Regular Session - August 6, 2009
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1 NEW YORK STATE SENATE
2
3
4 THE STENOGRAPHIC RECORD
5
6
7
8
9 ALBANY, NEW YORK
10 August 6, 2009
11 10:58 a.m.
12
13
14 REGULAR SESSION
15
16
17
18 SENATOR NEIL D. BRESLIN, Acting President
19 ANGELO J. APONTE, Secretary
20
21
22
23
24
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1 P R O C E E D I N G S
2 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: The
3 Senate will please come to order.
4 I ask all to rise and repeat the
5 Pledge of Allegiance.
6 (Whereupon, the assemblage recited
7 the Pledge of Allegiance to the Flag.)
8 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: In the
9 absence of clergy, may we bow our heads in a
10 moment of silence.
11 (Whereupon, the assemblage
12 respected a moment of silence.)
13 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: Thank
14 you.
15 The reading of the Journal.
16 THE SECRETARY: In Senate,
17 Wednesday, August 5, the Senate met pursuant
18 to adjournment. The Journal of Tuesday,
19 August 4, was read and approved. On motion,
20 Senate adjourned.
21 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN:
22 Without objection, the Journal stands approved
23 as read.
24 Senator Klein.
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1 SENATOR KLEIN: Mr. President, at
2 this time can we please recognize Senator
3 Serrano.
4 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN:
5 Senator Serrano.
6 SENATOR SERRANO: Thank you,
7 Mr. President. Thank you, Senator Klein.
8 As we all know here in this
9 chamber, we lost an esteemed former Senator, a
10 true pioneer, a wonderful loving colleague in
11 Olga Mendez, who passed away last week.
12 People use that term "pioneer," but
13 she was much more than that. Yes, it's true,
14 she opened doors for all of us, for people
15 like myself to even dream of being an elected
16 official. She was a fighter, a true fighter
17 for her community, but she never lost her
18 human touch.
19 And some may not expect to hear
20 this from me, because we were opponents, but
21 that was the beauty of Olga, that it was never
22 personal. It was about her community. And we
23 fought a very respectful campaign, but she was
24 always so loving to me and always so kind to
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1 me.
2 And after it was all over, we
3 became good friends and would speak on the
4 phone quite regularly, and she would give me
5 advice, mainly about the need to work in a
6 bipartisan fashion, which I tried to do.
7 With Olga it was never personal.
8 It was about love, it was about caring, it was
9 about helping everyone in her community. And
10 she was cared about so deeply by so many.
11 And Olga had a special way of being
12 able to use her charm, her wit, her
13 personality, her intelligence to get things
14 done that needed to get done for her
15 community.
16 So I will spend the rest of my
17 career endeavoring to live up to her legacy.
18 Olga Mendez, a trailblazer in every sense of
19 the word, a loving, caring individual whose
20 heart knew no bounds, who graced this chamber
21 for many years with charm and just -- people
22 just loved to be around her.
23 I miss Olga. My condolences go out
24 to her family and to everyone in the East
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1 Harlem-South Bronx community who is mourning
2 her loss. I miss you, Olga. I love you. God
3 bless you, and rest in peace.
4 Can I ask for a moment of silence.
5 (Whereupon, the assemblage
6 respected a moment of silence.)
7 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN:
8 Senator Huntley.
9 SENATOR HUNTLEY: Thanks,
10 Mr. President.
11 At this time I would like to offer
12 condolences to Senator Ruth Hassell-Thompson,
13 who lost her mom. And I just want her to know
14 that her mom was a fantastic person, did a lot
15 in the community, well-respected, well-loved,
16 and was in her nineties, which is a great life
17 to live.
18 And knowing Ruth and all her
19 stamina and her "go get 'em" -- you know, her
20 mom taught her a lot.
21 And I just want to say to Ruth she
22 has my condolences, the condolences of my
23 family, and I would like to offer a moment of
24 silent prayer for her mom.
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1 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: Can we
2 have a moment of silence for Delesta Taylor
3 Hassell, the mother of Senator Ruth
4 Hassell-Thompson.
5 (Whereupon, the assemblage
6 respected a moment of silence.)
7 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN:
8 Senator Diaz.
9 SENATOR DIAZ: Thank you,
10 Mr. President. I just want to speak on the
11 loss of Senator Olga Mendez.
12 You know, we humans, we have the
13 tradition of speaking good about a person when
14 they are dead. After they are dead, we all
15 speak how good, how decent, how great the
16 person was. But during their lifetimes, we
17 don't even care, we don't even notice that.
18 And one of those occasions is Olga
19 Mendez. You got to see how many politicians,
20 how many people are speaking so good about
21 Olga Mendez, how many elected officials
22 attended her services. And that should be a
23 lesson for our community, a lesson that our
24 community should learn.
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1 When Olga Mendez switched parties
2 and she became Republican, we all cursed her,
3 we all jumped on her, we all went after her
4 with passion. And we spoke so evil about her,
5 and we did so many things against her because
6 she switched parties. We never remember all
7 the thirty-plus years, the good things that
8 she did, the fighter that she was, the
9 commitment that she had for our community.
10 And the day that she lost the
11 election, that was the day that the community
12 lost her. The community didn't lose her the
13 other day when she died. Our community lost
14 Olga Mendez when she lost the election. And
15 we knew, we knew the fighter she was, we knew
16 how great she was, we knew how committed she
17 was to our community, but we didn't care.
18 When you change your party, you're dead. And
19 that should be a lesson to our community.
20 And I was one of those elected
21 officials in her services this week, Monday,
22 and I sat in there and I said, man, what a
23 bunch of hypocrites we all are. Now we are
24 sorry that we lost her.
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1 I went to see her at the hospital,
2 and I prayed with her while she was in the
3 hospital. And I said to myself, we lost a
4 great leader, a great Senator, a great fighter
5 from our community -- not the day that she
6 died, the day that she lost her election.
7 Just because she changed her party.
8 Thank you, Mr. President.
9 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: Thank
10 you, Senator Diaz.
11 I'd remind all the members that
12 there will be a more fitting tribute, a more
13 permanent tribute in September when we come
14 back in session.
15 So Senator Volker.
16 SENATOR VOLKER: Yeah, very
17 quickly.
18 I just want to say, first of all,
19 commending Senator Hassell-Thompson for being
20 here. There aren't too many people who lost a
21 mother so recently that would have the
22 dedication to be here, and I want to commend
23 you for being here, very much.
24 The second thing I just want to say
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1 is I spoke with Olga earlier this year after
2 she received the notice on the Senate Club.
3 And she was really very, very weak then, and
4 she said: "Dale, I have to tell you, I just
5 don't think I'm -- I'm not going to be able to
6 make it. But I want you to tell everyone up
7 there that I miss them and I love the Senate."
8 Just one final thing about that,
9 though. I think those of us that knew Olga
10 realized what the problem was. And it's an
11 example for a lot of people. Olga Mendez was
12 an extremely heavy smoker. I mean extremely
13 heavy.
14 And unfortunately, a lot of us
15 tried to say to her, Olga, you know -- she was
16 still, for a long time -- you've got to deal
17 with this, because it will eventually do you
18 in.
19 And I just want to mention that,
20 because she did what she wanted to do. But I
21 don't think there's any question if it wasn't
22 for her heavy smoking, she'd still be with us.
23 And she was a wonderful person.
24 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN:
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1 Returning to the order of business,
2 presentation of petitions.
