacher evaluation system that works.

The Governor added,

We need to achieve both short term and long term reform of this failed system. I will pursue such reform aggressively.

In the short term, I call on the State Department of Education, local school districts and the union leadership to expedite their negotiations on a teacher evaluation system to prevent the loss of hundreds of millions of dollars in federal funding.

Over the long term, we need to overhaul the system and change the law on the books. The Assembly-led legislation in 2010 protected the teachers union at the expense of the students and instituted a system that was destined to fail.

Here is a link to the USDE’s progress report on New York.

Additional text:

Governor Cuomo’s statement built upon comments he made during a radio interview the day before.  At the conclusion of the interview with Fred Dicker of the New York Post and 1300 AM Albany talk radio, the Governor made it a point to bring up the evaluation issue.

The Governor said,

The law has been a failure. It has not been implemented. It is unworkable. Some would say it was unworkable by design, ab initio [from the initiation], but time has shown that it’s unworkable.

The Governor also reiterated his refusal to get involved in resolving the New York City impasse over teacher evaluations, noting,

There are roughly 700 school districts in this state. The answer isn’t “The Governor should intervene between the local political official – the school board – and the union. I can’t negotiate 700 union contracts.

The Governor concluded by expressing respect for teachers and the union, adding, “my mother was a school teacher,” but concluded, “I represent the students.”

A podcast of the interview is available here.  The evaluation discussion comes at the 52 minute mark, near the very end.

In the area of education, the Governor that in his first year he learned the lesson that superintendents, teachers, school boards, maintenance personnel, and bus drivers all have lobbyists, but students do not have a lobbyist.  So he declared he would be taking on a second job in the coming year – students’ lobbyist.

He announced he would appoint a commission on education to recommend reforms in key areas, including teacher accountability and student achievement and management efficiency.

The Governor said, “we need a meaningful teacher evaluation system. The legislation enacted in 2010 to qualify for Race to the Top didn’t work.”

He added, “We must make our schools accountable for the results they achieve and the dollars they spend.”

No details have been provided yet on who will sit on the commission or when it will report.

I was quoted in a New York Times article on the commission and appeared on Time Warner’s statewide Capitol Tonight television show, along with Tim Kremer from the School Boards Association and Nikki Jones from the Alliance for Quality Education.

In the Times article, I said

“There are a lot of people who would disagree with the governor’s rhetoric and parts of his analysis, but would agree with the big picture.  How do we produce more learning for students with the resources our taxpayers can provide?”

On the rhetoric…

There is some grumbling across the education community about the Governor’s assertion that no one advocates for students.  Certainly superintendents see that as central to their work.

Capitol Tonight’s Liz Benjamin asked her guests for their reactions to the Governor’s announcement that he would be the students’ lobbyist.

I gave a two part response.

First, I said “We welcome him,” and added that that is a good perspective for a state leader to take – to be asking how the actions of state government affect student learning.

But I added that everyone working in the schools – teachers, principals, superintendents – got into the business because they wanted to have a positive impact of the lives of children, and that in our surveys superintendents tell us they sought their jobs to be able to affect more children.

On the analysis…

The Governor repeated claims that New York is first in per pupil spending but 38^th in graduation rates.

The numbers are what they are.  But using single broad measures overlooks simple facts and over simplifies complex situations.

As I explained on Capitol Tonight, New York is a high cost state across the board.  We have the highest weekly wages for all workers of any state.  Schools are labor intensive.  It should not be a surprise that we would have high per pupil spending.

I also said that we are a hugely diverse state, in ways good and bad.  Our graduation rate problem is concentrated, rather than universal, mostly focused in typically urban districts.

On the bigger picture…

With all the foregoing in mind, it remains that many in education would agree with the Governor on the bigger picture thrust.  I do.  We need to be asking how can our schools produce the learning our students need now with the resources our taxpayers can provide.

A commission can provide the focus for an extended statewide conversation aimed at answering that question.  So pending further details, we can welcome the idea of a commission.

Capitol Tonight’s Liz Benjamin said she had the sense the Governor would look to fill the commission with people from outside the state’s education system.

I said I hoped it would include insiders as well, because they could speak to what is working well now, and what isn’t.

I also said that it would be a mistake to assume that everyone working in schools now is wedded to the status quo.  Again, they entered education to positively affect the lives of young people.

I went on to add that even if some are wedded to the status quo, the status quo is changing – we have had there years of state aid cuts or freezes, now the tax cap, and continuing cost pressures from pensions and health insurance.  Schools have to change.

A commission can’t just point to what schools are doing wrong, however.  A corollary question for it must be what does the state need to change, in order to help schools produce more learning for students with the resources the taxpayers can provide.

A complication for the commission will be how to work with the $700 million worth of promises the state has made to Washington under Race to the Top, which has already defined a significant and demanding reform agenda for the State Education Department and the schools to execute.

Here is the complete prepared text of the Governor’s address (the education section begins on p. 19 and is preceded by a discussion of mandate relief).

Here is the video of the speech.  He discusses education beginning about 38 minutes in.

Here is the passage on education:

Education Commission to Promote Performance and Accountability

As we reimagine government, we must focus on our core values.

The future of our state depends on our public schools. A strong, effective school system is the hallmark of a healthy democracy.

We must make our schools accountable for the results they achieve and the dollars they spend.

I learned my most important lesson in my first year as Governor in the area of public education.  I learned that everyone in public education has his or her own lobbyist.

Superintendents have lobbyists.  Principals have lobbyists.  Teachers have lobbyists.

School boards have lobbyists.  Maintenance personnel have lobbyists.  Bus drivers have lobbyists.

