(
)
Gov. Cuomo extended an olive branch to Mayor Bloomberg yesterday by pledging to help find a “short-term solution” to prevent mass firings of teachers based only on seniority.
The mayor also won much-needed moral support for his efforts to end “last in, first out” from US Secretary of Education Arne Duncan.
“I understand where the mayor wants to go,” Cuomo said yesterday after delivering a speech at Staten Island’s Wagner College on his proposed budget. “I am committed to helping him.
“Well, this is all short term, right? No one’s talking long term here . . . You can say that we can’t implement fully a long-term evaluation process, so we’re going to have a short-term solution.”
Bloomberg fears that Cuomo’s proposal to create a statewide evaluation system to decide which teachers to lay off won’t become reality soon enough for the mayor to fire 4,650 teachers to make up for an expected reduction in state aid.
Both Cuomo and Bloomberg, who chatted yesterday, sought to downplay the LIFO rift.
“My hope is that we can find a way, with the governor’s help and the Legislature’s help, to make sure that we don’t use a system of deciding who goes that is irrelevant to the kids,” Bloomberg said. “The only thing that is relevant is who can do the best job in front of the class . . . and I know the governor has that in his heart, as well.”
Duncan, in a telephone conference call with reporters yesterday, backed up Bloomberg’s demand to end LIFO, which protects teachers with seniority from layoffs at the expense of younger, motivated teachers who serve some of the most needy students.
“If layoffs are based only on seniority, that doesn’t help kids,” Duncan said, promising to use his position as the nation’s education czar as a bully pulpit to end LIFO.
“Particularly, it doesn’t help students who need the most help. You have a concentration of young teachers in the most disadvantaged communities.
“And if, due to budget cuts, you’re only laying off those young teachers . . . there’s massive disruption to those children who, again, need the most stability, the most support, and need the strongest teachers.
“If you go by our basic premise of trying to minimize the negative impact on students, [LIFO] just doesn’t meet the test.”
The state Senate on Tuesday narrowly passed the mayor’s proposal to curb LIFO, and instead lay off underachieving teachers regardless of seniority.
But Cuomo then proposed his own statewide teacher-evaluation plan, which he claims would lead to job reductions based on merit, not just LIFO.
City Hall officials were furious that the governor had scuttled the mayor’s favored bill, and suspected that Cuomo had sided with the unions.
Indeed, the state AFL-CIO and the city Municipal Labor Committee both praised Cuomo’s approach yesterday, and blasted Bloomberg’s proposed LIFO repeal.
Cuomo’s evaluation system cannot go into effect without union backing as part of a new labor contract with the city.
Additional reporting by Sally Goldenberg