3 Messages from the Assembly.
4 Messages from the Governor.
5 Reports of standing committees.
6 Reports of select committees.
7 Communications and reports from
8 state officers.
9 Motions and resolutions.
10 Senator Klein.
11 SENATOR KLEIN: Mr. President, I
12 have two motions.
13 First, on behalf of Senator
14 Stavisky, I wish to call up Calendar Number
15 911, Assembly Print Number 6391.
16 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: The
17 Secretary will read.
18 THE SECRETARY: Calendar Number
19 911, by Member of the Assembly Glick, Assembly
20 Print Number 6391, an act relating to
21 reporting.
22 SENATOR KLEIN: I now move to
23 reconsider the vote by which this Assembly
24 bill was substituted for Senate Print Number
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1 3603 on July 16th.
2 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: Call
3 the roll on reconsideration.
4 (The Secretary called the roll.)
5 THE SECRETARY: Ayes, 55.
6 SENATOR KLEIN: I now move that
7 Assembly Bill Number 6391 be recommitted to
8 the Committee on Rules and that the Senate
9 Bill be recommitted to the Committee on Rules.
10 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: The
11 bill is before the house and restored to its
12 place on the Third Reading Calendar.
13 SENATOR KLEIN: Mr. President, on
14 behalf of Senator Breslin, I wish to call up
15 Senate Print Number 2088, recalled from the
16 Assembly, which is now at the desk.
17 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: The
18 Secretary will read.
19 THE SECRETARY: Calendar Number
20 50, by Senator Breslin, Senate Print 2088, an
21 act to amend the Insurance Law.
22 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN:
23 Senator Klein.
24 SENATOR KLEIN: Mr. President, I
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1 now move to reconsider the vote by which the
2 bill was passed.
3 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: Call
4 the roll on reconsideration.
5 (The Secretary called the roll.)
6 THE SECRETARY: Ayes, 55.
7 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: The
8 bill is before the house and restored to its
9 place on the Third Reading Calendar.
10 SENATOR KLEIN: Mr. President, I
11 now move to recommit the bill to the Committee
12 on Rules.
13 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: So
14 ordered.
15 Senator Klein.
16 SENATOR KLEIN: Mr. President,
17 can we now at this time take up privileged
18 Senate Resolution Number 2949, which is at the
19 desk. I ask that the title be read and move
20 for its immediate adoption.
21 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: The
22 Secretary will read.
23 THE SECRETARY: By Senator
24 Sampson, Senate Resolution Number 2949,
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1 providing for a Senate Select Committee on
2 New York City School Governance.
3 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN:
4 Senator Sampson.
5 SENATOR SAMPSON: Thank you very
6 much, Mr. President. I just rise in support
7 of this resolution in support of the issue of
8 school governance and putting a committee
9 together to make sure that we monitor the
10 progress with respect to the school governance
11 bill.
12 And I look forward to my colleagues
13 on both sides of the aisle working together to
14 ensure that we continue the progress for our
15 1.1 million children in the City of New York,
16 but most of all making sure that the parental
17 involvement and the voices are heard with
18 respect to our constituencies.
19 Thank you, Mr. President.
20 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: Thank
21 you, Senator Sampson.
22 Are there any other Senators
23 wishing to be heard?
24 Senator Perkins.
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1 SENATOR PERKINS: Thank you,
2 Mr. President. I rise also to express my
3 support of this resolution.
4 You know, the public school system
5 in New York City is presently under what has
6 come to be known as mayoral control but in
7 effect has been about mayoral dictatorship.
8 And I support this resolution because I
9 believe that it provides us with an
10 opportunity to end that type of dictatorship,
11 to end that raw political approach that's been
12 taken to the public school education for our
13 children in New York City that has created a
14 whole lot of havoc and controversy.
15 So to the extent that this select
16 committee has value, hopefully that value will
17 be to curb the excessive use of the influence
18 of the mayor in the policies that have shown
19 themselves not to have been good for the
20 children of the City of New York.
21 In fact, just this week, the Times
22 reported that the gap between children of
23 color -- black children, Latino children --
24 and white children has not in any way
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1 diminished. This is in the era of the 100th
2 anniversary of the NAACP. In the era when we
3 are expecting to see a more enlightened
4 approach to education, we are seeing something
5 quite the opposite.
6 So I look forward to working with
7 this committee and hope that it will get
8 passed.
9 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN:
10 Senator Larkin.
11 SENATOR LARKIN: We're listening
12 to someone, Senator Perkins, talking about a
13 resolution. I don't see any on my desk. I
14 don't even know what we're talking about,
15 then. There's nothing on our desks, at least
16 mine or the people next to me.
17 I think if we're going to be
18 discussing something, I think we ought to have
19 the courtesy of having that resolution in
20 front of us.
21 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN:
22 Senator Larkin, are you satisfied?
23 SENATOR LARKIN: I have a copy.
24 Thank you, Mr. President.
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1 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: Thank
2 you, Senator Larkin.
3 The question is on the resolution.
4 All those in favor please signify by saying
5 aye.
6 (Response of "Aye.")
7 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN:
8 Opposed, nay.
9 (No response.)
10 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: The
11 resolution is adopted.
12 Senator Klein.
13 SENATOR KLEIN: Mr. President,
14 can we at this time take up Senate Resolution
15 Number 2933, by Senator Diaz. I ask that the
16 title be read and move for its immediate
17 adoption.
18 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: The
19 Secretary will read.
20 THE SECRETARY: By Senator Diaz,
21 Legislative Resolution Number 2933,
22 commemorating the 52nd Annual German-American
23 Steuben Parade.
24 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: The
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1 question is on the resolution. All those in
2 favor please signify by saying aye.
3 (Response of "Aye.")
4 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN:
5 Opposed, nay.
6 (No response.)
7 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: The
8 resolution is adopted.
9 Senator Klein.
10 SENATOR KLEIN: Mr. President,
11 there will be an immediate meeting of the
12 Finance Committee in the Majority Conference
13 Room, followed by an immediate meeting of the
14 Rules Committee in the Majority Conference
15 Room.
16 Pending the return of the Rules
17 Committee, can we please stand at ease.
18 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: There
19 will be an immediate meeting of the Finance
20 Committee in the Majority Conference Room,
21 332, followed by a meeting of the Rules
22 Committee.
23 The Senate will stand at ease
24 pending these two committee reports.
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1 (Whereupon, the Senate stood at
2 ease at 11:16 a.m.)
3 (Whereupon, the Senate reconvened
4 at 12:22 p.m.)
5 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN:
6 Senator Klein.
7 SENATOR KLEIN: Mr. President, if
8 we could return to the order of reports of
9 standing committees, I believe there's a
10 report of the Rules Committee at the desk.
11 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN:
12 Senator Klein, there is a report of the Rules
13 Committee here at the desk.
14 The Secretary will read.
15 THE SECRETARY: Senator Smith,
16 from the Committee on Rules, reports the
17 following bills.
18 Restored: Assembly Print 8956A, by
19 Member of the Assembly Weinstein, an act to
20 amend the Civil Practice Law and Rules.
21 Reported: Senate Print 5968, by
22 Senator Sampson, an act to amend the Family
23 Court Act;
24 6104, by Senator Dilan, an act to
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1 amend the Education Law;
2 6105, by Senator Serrano, an act to
3 amend the Education Law;
4 6106, by Senator Adams, an act to
5 amend the Education Law;
6 6107, by Senator Huntley, an act to
7 amend the Education Law;
8 And Senate Print 5887, by Senator
9 Padavan, an act to amend the Education Law.
10 All bills ordered direct to third
11 reading.