The only group without a lobbyist?

The students.

Well, I learned my lesson. This year, I will take a second job — consider me the lobbyist for the students. I will wage a campaign to put students first, and to remind us that the purpose of public education is to help children grow, not to grow the public education bureaucracy.

Today, we are driven by the business of public education more than the achievement in public education. Maybe that’s why we spend more money than any other state but are 38th in graduation rates.

We have to change the paradigm. We need major reform in two areas:

· Teacher accountability and student achievement. We need a meaningful teacher evaluation system. The legislation enacted in 2010 to qualify for Race to the Top didn’t work.

· Management efficiency. We must make our schools accountable for the results they achieve and the dollars they spend.

We cannot fail in our mission to reform public education, because we simply cannot fail our children.

I will appoint a bipartisan education commission to work with the Legislature to recommend reforms in these key areas.

Late yesterday, State Education Commissioner John King announced that he is suspending federal School Improvement Grants to 10 districts which the State Education Department judges do not have teacher/principal evaluation plans which satisfy new state requirements.

The Commissioner said,

“The deadline is real; the funding is suspended,” King said.  “The good news is that six districts (Roosevelt, Poughkeepsie, Buffalo, Syracuse, Albany and Rochester) showed real progress toward meeting the requirements for a teacher and principal evaluation system agreed to in their SIG applications. All 10 districts can request a hearing. If these six districts get back to the table immediately to address the shortcomings in their plans, the hearings should go well for them.”

New York State United Teachers responded to the Commissioner announcement with a statement accusing the Commissioner and SED of taking a “dictatorial approach to reform” and asserting that they have “…demonstrated that they have totally lost their way in shepherding real, meaningful reform.”

Commissioner King appeared on Time-Warner’s Capitol Tonight to discuss his decision.

Reporting on the Governor’s plans to announce an education reform commission in today’s State of the State address, the New York Times noted that Board of Regents Chancellor Merryl Tisch, “said she would urge Mr. Cuomo and his commission to help advance a statewide teacher evaluation system…”

Commissioner King made similar comments in his television appearance.

A collection of education reform groups wrote to the Governor urging that he propose legislation ensure that all districts adopt new evaluation procedures consistent with Race to the Top timelines.

Specifically, the groups recommend,

To ensure that the City and the state’s other districts fulfill New York’s promises to its schoolchildren, we request that you introduce a back-stop measure that requires districts to develop teacher evaluation plans by August 31, 2012.  Any district that has not successfully negotiated its own plan by that date will have to automatically carry out a “default” plan, to be created by the State Education Department.  Those districts would have one year (until August 31, 2013) to install and fully implement their default plan systems.

1. Governor to appoint education commission
2. Teacher evaluation conflicts
3. School finance news

1.       Governor to appoint education commission

The 2012 session of the State Legislature begins on Wednesday when Governor Andrew Cuomo delivers his second, “State of the State” address.

Monday’s New York Daily News reported that the Governor will announce a commission to recommend reforms to the state’s education system.

The Daily News explains,

 Cuomo’s announcement will come just days after he was critical of the city and other districts that failed to reach agreement with their unions on a new teacher evaluation system by an end-of-year deadline.

“The failure to pass the teacher evaluation system is an example that not only is the system broken, but the ability to monitor the system and come up with a method to ensure kids are educated properly is broken,” said a source close to Cuomo.

The education commission he will announce will be designed to look at education from a “student perspective,” the source said.

“What are the performance indicators? How do you judge performance in the education system? How are the services being provided?” the source said. “No one has really looked at it without a particular perspective on what’s going on in education.”

Last Friday, Newsday reported that Governor Andrew Cuomo “wants to take a hard look at school governance.”

Asked in a year-end interview, what surprises he encountered upon taking office, the paper reported,

Cuomo didn’t hesitate before saying, “The need for reform in education is much more striking to me,” adding that he’s troubled by “the lack of performance evaluation-management strategies on the school system.

“The greatest challenge is going to be reforming the education system in this state,” Cuomo said. “It’s probably the most complicated, intractable issue I’ve come across.”

The Governor did not disclose any specific proposals during the interview.

2.       Teacher evaluation conflicts

In the preceding item, the New York Daily News cited the failure of New York City, some other districts, and their teacher unions to reach agreement on new evaluation procedures as an instigation for the Governor’s decision to appoint a commission on education.

Here’s more on that aspect of the story…

At the beginning of last week, State Education Commissioner John King announced that he would suspend federal School Improvement Grants to New York City and nine other districts if they and their local unions were unable to come to agreement on procedures for evaluating teachers and principals consistent with new state requirements.

At that time, Commissioner King said that only Syracuse and Rochester had submitted materials for review of their evaluation procedures.

Subsequently, Buffalo, Albany, and Schenectady submitted materials, although a State Education Department spokesman cast doubt on Schenectady’s chances for approval.

New York State United Teachers issued a statement accusing the Commissioner of “an arbitrary exercise of brinksmanship.”  The union noted that 14 states had received waivers from the U.S. Education Department allowing more time to work out evaluation procedures.

Last Friday, New York City Schools Chancellor Dennis Walcott announced he was breaking off negotiations on new evaluation procedures with the City’s teacher union, the United Federation of Teachers.

The Wall Street Journal reported,

The sticking point for a deal was whether teachers should be able to appeal a low rating to an outside arbitrator. Union officials said an appeal process would prevent principals from abusing their authority, but the city dismissed it as an unnecessary layer of bureaucracy.

