ALBANY — The city’s loss of $240 million in state school aid because of its failure to reach a teacher-evaluation deal with its union will be a one-time hit, Gov. Cuomo said yesterday.
Cuomo said he still opposes legislative efforts to restore the aid the city blew by missing a Jan. 17 deadline on a teacher-evaluation plan.
But he said the lost cash won’t reduce the “base” on which future state school aid increases would be calculated — as school funding advocates had feared.
“The $240 [million] is a one-time penalty,” he said. “It is not $240 [million] every year for the rest of your life.”
For purposes of future state aid, “we’re starting at the place of what they would have been” if they had met the legally required deadline for an approved teacher-evaluation plan and gotten a 4 percent state-aid increase, Cuomo said.
That wasn’t good enough for Assembly Speaker Sheldon Silver (D-Manhattan).
“We support a full restoration and don’t think children should be penalized in any way for the failure of adults to come to an agreement,” said Silver spokesman Michael Whyland.
Cuomo and legislative leaders have proposed that the state impose an evaluation plan for city teachers by June 1 if the city and UFT can’t agree on one. That would avert future state aid losses.