12 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN:
13 Senator Klein.
14 SENATOR KLEIN: I move to adopt
15 the Rules Committee report.
16 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: All in
17 favor of adopting the report of the Rules
18 Committee please signify by saying aye.
19 (Response of "Aye.")
20 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN:
21 Opposed, nay.
22 (No response.)
23 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: The
24 report of the Rules Committee is adopted.
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1 Senator Klein.
2 SENATOR KLEIN: Mr. President, I
3 believe there's a report of the Judiciary
4 Committee at the desk.
5 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN:
6 Senator Klein, there is a report of the
7 Judiciary Committee at the desk.
8 The Secretary will read.
9 THE SECRETARY: Senator Sampson,
10 from the Committee on Judiciary, reports the
11 following nomination.
12 As a judge of the Court of Claims,
13 Mark D. Cohen, of Stony Brook.
14 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN:
15 Senator Sampson.
16 SENATOR SAMPSON: Thank you very
17 much, Mr. President.
18 This is a reappointment for the
19 Honorable Mark Cohen, from Suffolk County, who
20 was here last month.
21 I had time to speak to him, he did
22 come before the committee. Due to a
23 prearranged vacation schedule, he could not be
24 here today, but he did report before the
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1 committee. He was in attendance the last
2 go-round. And I would like to move his
3 nomination.
4 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: Are
5 there any other Senators who wish to be heard?
6 Senator Maziarz.
7 SENATOR MAZIARZ: Thank you very
8 much, Mr. President.
9 As the ranking member of the
10 Judiciary Committee, I just want to thank the
11 chairman, Senator Sampson. Mr. Cohen did
12 appear before the committee, was more than
13 qualified, has done a great job as a judge of
14 the Court of Claims, and I would second the
15 nomination.
16 Thank you.
17 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN:
18 Senator Flanagan.
19 SENATOR FLANAGAN: Thank you,
20 Mr. President.
21 I too want to thank Senator Sampson
22 for moving this nomination along and
23 congratulate Judge Cohen, who does have an
24 outstanding record as a judge of the Court of
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1 Claims.
2 I'd just quickly add, as many of us
3 know, there are people that we work with who
4 oftentimes can make us much better at what we
5 do. Judge Cohen is fortunate enough to have a
6 lawman with him named Mr. Fagan who has made
7 him an even better judge. And all too often
8 we forget the people who work around our
9 members of the judiciary. I just wanted to
10 congratulate both of them.
11 Thank you.
12 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: The
13 question is on the motion to confirm the
14 nomination of Mark D. Cohen to the Court of
15 Claims. All those in favor please signify by
16 saying aye.
17 (Response of "Aye.")
18 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN:
19 Opposed?
20 SENATOR FOLEY: No.
21 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN:
22 Senator Foley will be recorded in the
23 negative.
24 The motion carries. The nomination
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1 is hereby confirmed.
2 Senator Diaz will also be recorded
3 in the negative. Senator Craig Johnson will
4 also be recorded in the negative.
5 Senator Klein.
6 SENATOR KLEIN: Mr. President, I
7 believe there's a report of the Finance
8 Committee at the desk.
9 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN:
10 Senator Klein, there is a report of the
11 Finance Committee at the desk.
12 The Secretary will read.
13 THE SECRETARY: Senator C.
14 Kruger, from the Committee on Finance, reports
15 the following nomination.
16 As a member and chairman of the
17 State Liquor Authority, Dennis Rosen, of
18 Orchard Park.
19 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN:
20 Senator Kruger.
21 SENATOR CARL KRUGER: Mr.
22 President, will you please move the
23 nomination.
24 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: Are
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1 there any other Senators wishing to be heard
2 on the nomination?
3 Senator Johnson.
4 SENATOR CRAIG JOHNSON: Thank you
5 very much, Mr. President. Just very briefly.
6 I wish to second the nomination for
7 Dennis Rosen for the chairman and member of
8 the SLA, the State Liquor Authority.
9 Mr. Rosen appeared before the
10 Investigations Committee this morning and gave
11 some very detailed responses to some very
12 difficult questions.
13 There's no doubt that this is a
14 very challenging position and that the State
15 Liquor Authority has hit some very troubled
16 times. And I am confident that with Mr. Rosen
17 at its helm, and under his leadership, we will
18 see those better days that are much needed for
19 this authority.
20 So I wish him success -- that
21 success is desperately needed over there --
22 and I congratulate him on his appointment.
23 Thank you very much.
24 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: Thank
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1 you, Senator Johnson.
2 The question is on the motion to
3 confirm the nomination of Dennis Rosen.
4 Senator Squadron.
5 SENATOR SQUADRON: Thank you very
6 much, Mr. President.
7 I rise as well to speak on the
8 nomination of Dennis Rosen for chair of the
9 State Liquor Authority.
10 This is unquestionably one of the
11 single most important jobs in the State of
12 New York. The chair of the State Liquor
13 Authority and the State Liquor Authority
14 oversee an arcane and often anachronistic body
15 of law that affects small-business owners
16 across the state.
17 It also affects communities in my
18 district in a way that cannot be overstated.
19 The profusion of liquor licenses, the
20 inability to have a consistency that would
21 work better, frankly, both for the
22 small-business owner and for the community,
23 has been nothing short of a disaster in parts
24 of my district across Lower Manhattan.
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1 I was pleased to get to meet Dennis
2 Rosen over the phone, have an extensive
3 conversation, speak to him at the
4 Investigations Committee this morning. His
5 openness and willingness to learn, his
6 awareness of the significant challenges that
7 the State Liquor Authority faces, and the
8 incredibly urgent need for true reform is
9 refreshing.
10 I look forward to hosting hm in my
11 district, showing him some of the effects that
12 the State Liquor authority has had in my
13 district, and look forward to working with
14 him. I am very proud to vote in favor of him
15 and look forward to many changes under his
16 leadership at the State Liquor Authority.
17 Thank you.
18 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN:
19 Senator Robach.
20 SENATOR ROBACH: Yes,
21 Mr. President. I too would like to
22 congratulate Mr. Rosen on this appointment and
23 say I'm looking forward to working with him.
24 While sometimes people who aren't
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1 affected by SLA really don't know a whole lot
2 about it, certainly in my community in
3 Rochester, New York, and upstate New York, we
4 are constantly on the phone with employees,
5 really trying to move that process and
6 certainly not try to circumvent anything but
7 shorten the waiting time it takes to get a
8 business going, a license going of someone
9 who's been in operation for a while. So it's
10 really going to become our mutual consistency.
11 And I wish you well in your new job
12 and look forward to working with you.
13 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN:
14 Senator Nozzolio.
15 SENATOR NOZZOLIO: Mr. President,
16 I rise to support the nomination of Mr. Rosen
17 to be a member of the State Liquor Authority
18 and chairman of that important board.
19 And I rise in support of him not
20 because he's a graduate of the Harvard Law
21 School, not because he had a distinguished
22 career within the Attorney General's office in
23 Western New York, but rather because he is the
24 son of a small-business owner. And his
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1 comments to me and to the committee at his
2 appearance before the Senate Finance Committee
3 I believe were telling and important that he
4 can focus on small business. And that's what
5 we need to enhance in New York State.
6 And I look forward to working with
7 the new chairman to ensure that our
8 businesses, particularly those in the Finger
9 Lakes region that depend on the tourist
10 dollar, can continue to help in New York's
11 economy.