Commissioner King issued a statement calling the breakdown in talks, “beyond disappointing,” adding

Sadly, the adults in charge of the City’s schools have let the students down.  SIG schools need to be fixed, and the best way to make that happen is to make sure there’s a quality teacher in front of every classroom and a quality principal at the head of every school.

On New Year’s Eve, Governor Cuomo issued this statement,

Teacher evaluations are critical to ensure our kids have high quality teachers in the classroom because performance counts.

I am disappointed that agreements could not be reached to impose teacher performance evaluations at some of our troubled school districts across the state.

Students lose twice because of this failure. First, the failure to reach agreements on teacher evaluations forces these schools to continue to operate without true accountability, which would ensure students receive a high quality education from high quality teachers. Second, these schools will also lose out on millions of dollars in much needed federal aid.

I urge all involved to get back to the table immediately, put their differences aside and put the kids first. They should agree on an evaluation system that improves performance and prevents the loss of more than one hundred million dollars this year for these schools across the state.

City Schools Chancellor Walcott elaborated his perspective in a Daily News columnon Monday, calling the UFT’s insistence on outside arbitrators to hear appeals “a radical departure” and a “a burdensome procedural layer designed to keep ineffective teachers in the classroom.”

UFT President Michael Mulgrew gave his side of the story on Time-Warner’s Capitol Night.

3.       School finance news

In blog posts last month I summed up the Regents State Aid proposal and offered reflections on the complexities of school district consolidation.

Here are some other items on school finance…

The attorney who led the Campaign for Fiscal Equity’s successful challenge to New York’s system of school finance is contemplating a new effort.

Speaking with the Wall Street Journal, Michael Rebell said he isn’t necessarily headed back to court, but he is leading a research project which will evaluate whether a sample of schools in New York City and around the state are able to provide a sound basic education, as promised under the state constitution.

Mr. Rebell told the Journal, “I don’t rule out litigation.  I’ve been there. I’m prepared to do it if necessary. But we’re in this for the long run, and we’re not looking to just score some quick points and free up a few bucks if we can get it.”

Mr. Rebell also appeared on Capitol Tonight last evening.

On December 15, Governor Cuomo appeared on the Capitol Pressroom radio program to discuss the Regents state aid proposal.

The Gannet News Service Politics on the Hudson Blog observed,

Cuomo, asked several times about the Regents’ proposal by WCNY’s Susan Arbetter, didn’t commit to a specific formula for distributing school aid—always one of Albany’s most scrutinized decisions during the budget process—but said he wants to make sure school performance is part of the conversation.

As the blog reported, the Governor added,

“We want to incentivize performance by the school districts. This system, in my opinion, is sorely lacking in terms of performance,” Cuomo said. “We just fund process. We give school districts a block grant … where they get the same amount whether they are doing great or doing poorly.”

…But Cuomo repeatedly said he wants to focus on performance, without committing to any specific aid-distribution system. Cuomo’s budget proposal will be revealed in January.

“I want to add another component to the conversation, which is let’s talk about the students and whether or not you are educating students,” Cuomo said. “This whole conversation has become about the school district and the teacher and the superintendent, and I want to talk about the student.”

Also in the middle of last month, the Rochester Democrat and Chronicle contrasted the learning opportunities available in poor rural districts and elsewhere.  Phelps-Clifton Springs superintendent Mike Ford warned that his district faces the prospect of eliminating kindergarten and all high school electives next year.

Another potential source of tension in school finance is the disparity between where state revenues come from versus where they go.

The State University’s Rockefeller Institute of Government reported that New York City residents and businesses paid about $4.1 billion more in taxes and fees than the City received in state funding and services in 2009-10.

The suburban counties (Nassau, Suffolk, Westchester and Rockland) paid $7.9 billion more into the state treasury than they received in state aid.

In contrast, upstate regions contributed 28 percent of the state’s revenues and received 42 percent of state outlays.

Writing in the New York Post, the Institute’s Deputy Director, Robert Ward, notes

Regional disputes, often bitter, have haunted New York since colonial days. City and suburban taxpayers might take some comfort simply in knowing that their basic sense of the state’s budgetary balance — we’re paying more than our share! — is, by the numbers, absolutely correct.

Upstaters also have a point when they say that Downstate political sensibilities drive up local taxpayer costs everywhere in New York. Thus, the state sets the rules for programs such as Medicaid and special education — helping to make them far more costly here than in most states — but requires localities to pick up much of the cost, which helps explain the Empire State’s extraordinarily high property taxes.

Nor does the apparent imbalance among regions necessarily mean the current division of dollars is unfair.

For a century or more — certainly since the days of Franklin Delano Roosevelt — Americans, and especially New Yorkers, have believed that redistribution of wealth is a central purpose of government. FDR defined the measure of progress itself as “whether we provide enough for those who have too little.”

Thus, Albany will distribute some $20 billion in education aid this year based partly on how many children in each school are poor enough to qualify for free lunch. Individuals’ age and need will help drive more than $50 billion in Medicaid and welfare spending.

On the other side of the ledger, the state’s major source of revenue, the personal-income tax, is designed to take more from individuals who have more….

Finally, in the past I have noted the powerful impact of two costs — pensions and health insurance — on school spending and taxes.

For four successive years in the last decade, increased costs for those two items roughly matched or exceeded increases in state funding, contributing to a run of higher than historically typical local tax increases.  More recently, districts have cut other spending on balance to absorb pension and health costs while holding down overall spending and taxes.

Monday’s New York Daily News carried a column by the Speaker of the Massachusetts State House of Representatives on that state’s successes in managing pension and health care costs of its workforce.

