This morning, Cardinal Timothy Dolan will speak at Cathedral HS on an initiative with the potential to overhaul education in a city where 85 percent of black and Latino children in public schools are failing. And the broad diversity of those pushing for it speaks to the urgency.
It’s called the Education Investment Tax Credit. Under legislation now making its way through Albany, there would be a dollar-for-dollar credit against New York personal income, corporate franchise, bank and insurance taxes for donations to education-related entities. The aim is to encourage funding for programs at public schools and scholarships that will help kids in failing schools find other options.
The beauty of the proposal is this: Instead of pitting our public against our private schools, it aims to boost them all. The emphasis is on ensuring our kids get a decent education no matter where they go.
In a Post column, Pat Lynch of the Patrolmen’s Benevolent Association speaks to the strong union support for the bill. Religious support ranges from the United Black Clergy of Westchester to Agudath ÂIsrael and the Orthodox Union to the Lutheran Schools Association. Let’s not Âforget, too, the Association of Historic Black ÂIndependent Schools, the Black Girl Project and Centro Altagracia de Fey y Justicia.
And did we mention the Brooklyn branch of the NAACP? These are just a few of the community, faith, education and civic organizations that recognize the status quo is shutting out too many kids from the American Dream. They need more good schools.
The state Senate passed this legislation in 2012 by a vote of 54 to 4. Majorities of both Democrats and Republicans in the Assembly have signed on as co-sponsors. The only way this bill fails is if a powerful minority keeps it from coming to a vote.
It’s hard to imagine any other movement today that could count the PBA and a branch of the NAACP united in common cause. If New York can give tax credits to Jimmy Fallon, surely we can do so for those who invest in our children.