12 I support this nomination and thank
13 you, Mr. President, for the opportunity to
14 speak on its behalf.
15 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: Thank
16 you, Senator Nozzolio.
17 Senator Marcellino.
18 SENATOR MARCELLINO: Yes,
19 Mr. President. I also rise in support of
20 Mr. Rosen's nomination.
21 We had a conversation in the
22 Finance Committee where I pointed out the
23 problems of those of us who represent suburban
24 communities where bars are located and in many
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1 cases, in some cases, can be hot spots or
2 spots where trouble arises. Gangs have moved
3 into certain areas and claimed bars as their
4 turf and created problems in our communities.
5 They're asking that the Liquor
6 Authority, who is understaffed and needs
7 help -- and we hope to give it to them -- gets
8 out and works more closely with the local
9 police precincts and with the local
10 authorities to rid our neighborhoods of these
11 bars and locations where nothing but trouble
12 occurs and no good actually happens.
13 So we look forward to that. I
14 intend to be on the phone with you, Mr. Rosen,
15 with some frequency on that issue because it
16 is a concern of mine, it is a concern of my
17 constituents. And I look forward to working
18 with you in the future.
19 Thank you.
20 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: Thank
21 you, Senator Marcellino.
22 Senator Farley.
23 SENATOR FARLEY: Thank you,
24 Mr. President.
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1 I also rise to support Mr. Rosen
2 for this position. This is one that every
3 legislator in both houses works with this
4 agency constantly, and of course many times
5 frustrated because of the delays and so forth.
6 But basically so much of this delay is caused
7 by the fact that they are shorthanded,
8 something that we should recognize and be able
9 to support that agency.
10 But let me just say, on the
11 candidate that is before us, I don't think
12 that anybody could be more suited for this
13 position with the background that he has in
14 the Attorney General's office, having served
15 under several administrations and worked in
16 the Attorney General's office. And I think
17 that that makes for a great commissioner.
18 And certainly he's eminently
19 qualified, and it is with enthusiasm that I
20 support his nomination.
21 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: Thank
22 you, Senator Farley.
23 Senator Volker.
24 SENATOR VOLKER: Yes,
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1 Mr. President. Very quickly, Dennis Rosen is
2 a constituent of mine from Western New York.
3 He has served under a number of Attorney
4 Generals. In fact, he was first appointed, I
5 believe, under Dennis Vacco. His immediate
6 superior I believe was my counsel, J.R.
7 Drexelius.
8 As I said at the meeting, part of
9 the problem with the SLA, I don't believe that
10 some of people who died at the World Trade
11 Center have been totally replaced. There were
12 SLA people who died at the World Trade Center.
13 It has been an vastly underfunded
14 agency. It unfortunately is an agency which
15 is rife for what's happening apparently in
16 New York City, because when things are so
17 delayed, certain things happen.
18 This is something that the Bureau
19 of the Budget should better look at, because
20 it is a money gainer not a money negative.
21 One of the things we must understand is some
22 businesspeople don't understand that there are
23 certain agencies that we need people to make
24 us money, and the SLA is one of those.
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1 I wish you the best of luck,
2 Dennis.
3 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: The
4 question is on the motion to confirm the
5 nomination of Dennis Rosen as a member and
6 chair of the State Liquor Authority. All
7 those in favor please signify by saying aye.
8 (Response of "Aye.")
9 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN:
10 Opposed, nay.
11 (No response.)
12 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: The
13 motion carries. The nomination is hereby
14 confirmed.
15 Dennis Rosen is in the gallery, and
16 we all congratulate him. And I think all of
17 us want him to do the best job imaginable.
18 (Applause.)
19 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN:
20 Senator Klein.
21 SENATOR KLEIN: Mr. President,
22 can we now please move to a reading of the
23 calendar.
24 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: The
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1 Secretary will read.
2 THE SECRETARY: Calendar Number
3 842, by Member of the Assembly Weinstein,
4 Assembly Print Number 8956A, an act to amend
5 the Civil Practice Law and Rules.
6 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: Read
7 the last section.
8 THE SECRETARY: Section 7. This
9 act shall take effect September 1, 2009.
10 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: Call
11 the roll.
12 (The Secretary called the roll.)
13 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN:
14 Senator Young, to explain her vote.
15 SENATOR YOUNG: Thank you,
16 Mr. President.
17 The County Clerks Association has
18 removed their opposition to this particular
19 bill. But there still is some concern out
20 there that this is an unfunded mandate for the
21 counties, and therefore I vote no.
22 Thank you.
23 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN:
24 Senator Young will be recorded in the
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1 negative.
2 Announce the results.
3 THE SECRETARY: Those recorded in
4 the negative on Calendar Number 842 are
5 Senators Alesi, Griffo, Nozzolio, Seward and
6 Young.
7 Ayes, 51. Nays, 5.
8 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: The
9 bill is passed.
10 The Secretary will continue to
11 read.
12 THE SECRETARY: Calendar Number
13 953, by Senator Sampson, Senate Print 5968 --
14 SENATOR MARCELLINO: Lay it
15 aside.
16 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: The
17 bill is laid aside.
18 THE SECRETARY: Calendar Number
19 954, by Senator Dilan, Senate Print 6104, an
20 act to amend the Education Law.
21 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: Read
22 the last section.
23 SENATOR SALAND: Lay it aside.
24 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: The
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1 bill is laid aside.
2 THE SECRETARY: Calendar Number
3 955, by Senator Serrano, Senate Print 6105, an
4 act to amend the Education Law.
5 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: Read
6 the last section.
7 THE SECRETARY: Section 2. This
8 act shall take effect on the same date and in
9 the same manner as a chapter of the Laws of
10 2009.
11 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: Call
12 the roll.
13 (The Secretary called the roll.)
14 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN:
15 Senator Serrano, to explain his vote.
16 SENATOR SERRANO: Thank you very
17 much, Mr. President.
18 I've been a staunch advocate for
19 the arts over the years, especially arts
20 education. And I strongly believe that the
21 arts play a vital role in ensuring that our
22 youth receive a well-balanced education that
23 will provide them real opportunities in life.
24 That's why I'm proud to sponsor
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1 this piece of legislation to create an arts
2 advisory committee. The committee will
3 provide oversight on arts education within the
4 New York City school system. It will be
5 empowered to advise and comment on all
6 educational policy related to the arts, issue
7 annual reports on the effectiveness of arts
8 education in city schools, hold public
9 meetings to help foster public debate and
10 awareness regarding how to move arts education
11 forward.
12 And what makes this legislation
13 empowering is that the advisory committee will
14 also make recommendations for improvement.
15 This means that the public dialogue is not a
16 simple recital of problems; rather, a
17 discussion of focused and real methods
18 New York City can employ to improve
19 educational outcomes.
20 I deem all aspects of this bill to
21 be essential in moving arts education forward
22 and advancing public awareness regarding the
23 importance of arts in our children's
24 education. While it cannot be denied that
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1 courses such as reading and math are critical
2 to a child's education, I and many others
3 believe that arts courses are critically
4 important.
5 It is important that we not make
6 the mistake of thinking that the only critical
7 courses are the ones linked to statewide
8 testing standards. It has been proven time
9 and time again, with study after study, that
10 children who are taught music and art do far
11 better in courses like reading and math.
12 The arts also open doors for better
13 cognitive thinking and awakens passions for
14 self-expression and individual thinking,
15 attributes that will foster our next
16 generation of great thinkers and leaders.