Here is a piece from the Boston Globe providing more details on the health insurance initiative.

First some humor, at least an attempt:

The CEO of a failing baby food company calls a meeting of senior corporate executives and leads off, “I don’t understand why we are losing money.  We use the best ingredients.  We spend the most on advertising.  We have a great marketing strategy.  We have a great delivery system.  We even have the most attractive packaging.  Why aren’t we selling more dog food?”

Silence.

Finally, the most junior executive speaks up from a distant corner of the room, “Babies don’t like it.”

The point?

Voters also often don’t like something it is presumed they should like – school district consolidation.

Over the past few weeks, Education Commissioner John King has spoken of the potential benefits of school district consolidation in stops around the state, and in a televised interview (the school discussion begins 10 minutes in).

Here are reports on the Commissioner’s observations from the Mid-Hudson Valley, Long Island, and Westchester County.

The Commissioner has stressed that broader consolidations, more than just a pair of districts, but perhaps countywide school systems, could better support comprehensive learning opportunities for all students, enhance administrative efficiency, and improve funding equity.

He has stressed that the greatest opportunities for savings would probably come from school district mergers downstate.

But current law generally gives the final say to local voters, with a requirement that voters in each separate district give their approval.  Over the past decade or so, fewer than a quarter of studied mergers have come to pass.

This past week, voters in Oppenheim-Ephratah rejected a proposed merger with Saint Johnsville, whose voters gave the proposition overwhelming support.

Superintendents of both districts expressed discouragement with the outcome.

Here are some observations about school district consolidations:

♦ There are some places upstate where superintendents are strong supporters of consolidation – because they see districts are running out of kids and they cannot offer comprehensive high school programs and consolidation is geographically feasible.

♦ Generally, consolidations have not produced upfront savings, because reductions in administrative costs are more than offset by the practice of leveling up compensation of the merged workforce.

♦ Savings in upstate rural districts are likely to be especially limited because they already often very lean administratively.

♦ Merging combinations of small, poor school districts would result one larger poor district, providing only a temporary break from deeper structural challenges in school finance.

♦ Everyone wants to “marry-up,” but no more than half the districts can.  All districts would prefer to merge with a more affluent neighbor, to share the neighbor’s wealth and lower tax rates for their residents.

♦ There are legitimate concerns about accelerating the decline of rural communities from closing schools.

♦ School district consolidations are also controversial because they can affect the most consequential financial decision most families make — where to buy a home.  Schools systems often are a critical consideration affecting home values.

♦ In some places regional high schools should be authorized while allowing districts to maintain their elementary schools, this would preserve at least some community schools as well as shorter bus rides for younger children.

♦ There is already a lot of activity aimed at sharing and consolidating administrative and other overhead functions.  These don’t raise concerns about direct impacts on children or losses of community identity.

♦ In downstate regions, typically there have not been the steep enrollment declines found upstate.  But these are areas where districts tend to be more geographically compact and they may realize more administrative savings from consolidation.

♦ Consolidation among smaller downstate districts could also improve funding equity in these areas.  There are also nasty demographic issues in some cases, however.

♦ There are other states with comparable numbers of districts which don’t spend what we do, so the number of districts we have does not fully explain our high overall per pupil spending.

♦ As a cost saving strategy, “the juice may not be worth the squeeze” with consolidation.  If we merge a bunch of small districts, the aggregate savings, by definition, will be small.

♦ Focusing primarily on school district consolidation diverts attention from other actions which may yield more immediate benefits for sustaining student opportunities or managing taxpayer costs.

The bottom-line on the debate, however, is that voters generally have the final say under existing law and they have opposed consolidations, more often than not.

So if one believes that voters are too often making the wrong decision on whether or not to consolidate their local school systems, then that begs the question, what should be done?:

♦ Nothing — New York’s strong tradition of local voter control is justified;

♦ Make the choice clearer, by somehow providing better information to voters;

♦ Make the choice more compelling, for example, by strengthening incentives or by threatening reduction in state aid if a state-endorsed merger is not locally approved; or

♦ Take the final decision away from the voters in some cases.

If one favors more aggressive state authority, then what criteria should be applied and what procedures should be followed?

As criteria, simple enrollment cut-offs don’t work. Some of the smallest districts measured by enrollment are among the largest measured in square miles.

For process, the Education Department could be authorized to order consolidations, or to recommend them with either a streamlined process for approval, or consequences if not locally approved.

Or the state could follow the the military base-closing model, empowering a special commission to develop a plan for school district consolidation which the Legislature would vote up or down, without change.

The Council has not adopted  positions on what, if anything, should or should not be done to support actual school district consolidation.

This past August, the Onondaga-Cortland-Madison BOCES held a one-day conference on consolidation.  OCM BOCES has a website with many good pieces of background information on the process now, and research on the effects of consolidation.

Below is the text of the news release announcing the agenda.  At the end of the release is a link to a more detailed explanation of the agenda.

Update:  Here is a 12-minute video clip video of Bob Reidy discussing the agenda with Gannett News Service reporter Jon Campbell.

For Immediate Release: November 1, 2011

Contact: Andrew Gregory

518-689-7208 (Office)

518-424-3245 (Cell)

agregory@corningplace.com

New Statewide Coalition Unveils Let New York Work: A Common Agenda for the Common Good

Business, local government and education leaders introduce six-point plan to achieve mandate relief.

ALBANY, NY – An historic coalition of eleven prominent business, local government and educational organizations launched a new, comprehensive initiative to advance significant mandate relief. The effort, Let New York Work: A Common Agenda for the Common Good, consists of six key measures that will provide relief from mandates faced by all New Yorkers.