17 It is well documented that arts
18 education provides students with the ability
19 to develop a number of critical skills --
20 skills like self-discipline, teamwork, problem
21 solving, and the list goes on and on. Such
22 skills are critical not only to scholastic and
23 academic success, but also to future workforce
24 success. In today's world, when young people
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1 can expect to have jobs in more than one field
2 and work with colleagues from different parts
3 of the world, these skills are essential.
4 There are state requirements on the
5 books, but they are not being met. In
6 New York City, in the 2007-2008 school year,
7 according to the DOE, only 8 percent of
8 elementary schools were in a position to meet
9 the minimum requirements established by the
10 state by offering all four arts forms in each
11 grade, and less than half of middle schools
12 met the state's requirements. These numbers
13 are abysmal, yet without proper oversight they
14 went largely unnoticed.
15 As one might expect, these
16 compliance statistics are especially appalling
17 in communities with a high concentration of
18 low-income families, many of which fall into
19 my own district in East Harlem and the South
20 Bronx. It should not matter if a student
21 resides on 104th Street or 84th Street.
22 Access to arts in schools must not be
23 dependent on where a student lives and income
24 of the student's parents.
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1 By creating this advisory
2 committee, there will be a mechanism in place
3 to identify the lack of compliance with arts
4 education standards and, more importantly,
5 develop a sufficient remedy.
6 While I stand here on the Senate
7 floor, I can't help but think about all of the
8 arts and music teachers who work hard every
9 day and fight hard for the resources needed to
10 teach their craft to their eager students.
11 They never give up hope that they will be able
12 to reach inside that young person's mind and
13 help flip the switch that will awaken a
14 lifetime love for the arts and music and a
15 passion for what is truly beautiful in this
16 world.
17 I think about the late, great Fred
18 Daris, who for generations taught everything
19 from classical music to Shakespeare to
20 students in the South Bronx at Berger Junior
21 High School. His tireless efforts helped
22 create eventual leaders; one of them is my
23 father. From Fred Daris I learned firsthand
24 at a very young age how the arts can translate
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1 to countless positive things outside the
2 classroom and maybe even help change what
3 happens in the street.
4 To be clear, there is a lot of work
5 to be done, both on the city and state level,
6 to ensure arts education is getting the
7 attention it deserves. We must continue to
8 look for new ways to ensure that children get
9 the type of quality education they deserve.
10 Still, this legislation is a very important
11 step forward, and I'm proud to stand here to
12 sponsor it.
13 I'd like to thank the advocates who
14 helped, such as the Center for Arts Education
15 and the New York State Alliance for Arts
16 Education. Finally, I'd like to thank Mayor
17 Bloomberg and Deputy Mayor Walcott for their
18 commitment to arts education. And I look
19 forward to viewing this legislation as a
20 starting point to help greater advancement for
21 arts in the classroom.
22 Thank you. I vote yes.
23 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: Thank
24 you, Senator Serrano.
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1 Senator Serrano will be recorded in
2 the affirmative.
3 Senator Perkins, to explain his
4 vote.
5 SENATOR PERKINS: Thank you very
6 much, Mr. President.
7 First let me begin by commending my
8 colleague Senator Serrano for his visionary
9 understanding of the role that arts plays in
10 the child's development, especially in our
11 educational system when it is not in the
12 context of mayoral control.
13 However, in that context, it does
14 not get the chance to flourish and provide all
15 those wonderful things that my colleague just
16 pointed out. And so for that reason, as well
17 as because the advocates such as the Center
18 for Arts Education have determined that this
19 particular approach will not be as effective
20 as I think Senator Serrano had in mind, I'm
21 going to have to vote no on this resolution.
22 In fact, I will say now that I'll
23 be voting no on all the resolutions because
24 again, I believe that in the context of
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1 mayoral control, that the intention and the
2 vision that these have will be crippled and
3 that what we hope to achieve will not be
4 achieved.
5 So thank you very much. I vote no.
6 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: Thank
7 you, Senator Perkins.
8 Senator Perkins to be recorded in
9 the negative.
10 Announce the results.
11 THE SECRETARY: Ayes, 55. Nays,
12 1. Senator Perkins recorded in the negative.
13 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: The
14 bill is passed.
15 The Secretary will continue to
16 read.
17 THE SECRETARY: Calendar Number
18 956, by Senator Adams, Senate Print 6106, an
19 act to amend the Education Law.
20 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: Read
21 the last section.
22 THE SECRETARY: Section 2. This
23 act shall take effect on the same date and in
24 the same --
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1 SENATOR MORAHAN: Lay it aside.
2 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: The
3 bill is laid aside.
4 The Secretary will continue to
5 read.
6 THE SECRETARY: Calendar Number
7 957, by Senator Huntley, Senate Print 6107, an
8 act to amend the Education Law.
9 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: Read
10 the last section.
11 THE SECRETARY: Section 2. This
12 act shall take effect immediately.
13 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: Call
14 the roll.
15 (The Secretary called the roll.)
16 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN:
17 Senator Saland, to explain his vote.
18 SENATOR SALAND: Thank you,
19 Mr. President.
20 Mr. President, certainly the
21 purpose of this bill is clear. And while I
22 may question the necessity for the kind of
23 training center in each of the boroughs that
24 the bill provides, I'm more concerned about
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1 the last paragraph in the bill, which makes
2 reference to the City of New York providing
3 annual funding to the center in an amount
4 equal to that provided in appropriation by the
5 state, but not to exceed $800,000 per year.
6 I'm not exactly certain what that
7 obligates the state to do, whether in fact it
8 obligates an appropriation by the state. I'm
9 not exactly sure what happens if the cost of
10 these centers exceeds some $800,000, if that
11 somehow or other is going to result in yet
12 additional appropriations being required of
13 the state.
14 I realize the Assembly hasn't acted
15 on this bill yet, but it may well. And given
16 the fiscal crisis that we find ourselves in at
17 this particular time, anticipating coming back
18 within the next month or two having any number
19 of bills that have been vetoed for
20 appropriations not provided for in the budget,
21 I'm going to cast my vote in the negative on
22 this.
23 Thank you, Mr. President.
24 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: Thank
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1 you, Senator Saland.
2 Senator Saland will be recorded in
3 the negative.
4 Senator Perkins, to explain his
5 vote.
6 SENATOR PERKINS: Again, thank
7 you, Mr. President. I'm going to be voting no
8 again on this.
9 There's nothing more important than
10 the involvement of parents and the empowerment
11 of parents in this process of educating our
12 children. Mayoral control, as we have come to
13 know it, is mayoral dictatorship, and parents
14 have been crippled to the point of tears and
15 outrage about the fact that they are not. And
16 this bill unfortunately, in that context, will
17 not give them the opportunity to play a
18 meaningful role.
19 And in fact I have received
20 numerous complaints from parents that have
21 asked me to make sure that we do not allow
22 mayoral control to be continued. Of course
23 we'll do what we can towards that end.
24 But nevertheless it is clear, at
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1 least in my district, that what we have been
2 experiencing has been a horrible thing for
3 parents and their involvement -- and
4 especially within the context of something
5 called mayoral control as it is being proposed
6 and as these amendments will be attached.
7 I should also point out to you that
8 I have also received numerous phone calls from
9 my constituents: "Thank you for voting
10 against mayoral control. There is a robocall
11 saying that your vote condemns our children."
12 She doesn't agree, and they want us to make
13 sure that we vote against mayoral control.
14 And so even as the mayor has
15 attempted to get our communities to come out
16 against us, it has backfired. Because the
17 calls that I got, the numerous calls that I
18 got were telling me not to be supportive.
19 So again, I'm going to be voting
20 no. And I hope that my colleagues understand
21 that I agree with them in terms of the
22 importance, but this is not the way that my
23 constituents feel that it can be achieved.
24 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: Thank
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1 you, Senator Perkins.
2 Senator Perkins will be recorded in
3 the negative.
4 Senator Diaz, to explain his vote.
5 SENATOR DIAZ: Just to let you
6 know, Mr. President, that I'm joining my
7 colleague Senator Perkins.
8 And I'm going to take advantage of
9 his explanation to make it mine and also to
10 let you know that on the previous bill, 955,
11 I'm also voting no. And I am joining my
12 colleague from Manhattan and the Bronx united
13 against this thing. Thank you.
14 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: Thank
15 you, Senator Diaz.
16 Senator Diaz will be recorded in
17 the negative.
18 Announce the results.
19 THE SECRETARY: Those recorded in
20 the negative on Calendar Number 957 are
21 Senators Bonacic, Diaz, Flanagan, Griffo,
22 O. Johnson, Lanza, Maziarz, Nozzolio, Perkins,
23 Ranzenhofer, Robach, Saland and Young. Also
24 Senators Larkin and Morahan.
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1 Ayes, 41. Nays, 15.
2 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: The
3 bill is passed.
4 Senator Marcellino.
5 SENATOR MARCELLINO: Yes,
6 Mr. President. Can we withdraw at this time
7 the lay-asides on Calendar Numbers 954 and 956
8 and have those bills returned to the
9 noncontroversial reading.
10 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: Bills
11 956 and 954 will be restored to the
12 noncontroversial reading, and we will continue
13 with Calendar Number 954.
14 The Secretary will read.
15 THE SECRETARY: Calendar Number
16 954, by Senator Dilan, Senate Print 6104, an
17 act to amend the Education Law.
18 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: Read
19 the last section.
20 THE SECRETARY: Section 2. This
21 act shall take effect on the same date and in
22 the same manner as a chapter of the Laws of
23 2009.
24 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: Call
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1 the roll.
2 (The Secretary called the roll.)
3 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN:
4 Announce the results.
5 THE SECRETARY: Those recorded in
6 the negative on Calendar Number 954 are
7 Senators Diaz and Perkins.
8 Ayes, 54. Nays, 2.
9 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: The
10 bill is passed.
11 The Secretary will continue to
12 read.
13 THE SECRETARY: Calendar Number
14 956, by Senator Adams, Senate Print 6106, an
15 act to amend the Education Law.
16 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: Read
17 the last section.
18 THE SECRETARY: Section 2. This
19 act shall take effect on the same date and in
20 the same manner as a chapter of the Laws of
21 2009.
22 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: Call
23 the roll.
24 (The Secretary called the roll.)
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1 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN:
2 Senator Perkins, to explain his vote.
3 SENATOR PERKINS: Again, I want
4 to commend my colleague Senator Adams and
5 company for their very, very important concern
6 and interest in the safety of our children.
7 Clearly, that is very, very important to all
8 of us.
9 However, you know, as we are
10 presently managing safety in our public
11 schools in New York City, it is effectively
12 putting into the closet the role of the
13 educators, the principals and the teachers and
14 related staff who have often been in
15 confrontation in that arena. And there have
16 been instances, too many instances in which
17 police action was taken when other types of
18 action did not need to be taken.
19 Our schools are beginning to almost
20 look like steps towards prison because of the
21 fact that there's so much policing of that
22 type being done when in fact we don't need to
23 police necessarily to do it, that there are
24 other ways that it can be done.
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1 And so again, this is an idea that
2 I think is important. But in the context
3 especially of mayoral control, the type of
4 dictatorship that we've seen, I cannot support
5 it and I will be voting no.
6 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: Thank
7 you, Senator Perkins.
8 Senator Perkins will be recorded in
9 the negative.
10 Senator Adams, to explain his vote.
11 SENATOR ADAMS: Thank you,
12 Mr. President.
13 First, I thank you, Senator
14 Perkins. And I want to really take a moment
15 to thank, as I explain my vote, my colleagues
16 on the other side of the aisle -- particularly
17 Senator Lanza -- for really understanding why
18 this issue was so important to us.
19 And some of the calls we received
20 as we debated this issue several weeks ago,
21 they understood that these chapter amendments
22 were important. And they understood why there
23 was a lot of discussions and this was a very
24 tense argument.
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1 And I just want to especially
2 acknowledge Senator Huntley and Senator Dilan
3 and the conference leader, Senator Sampson, of
4 trying to put together a very difficult issue.
5 And the most important part of this
6 issue, as I spoke with some of my colleagues
7 on the other side of the aisle, is that we're
8 now in the position where we have a committee
9 that can raise the questions. Because the
10 only thing we want is for our children to be
11 educated.
12 It doesn't matter who's the mayor
13 that's doing it, it doesn't matter what
14 process is put in place -- as long as we know
15 that the numbers that are put before us are
16 the real numbers and we're not using Bernie
17 Madoff-type math to take away the future of
18 our children. If the numbers are correct,
19 then we will all see them and the transparency
20 we're getting.
21 This amendment that I put forward
22 is dealing with public safety. Public safety
23 starts with a conversation. We don't want our
24 children in small fights -- I don't know
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1 anyone in here that didn't get into some form
2 of a fight in school. I had three. And if I
3 was arrested each time I pushed someone or did
4 something inappropriate, I would not have
5 become a police officer.
6 So I want to thank all of us for
7 coming together, finding a resolution,
8 continuing the process of educating our
9 children. And a special note to my friend in
10 the rafters, Deputy Mayor Walcott, for his
11 commitment to the education of our children.
12 This is an important issue. This
13 is important to us all. And that's why there
14 was so much passion and so much tension around
15 this issue. And again, I will be voting in
16 the affirmative on this amendment.
17 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: Thank
18 you, Senator Adams.
19 Senator Adams will be recorded in
20 the affirmative.
21 Announce the results.
22 THE SECRETARY: Those recorded in
23 the negative on Calendar Number 956 are
24 Senators Diaz, Griffo and Perkins.
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1 Ayes, 53. Nays, 3.
2 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: The
3 bill is passed.
4 We are now taking up Bill 958,
5 which in your book is listed improperly or
6 incorrectly as 952.
7 THE SECRETARY: In relation to
8 Calendar Number 958, Senator Padavan moves to
9 discharge, from the Committee on Rules,
10 Assembly Bill Number 8903A and substitute it
11 for the identical Senate Bill Number 5887,
12 Third Reading Calendar 958.
13 SENATOR KLEIN: Lay it aside,
14 please.
15 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN:
16 Substitution ordered.
17 The bill is laid aside.
18 Senator Klein.
19 SENATOR KLEIN: Mr. President, at
20 this time can we please move to a reading of
21 the controversial calendar.
22 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: The
23 Secretary will please ring the bell as we move
24 to the controversial calendar. Members are to
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1 be called to the chamber.
2 The Secretary will read.
3 THE SECRETARY: Calendar Number
4 953, by Senator Sampson, Senate Print 5968, an
5 act to amend the Family Court Act.
6 SENATOR KLEIN: Lay the bill
7 aside for the day.
8 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: The
9 bill is laid aside for the day.
10 The Secretary will continue to
11 read.
12 THE SECRETARY: Calendar Number
13 958, substituted earlier by Member of the
14 Assembly Silver, Assembly Print Number 8903A,
15 an act to amend the Education Law.