The agenda’s main points include:

• Make the pension system predictable and affordable – The state should offer two retirement options to new employees – a reduced defined benefit plan or a new defined contribution plan that is controlled by the employees and does not weigh down taxpayers.

• Redefine compulsory arbitration – A number of amendments are needed to the state’s compulsory arbitration statute that will benefit local municipalities and taxpayers such as: defining the ability to pay; prohibiting consideration of non-compensation issues; limiting access to binding arbitration; and, adding transparency to the arbitration process.

• Reduce the costs of construction on public/private projects – The state should enact a number of measures that will spur building and development such as: supporting alternative project delivery methods like design build; increasing the Wicks Law threshold across the state; enacting the Public Construction Savings Act (S.4121/A.7855); and making common sense changes to the antiquated Scaffold Law.

• Freeze step increases when contracts expire – Due to the state’s Triborough Amendment, all public employees’ pay continue to increase under an expired contract, placing additional burdens on school districts and municipalities.

• Establish minimum health insurance contribution level for employees and retirees – Employers should cover no more than 85 percent of a single healthcare premium or 75 percent of a healthcare premium for families or retirees.

• Prohibit new mandates – The state should not impose any future mandates on municipalities, school districts and taxpayers.  Enacting the Unfunded Mandate Reform Act (S.5379/A.8150) and requiring a super-majority to add new unfunded mandates would be beneficial.

Following the passage of the 2-percent property tax cap earlier this year, members of the newly-formed coalition recognized the need for a unified pro-mandate relief voice leading up to the 2012 legislative session.

“Just as we faced the property tax cap head on, we must focus on enacting meaningful mandate relief,” said Brian Sampson, executive director of Unshackle Upstate.  “Making our communities more affordable and preventing the insolvency of local governments and school districts needs to be our top priority.  Doing so will help to stabilize the state’s economy and provide a sense of security for taxpayers.”

Representing prominent business, local government and education organizations across the state, the coalition’s leaders strongly believe that mandate relief is essential to the future of New York’s economy.

“In order to rebuild our economy and our state, we must reduce costs on job creators, taxpayers, local governments and school districts alike. The comprehensive reform agenda that a historic and unprecedented coalition of organizations representing all of these entities is advancing today is a critical and common sense step in that direction,” said Mike Elmendorf, President and CEO of the Associated General Contractors of New York State.

“Real mandate relief is part of a broader goal of controlling total state and local spending, and lowering the combined tax burden on individuals and businesses,” said Heather Briccetti, acting-president and CEO of The Business Council of New York State, Inc. “A more competitive cost climate is essential for promoting new investment and new job growth in New York. The enactment of a 2 percent cap on the growth of property taxes was the first step. By working together, members of this newly-formed coalition hope to rein in the high cost of state mandates and provide much-needed fiscal relief to municipalities.”

“Outdated, only-in-New-York laws, like labor law 240/241, are actually unfunded mandates on our municipalities,” said Tom Stebbins, executive director, Lawsuit Reform Alliance of New York. “Our local communities pay for these unnecessary laws in the form of inflated legal settlements, skyrocketing insurance rates and prohibitively high construction costs. We need to free our municipalities from these antiquated laws in order to make New York a better place to live and do business.”

“This is not the first tough year for schools.  We have had three years of state aid cuts and freezes,” said Robert Reidy, executive director, New York State Council of School Superintendents. “With the prospect of operating under a tax cap it is imperative schools get help to preserve services for children. Immediate and significant mandate relief is necessary to maintain quality services for all children.”

“New York is at a crossroads and action is needed now to stem the high costs of mandates on local governments and school districts. These mandates translate into ever increasing costs for agricultural businesses and create a very unfavorable environment for farm retention and growth. While the enactment of the property tax cap helped solve the first half of the problem, New York must address the cost drivers for local governments and school districts to truly let New York work,” said Jeff Williams, Manager of Governmental Relations for New York Farm Bureau.

“Enacting the property tax cap was the first step in drastically changing the future for New York’s small business owners and taxpayers. This coalition of business, school and municipal leaders stands here today advancing the critical second step of mandate relief. This agenda will drastically reform our business climate, by addressing many of the key cost drivers that have driven businesses and people from New York’s borders, and provide significant relief to communities and school districts across the state from public pension and health benefit costs that are rising at an unsustainable rate. We urge the Governor and legislative leaders to heed this call of business owners and taxpayers, setting New York on a course for a new dawn of prosperity,” said Mike Durant, New York State Director of the National Federation of Independent Business

“New York’s local government cost structure, in its current mandate-driven form, cannot support real and sustainable property tax relief. A property tax cap, alone, will not change this fact,” said Peter A. Baynes, executive director of the New York Conference of Mayors. “Yet, with the significant mandate relief our broadly-based coalition is advancing today, there is an opportunity to finally change this destructive equation and provide the property tax relief New Yorkers desperately need.”

“Now is the time to finish the job of building meaningful and lasting property tax relief,” said Duncan MacKenzie, CEO of the New York State Association of REALTORS.  “The cap approved earlier this year provided the framework for ending the cycle of property taxpayer abuse. To fulfill the promise of sustainable tax relief, this diverse coalition calls on state lawmakers to rethink every existing mandate and refrain from any further unfunded requirements on our schools and local governments. While the tax cap issue created divides between business and local taxing entities, mandate relief does not.”

“As school districts continue to grapple with the worst fiscal crisis in a generation, they need a new set of rules. The Let New York Work proposals, if enacted, would result in dramatic improvements to the fiscal health of our schools,” said Timothy Kremer, executive director, New York State School Boards Association. “They would also result in a more viable system of operating in this heightened era of fiscal responsibility and taxpayer fatigue. If we are to simultaneously address the fiscal crisis and advance academic achievement we must focus resources on those things that improve results for kids.”

“The Westchester County Association is very pleased to be a part of the Let New York Work coalition. We have long believed that once the tax cap was passed, there would be a collective outcry for mandate reform,” said Bill Mooney, president of the Westchester County Association. “Having the business community joined by local government and school groups with one common agenda, sends a powerful message to our elected officials in Albany that meaningful and significant mandate relief must be achieved in 2012.”

Following today’s release of the Let New York Work agenda, the group will continue to advocate for the passage of the agenda during the 2012 legislative session.

To view the complete version of the Let New York Work agenda, click here.

• Commissioner on Twitter
• Three BOCES leaders on school finance issues
• Should ratings of teachers be made public?
• More on bullying
• Silver, Skelos, and DiNapoli on taxes

Commissioner on Twitter
State Education Commissioner John King is now on Twitter.  Follow him here, if you wish:  http://twitter.com/#!/JohnKingNYSED

Three BOCES leaders on school finance issues
Over the past week and a half, leaders of three BOCES have published columns on school finance issues in regional newspapers.

In Long Island’s Newsday, Gary Bixhorn, Chief Operating Officer of Eastern Suffolk BOCES, writes, “More state aid is crucial to schools.”

In the Buffalo News, District Superintendent Michael Glover of the Genesee Valley Educational Partnership, writes “State funding system endangers rural school districts.”

In the Albany Times Union, Questar BOCES District Superintendent James Baldwin writes, “NY’s next task is to reduce school costs.”

Mr. Bixhorn observes that strong schools are a regional asset that sets Long Island apart.  He argues that new state and federal initiatives, including Race to the Top initiatives and the property tax cap, are eroding the local control that built those schools.  He calls on Long Islanders to “…work together to assure that the formulas used to allocate funds between the state’s schools recognize the needs of Long Island.”

Dr. Glover warns that many low wealth districts are in structural deficit and at risk of being unable to deliver the state constitution’s promise of a sound basic education.  He cites a national report calling New York’s system of school finance “highly regressive,… providing fewer resources to their high-poverty districts even though those districts serve many disadvantaged children with high levels of need.”

Dr. Baldwin says Governor Cuomo’s efforts have led the state a long way toward fiscal stability, and adds,   “School leaders are anxious to work with him and the Legislature to take on the expenses that, according to the Statewide School Finance Consortium, threaten to bankrupt hundreds of school districts over the next five years.”  He suggests a series of steps state leaders should take.

The tax cap compounds pressure on school budgets and that pressure will expose and and expand cracks within the public school community, between districts, regions and stakeholders.  Beyond their well-argued substantive points, the three columns also help illuminate some of those fault-lines.

Should ratings of teachers be made public
Sunday’s Syracuse Post-Standard carried a column asking, Should ratings of public school teachers be made public?

Ratings were published in Los Angeles last summer, and in New York State, courts at the first two levels have ruled in favor of releasing ratings in a New York City case. The City teacher union intends to challenge those rulings in the state’s highest court.

Robert Freeman, Executive Director of the Committee on Open Government says that the state’s Freedom of Information Law requires release, and adds, “What could be more important to the parent of a child than learning how well or poorly the child’s teacher is performing in the classroom?”

A spokesman for New York State United Teachers objects to releasing individual teacher ratings, including citing the prospect of “teacher shopping” — parents insisting that their child be assigned to the highest rated teacher.  Another concern is that ratings coming out of newly required evaluation procedures may not be reliable, at least at first.

A couple superintendents are quoted raising issues.  Jessica Cohen, District Superintendent of the Onondaga-Cortland-Madison BOCES, brings up what might be the biggest concern — that publicizing individual ratings could dissuade people interested in becoming teachers.

Dr. Cohen warns, “It would cause people to question whether or not they wanted to go into a profession where ratings which were not necessarily accurate were shared publicly.”

Rick Hess, an education scholar at the American Enterprise Institute, generally finds himself on the opposite side in policy debates with teacher union leaders.  But he has expressed reservations about publishing individual teacher evaluations,arguing,

…there’s a profound failure to recognize the difference between responsible management and public transparency. Transparency for public agencies entails knowing how their money is spent, how they’re faring, and expecting organizational leaders to report on organizational performance. It typically doesn’t entail reporting on how many traffic citations individual LAPD officers issued or what kind of performance review a National Guardsman was given by his commanding officer. Why? Because we recognize that these data are inevitably imperfect, limited measures and that using them sensibly requires judgment. Sensible judgment becomes much more difficult when decisions are made in the glare of the public eye.

I might agree with Mr. Freeman, the open government czar, on what the law requires now, but that is different than debating what the law should be.  I can be persuaded either way on whether ratings should be provided to parents — the details matter.

But I am uneasy with the idea of making all individual evaluations widely available. Is there a purpose, other than satisfying nosiness, served by allowing neighbors to look up the evaluation of a teacher down the street, when they have no children taught by that teacher, or perhaps no children at all?

The goal of the new evaluation structure is to raise the quality of teaching and leadership in our schools.  Would publicly releasing individual evaluations advance that goal?

More on bullying
Last week I reported on how a tragedy in Western New York has reignited debates about how to combat bullying, and especially cyber-bullying.