16 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: Read
17 the last section.
18 Senator Squadron, would you like to
19 speak on the bill?
20 SENATOR SQUADRON: Thank you,
21 Mr. President. I appreciate it. And I know
22 Senator Padavan will also be speaking to
23 explain the bill; I wanted to just explain
24 this bill briefly.
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1 There's no question and we all say
2 that education is the most important,
3 education in New York City particularly --
4 1.1 million schoolchildren, a larger school
5 system that most states in this country.
6 And I think that there's no
7 question, if you look at it, there's been a
8 lot of good work for those 1.1 million
9 schoolchildren over the last several years.
10 And I think, if you look at it, there's no
11 question that there's a lot of work still to
12 do.
13 The challenge we face this year was
14 how do you keep the process going while
15 improving in the ways that improvements were
16 needed. How do you add transparency and
17 parental input while maintaining that strict
18 accountability to the mayor that the school
19 governance bill passed seven years ago -- the
20 quote, unquote, mayoral control -- does.
21 I think this bill does that
22 perfectly. Unlike some of the reports out
23 there, this is not just a strict extender of
24 what we already have in the system. This
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1 improves the system in significant ways.
2 Local superintendents will appear
3 back in local districts in a way they haven't
4 been in years. They're required in this bill
5 to be in the districts. They have real
6 authority in the schools. The Community
7 Education Councils, the parent bodies,
8 actually have a say in who the superintendents
9 are, have a voice with the chancellor in
10 choosing those superintendents. That is a big
11 improvement. We're going to have local
12 offices, local say in a way we haven't had.
13 These CECs, those parent education
14 councils, are beefed up in significant ways.
15 Not just is eligibility expanded for them --
16 which it is -- but there's new hearing
17 requirements, any time there's a change in use
18 of schools or a school opens or closes, with
19 those CECs. And as I said before, they have a
20 real say with the superintendents. We're not
21 going to have CECs, Community Education
22 Councils, that are just rubber-stamps or sort
23 of defunct. They're going to have a real role
24 that gives parents a real, official voice.
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1 That is a great improvement to the law.
2 When you look at the public process
3 more broadly, there is a robust public process
4 in this bill. You have it on the local level
5 with the Community Education Councils; you
6 also have it at a citywide level through the
7 Panel for Educational Policy.
8 Much has been made of what is this
9 role for the Panel for Educational Policy.
10 Well, I think in this bill the role is made
11 very, very clear. It is a process for public
12 input, for transparency. They have a
13 requirement to publish their agendas 10 days
14 ahead of time. They have a 45-day waiting
15 requirement for any number of significant
16 decisions of the chancellor's.
17 The Panel for Educational Policy's
18 role is clarified, is rationalized, and is
19 meaningful. It is going to be an effective
20 voice for transparency citywide.
21 Procurement in contracts, been
22 talked about a whole lot. This might be the
23 tightest procurement system in the State of
24 New York that the New York City Department of
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1 Education is now going to have, and that's a
2 good thing. That's going to work well. It is
3 a $15 billion budget. Hopefully it will
4 continue to be a $15 billion budget and in
5 fact grow so we continue to invest in our
6 kids. And as it grows, we need to make sure
7 the money is being spent well. This
8 procurement policy will do that.
9 The New York City comptroller has
10 real authority now in the Department of
11 Education, just like any other city agency.
12 That's a good thing. There was no reason for
13 the department to kind of fall into a
14 netherworld between the city and the state.
15 That happened too often in the past. It's not
16 going to happen in the future.
17 The Independent Budget Office of
18 New York City, which has proven to be an
19 independent, strong voice -- oversight on City
20 Hall, both the Council and the mayor -- is
21 going to get extra funding, is going to have
22 the ability not just to look at the budget of
23 DOE, but also at a whole lot of those
24 education metrics.
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1 All of these questions are out
2 there: What does this educational number
3 mean? What does the graduation rate mean?
4 Well, the IBO is going to have the ability to
5 get in there, get those raw numbers and make
6 real definitive judgments and statements, real
7 substantive analysis. That is incredibly
8 important.
9 And we now are going to have
10 educational impact statements that the
11 chancellor needs to put out there on any
12 number of issues, from the students with
13 special needs to needs of communities. That's
14 going to get out there early in the process.
15 That's going to help every step of this
16 process, from the local one to the citywide
17 one. It changes the dynamic between the
18 chancellor and the communities, between the
19 department and the public at large. That is a
20 good thing.
21 Two of these -- I proposed two
22 ideas this spring. One was something called
23 the UPEP, the Universal Parent Engagement
24 Procedure, an idea originally proposed by
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1 Borough President Scott Stringer of Manhattan.
2 It was a great way to create exactly the
3 process that we see in this bill. I am
4 pleased to see those ideas in the bill that
5 hopefully we will pass today.
6 I also proposed a bill that would
7 very clearly make the Department of Education
8 a city agency. Not every piece of that bill
9 is in this one, but I got to tell you, as I
10 said earlier, the Department of Education no
11 longer falls into a netherworld between the
12 city and the state.
13 When it comes to the comptroller,
14 when it comes to the IBO, when it comes to
15 procurement, it's very clear what the role,
16 what the relationship of the Department of
17 Education to other city and state agencies is.
18 That's a very, very, very good thing.
19 So this bill in significant ways
20 improves the law, I don't think there's any
21 question. And it does it without undermining
22 the central tenet that we needed to preserve,
23 which is a clear line of accountability to the
24 mayor. The mayor needs to have the ability
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1 and the responsibility to change the system,
2 to close the achievement gap that persists,
3 and to improve public education on a broad
4 scale in an urban setting.
5 Certainly, as I said at the
6 beginning, I think real progress has been made
7 in the last seven years. Graduation rates in
8 the City of New York are up. Test scores as
9 against other big cities in the State of
10 New York are up. Those are terribly important
11 numbers. For many, many parents the system,
12 their local school, their local neighborhood
13 is so much more responsive and effective than
14 it ever was in the past. That matters.
15 But of course there's still much to
16 do. We haven't solved the problem of urban
17 education in the last seven years. The
18 achievement gap persists, as I said.
19 Graduation rates, while up, are nowhere near
20 where they need to be. I worry about how
21 we're educating English language learners and
22 special education students. They're still not
23 achieving anywhere near at the level they have
24 to.
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1 I believe that there's a greater
2 role for assessments, educational assessments
3 outside of the anachronistic
4 fill-in-the-bubble test that we're still much
5 too dependent on. I don't believe that the
6 role of arts education or of civics is yet
7 significant enough in the City of New York and
8 has to be more significant.
9 But the fact is overall in the last
10 seven years the system of education for
11 New York City schoolchildren has gotten better
12 across the city. And this bill that we are
13 passing today improves on that system. It
14 places the responsibility for future
15 improvement when it comes to the achievement
16 gap, when it comes to arts and civics, when it
17 comes to graduation rates, when it comes to
18 parental engagement with New York City's
19 mayor. There's no question about that: it's
20 his or her responsibility to keep the progress
21 going and frankly take it a whole lot farther.
22 But the formula that we are passing
23 today in this bill, accountability combined
24 with transparency and parental input --
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1 regardless of all of the Albany power
2 struggles and all of the craziness that
3 happens up here, that formula will give the
4 1.1 million children down in New York City the
5 best possible chance to go to schools that
6 will give them the best possible chance to
7 succeed in life.