Since then,

• Senator Jeff Klein, leader of the Senate’s Independent Democratic Conference appeared on cable TV’s Capital Tonight to discuss his proposals to increase penalties for bullying and to define “cyber-bullying” as a crime.
• Gannett News summed up the various legislative proposals advanced so far.
• The Buffalo News ran an editorial subtitled, “Schools are the epicenter of bullying, and must lead the search for a solution.”

Silver, Skelos, and DiNapoli on state revenues
Appearing on Capital Tonight, Assembly Speaker Sheldon Silver reiterated his support for extending the so-called “millionaire’s tax,” continuing higher personal income tax rates on taxpayers’ with incomes over $1 million.  He specifically cited increasing School Aid has one of the targets for the revenue that step would generate,

I would like to see an increase in education aid in this state…   I think school districts are hurting and students are suffering as a result in the terms of their educational opportunities.,

But appearing on an Albany-based radio program, Senate Majority Leader Dean Skelos re-stated his opposition to extending the tax:

“The Governor’s made himself very clear on that position. No new taxes, no new fees and I support the governor on that.”

Later, the host of that show New York Post Editor Fredric Dicker, declared,

Gov. Cuomo scored a major victory in his battle against a “millionaire’s tax’’ yesterday when Assembly Speaker Sheldon Silver, the tax’s leading advocate, pledged not to hold up next year’s budget in order to get the measure approved.

Finally, today State Comptroller Thomas DiNapoli warned of continuing job losses on Wall Street.  He noted securities related activities accounted for 14 percent of the state’s revenues last year, down from 20 percent before the financial crisis.

The Comptroller estimates that the securities industry lost 4,100 jobs between April and August 2011, and projects 10,000 additional jobs could be lost by the end of 2012.  He foresees profits for 2011 at New York Stock Exchange firms declining by 35 percent from a year ago.

Comptroller DiNapoli warns,

The industry’s current weakness has led OSC [Office of the State Comptroller] to estimate that Wall Street-related tax collections will fall short of City and State targets in their current fiscal years and that the shortfalls could be even greater next year. As Wall Street’s slowdown affects business and personal spending in the rest of the economy, overall tax collections will also weaken, widening the State and City budget gaps.

• Cuomo on Triborough
• Silver on taxes
• SED on paperwork
• Fellows on loan
• Buffalo News on cyber-bullying

Cuomo on Triborough
During a radio interview on Friday, Governor Cuomo appeared to rule out seeking changes to New York State’s “Triborough Law” which guarantees that the provisions of an expired public employee collective bargaining agreement remain in effect, until a successor agreement is in place.

Whenever we ask superintendents what actions the state could take to help their districts reduce or control costs, relief from Triborough is always at or near the top of the list.

Specifically, they cite Triborough’s guarantee of “step increases,” as reducing management leverage in negotiations, arguing that it gives unions little reason to agree to a new contract with cost saving measures, since most members will continue to receive raises and maintain other benefits under their old contract.

This dynamic was cited as a contributing factor to the rejection of a proposed contract by the members of the second largest state employees union, the Public Employees Federation.

As a result of the rejection, the Administration is proceeding with plans to lay off 3,496 PEF members, including 19 State Education Department employees.

Discussing the PEF rejection on the Capitol Pressroom radio show, the Governor acknowledged, “you could see that that’s a pragmatic judgment,” for some union members to conclude they could oppose the contract since they would not be laid off because of their seniority, and would receive raises because of Triborough.

Host Susan Arbetter asked, “Do you think it’s time to revisit Triborough?”

The Governor responded, “I think it’s a political non-starter to try to revisit Triborough.  Period, you know, and we live in the real here.”

In my experience, getting “big” legislation enacted, like amending Triborough, requires two ingredients:   noise from the outside (from advocates and voters) and a champion on the inside — at least one leader who won’t allow budget negotiations to close or the legislative session to end unless the issue gets addressed.

Obviously, the most potent champion for an issue would be the Governor.

Silver on taxes
Gannett News reported that Assembly Speaker Sheldon Silver reiterated his support for retaining higher income taxes on the state’s wealthiest taxpayers while appearing on an Albany area radio show last Tuesday.

The Speaker said, “I still think we should not allow people making more than $1 million to have the benefit of a tax cut.”

Higher tax rates on New Yorkers with incomes above $250,000 were adopted in 2010 and are due to expire on December 31.

Rather than extend the entire increase, Speaker Silver has proposed limiting the extension to taxpayers with incomes over $1 million.

Meanwhile, Governor reiterated his opposition, saying, “If I raise taxes, I’m in a running race every day with Connecticut and Jersey and other states.  If I raise my taxes, they can move 20 minutes away in some directions and I’m hemorrhaging from the borders. That’s not true federally.”

The two leaders’ characterizations of the issue are revealing.  The Governor refers to extending the rates as a tax increase, while the Speaker calls ending them a tax cut.

Had the higher rates not been scheduled to expire, it’s hard to imagine state leaders would have chosen to cut them while also grappling with closing the projected $10 billion gap they faced in assembling this year’s state budget.

SED on paperwork
The State Education Department has launched a consolidated web-based reporting system, giving school officials one place to go to for information on all the plans, reports and applications they are required to submit each year.

This is a very welcome step by SED.

Nearly 10 years ago, the Council issued a report, “Drowning in a Sea of Paperwork,” describing the time school district leaders had to spend completing plans and reports of questionable usefulness.

Legislation was passed requiring the SED to complete a report on reports.  The Department was conscientious and identified roughly 100 more plans, reports, and applications required of districts than we did.

There have been administrative and legislative attempts at reducing the paperwork burden.

Until very recently, however, we continued to receive requests for our 2002 report – because it very clearly laid out specific reporting deadlines school officials were expected to meet.  We referred people to newer SED resources, but the new web-based portal is a big step forward.

Fellows on loan
The State Education Department has faced some questioning for its use of privately funded “Regents Fellows” to assist on activities undertaken as part of its $696 million federal Race to the Top grant.

But The Capitol reports that the U.S. Education Department recently called on the Fellows and State Education Commissioner John King for advice in developing the Obama Administration’s plans for waivers from No Child Left Behind requirements.

SED officials would neither confirm nor deny that the Fellows were involved in designing the waiver plan.  But The Capitol quoted an unnamed source, ““We’ve been loaning them manpower. It’s embarrassing.”

The Capitol says New York has not decided whether to apply for a waiver.  But SED is consulting with stakeholders, including superintendents and the Council, and all signs are that the Department will develop a waiver request.

Buffalo News on Cyber-Bullying
The recent death by suicide of a Western New York teenager following “cyber-bullying” and other harassment drew national attention for a time.  Understandably, the tragedy continues to command attention from regional media.

On Saturday, for example, The Buffalo News ran an editorial titled, “More steps needed:  State must pass tougher measures to fight bullying in the digital age.”

The editorial cites proposals by Senators Stephen Saland (R-Dutchess) and Jeffrey Klein (D-Bronx) to strengthen penalties for cyber-bullying.

Addressing cyber-bullying presents special challenges for schools because the act often occurs off school grounds, outside the school day, and without using school resources.

Yesterday, the News ran a column by a local middle school teacher who writes, “As a teacher, I’ll be the first to admit that students have more power in schools than any of us hired to instruct usually give them credit for.”

She calls on adults to do their part by teaching students to exercise positive peer pressure,

If a culture of respect is nurtured, and students are taught to voice their displeasure when they see and hear bullying of any kind—especially if they are simply bystanders — the actions will all but disappear. To put it simply, if it is very uncool to be rude or threatening to someone, the behavior will change.

Her observation makes sense to me, chiefly based on a conversation with one of my own teenaged children.  But how to translate the idea into widespread practice, and whether a new state law might play a role, is not clear.

Meanwhile, Newsday reported on Facebook’s efforts to reduce its use in bullying.

• Why NYSUT sued the Regents
• State’s second largest union rejects proposed contract
• Health insurance premiums surging nationwide

Why NYSUT sued the Regents
Richard Casagrande, General Counsel of New York State United Teachers, has a column in the union’s newspaper explaining, “Why we sued the Regents” over the new teacher/principal evaluation regulations.

Mr. Casagrande contends,

the regulations undermined the three main pillars of the law: the guarantee of limits on the use of standardized testing in measuring a teacher’s effectiveness; the guarantee that a teacher’s effectiveness rating would be based on multiple measures; and the guarantee that teachers would have a voice in this process through collective bargaining.

He gives NYSUT’s view on the State Supreme Court ruling invalidating portions of the regulations.

The State Education Department plans to appeal that decision.

State’s second largest union rejects proposed contract
Yesterday, the second largest state employees union, the Public Employees Federation, announced that its members had voted to reject a proposed contract its leaders had reached with the Cuomo Administration.

Earlier, members of the largest state employees’ union, the Civil Service Employees Association, approved a nearly identical contract.

The agreements had been cited as enabling the state to avoid layoffs of CSEA and PEF members.  With the rejection, the Cuomo Administration moved swiftly to begin PEF layoffs.

E.J. McMahon of the Empire Center argues that PEF members felt they could afford to “slap the Governor” because of the Triborough Law which maintains in effect provisions of a public employee collective bargaining agreement when it has expired with no successor agreement in place.

Mr. McMahon notes,

…up to 3,500 PEF members will now be laid off. But more than 90 percent of the union membership will keep their jobs while avoiding payless furloughs and higher insurance premiums. What’s more, thanks to Triborough, many workers will also continue pocketing the annual longevity “step” increments mandated by the civil-service-salary schedule — just as they would have done if the squishy “freeze” in base salaries had been ratified.

Writing about the agreements back in July, I noted

…it might be expected that the Governor will trumpet his achievement at some point in the next year, challenging school or local government officials to do as he has done, when they cite the challenges of operating under the new property tax cap.

Noting that the Governor also has to work with the complications of Triborough, I stressed differences in state and school district circumstances that would make it unwise for a school district to make a multi-year no layoff pledge to try to gain union concessions:

• First, employee costs are a much smaller part of the state budget (about 20 percent) than a typical school district budget (70-80 percent), making it easier for the state to spare personnel costs when cuts are necessary; and
• Second, the state has greater ability to increase its revenues if necessary to honor a no layoff pledge; schools have no control over one of their two major revenue streams (state aid) and diminished control over the other, due to the property tax cap.

Health insurance premiums surging nationwide
It’s not strictly a labor news item, but it does concern one of the fastest growing costs for school districts, labor or otherwise.

The New York Times reports that premiums for family health insurance coverage nationwide rose by an average of 9 percent in 2011.

The Times warns bigger increases could be on the way in New York, especially for individual and small group plans.

Our estimates are that, in each of the past two years, increases in health insurance costs alone exceeded the overall increase in school spending, suggesting that districts cut all other costs on balance.

The most widely mentioned legislative solution for helping schools achieve some savings in health insurance costs has been to mandate minimum employee contributions or prescribe maximum employer contributions.

Those proposals would adjust the share of who pays how much.  I am not aware of serious proposals that would more directly address the larger fiscal problems with health insurance:  the cost is too great and is growing too fast, no matter who pays what share.