8 That's why I am proud to be the
9 first cosponsor of this bill and why I'll be
10 supporting it.
11 Thank you very much, Mr. President.
12 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: Thank
13 you, Senator Squadron.
14 Senator Padavan.
15 SENATOR PADAVAN: Thank you,
16 Mr. President.
17 And thank you, Senator Squadron,
18 for your very, very articulate and
19 comprehensive outline of this bill. You hit
20 many of the very significant areas that I
21 think have preoccupied this Legislature not
22 only this year but for decades.
23 One of the first things that was
24 handed to me when I arrived here 37 years ago
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1 was something called the Fleischmann Report.
2 Years later, there was the Marchi Commission.
3 Nothing has preoccupied the State Legislature
4 more than governance and the Department of
5 Education, the former Board of Education in
6 the City of New York.
7 During the past nine months, a
8 great deal of study and analysis has been done
9 relevant to the effectiveness of mayoralty
10 control which began in 2002. Whether it's the
11 Citizens Union or the public advocate or the
12 CSA, the principals who certainly are there
13 every day in our schools, who know certainly
14 whether or not the experiment was valid and
15 productive, the teachers in the classroom --
16 all of them, without exception, urged us to
17 continue mayoralty control and that form of
18 governance which we've had for the last seven
19 years.
20 The bill before us passed the
21 Assembly 129 to 18, with 70 percent of the
22 Assemblymen from the City of New York voting
23 for it. Clear indication at the grassroots
24 level of support for what has been going on
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1 for the past seven years.
2 Now, it isn't just governance,
3 because, as the Senator indicated, we have
4 authority married with responsibility. And
5 what that engenders more than anything else is
6 resources. Embedded in the 2000 law and
7 continued in this one is maintenance of
8 effort. Those of you who know I'm sure know
9 what that is, to ensure that the City of
10 New York maintains its level of funding
11 consistent with what we have been doing here
12 for the past decade at the state level.
13 And it's worked. We're now
14 spending well over $16,000 per pupil in the
15 City of New York, more than any school system
16 in any city or state in the nation on a
17 per-capita basis.
18 On top of that, because this mayor
19 was on the hook, he came up with a five-year
20 capital program of over $13 billion where
21 we're building schools in every borough,
22 modernizing them, upgrading them, expanding
23 them. There isn't a school area or any
24 district in the city where you don't find
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1 scaffolding or work being done. So our
2 children and our teachers, employees, 130,000
3 of them who go to work every day, 1.1 million
4 children into those schools, find an
5 environment which I think is far better than
6 it has ever been and certainly contributes to
7 the quality of the education they get.
8 There is a sunset in this bill,
9 2015. And there's no doubt in my mind that
10 whatever legislature is here, those of us who
11 are here, we will be having a similar
12 discussion looking back at a six-year period
13 and saying, well, are the changes that we put
14 in place from 2002, are they beneficial? Have
15 they done the job? Have they improved the
16 product? And then make another judgment. I
17 think that we will come up with the answer of
18 yes.
19 Senator Squadron indicated the
20 concerns with English-language learners. One
21 of the things in this bill is a new citywide
22 council just for that purpose. He talked at
23 great length, and properly so, about the
24 auditing and oversight. The comptroller of
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1 the City of New York and the office of the
2 budget, budget office, all will have access to
3 all the data and contracts and oversight that
4 goes on in the Department of Education.
5 We could be here all afternoon, and
6 I know that many of you would like to get back
7 home. I'm going to end with one of the
8 letters that I got a copy of from the
9 Department of Education, written by the U.S.
10 Secretary of Education, Mr. Duncan. "As
11 President Obama's Secretary of Education, I
12 can tell you that both change and the
13 resulting progress that has occurred in
14 New York City schools over the last seven
15 years is truly remarkable."
16 I believe, whether it's remarkable
17 or outstanding or positive, whatever adjective
18 you'd like to use, we did the right thing
19 seven years ago. And hopefully we'll do the
20 right thing again today by keeping this thing
21 moving forward with all the improvements that
22 have been articulated -- and I won't repeat
23 them -- particularly the area of
24 superintendents, which is something we fought
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1 for.
2 Senator Lanza, myself, Senator
3 Golden had three or four meetings with the
4 chancellor, and that's what we talked about
5 most of all. We've got to give those
6 superintendents the opportunity in their
7 districts to do their job and not be sent all
8 over the city doing things that are not
9 relevant to their district and give them the
10 resources to do it. Ninety percent of the
11 problems at the district level can be handled
12 in that office if given the opportunity to do
13 so.
14 So there are tons of things in
15 here. You all got the fact sheet, you can
16 read them; I don't need to read them to you.
17 But we've done a good job, I think, together,
18 both houses, working, ironing out, accepting
19 inputs and recommendations, and we're here
20 today to vote on the bill.
21 Thank you, Mr. President.
22 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: Thank
23 you, Senator Padavan.
24 Senator Diaz, on the bill.
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1 SENATOR DIAZ: Thank you,
2 Mr. President.
3 I keep reading the news saying how
4 great of a job Mayor Bloomberg has done in our
5 educational system. I hear my colleagues
6 Senator Squadron and Senator Padavan praising
7 the mayor, how great, how beautiful the mayor
8 has done in our educational system.
9 My question is, where is the beef?
10 Where is the beef? And I take from that old
11 commercial, that old woman that used to say
12 "Where's the beef?" There's no beef. The
13 mayor hasn't don't a great job in the
14 educational system.
15 I have -- I read something from the
16 Daily News, Wednesday, July 15th, and they
17 carry the headline "Low Test Standards Are a
18 Form of Social Promotion." That's the Daily
19 News. In that article it says, what --
20 Mr. President, you got to listen to this.
21 There's no beef. I don't know -- these people
22 that are praising the mayor, I don't know what
23 paper are they reading? What soda are they
24 drinking? There's no beef.
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1 Look at what he says. "'What
2 appears to be happening in the last four years
3 under Mayor Bloomberg's system is the hurdle
4 is getting lower,' said Fred Smith, former
5 testing analyst for the Board of Education.
6 Smith was one of the experts who reviewed the
7 numbers and provided research to the Daily
8 News.
9 "In 2006, for example" -- ladies
10 and gentlemen, so you can see where is the
11 beef -- "In 2006, for example, third-graders
12 had to get 44 percent of points on the math
13 tests to earn a promotion." In 2006, they
14 were supposed to get 44 percent of points to
15 get the -- to pass the math tests and earn a
16 promotion.
17 This year, Mr. President, they only
18 had to get 28 percent. What a good job,
19 ladies and gentlemen, the mayor has done.
20 Lower the standards, lower the points, our
21 children pass. And more children are
22 graduating. Bingo, wonderful job.
23 Look at what he says: "The reading
24 tests show a similar pattern. The number of
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1 students who failed to make the cut in reading
2 declined from 46,085 to 11,755 -- a 75 percent
3 drop just in three years."
4 Luna Castro says, "'I have kids who
5 really struggle as readers,' said Claudia de
6 Luna Castro, who teaches fourth grade and
7 fifth grade at Harlem" -- in our
8 neighborhood -- "at Harlem's Central Park East
9 II and had no students who scored at level
10 one. 'It always makes me wonder when I see
11 data that doesn't match my experience with my
12 kids.'" That's a teacher talking.
13 Another person, a student has to
14 get fewer questions right, student get this
15 right. Please, listen to this. "'Students
16 had to get fewer questions right in 2009 than
17 they did in 2006 to earn the same score,' said
18 State Education Department spokesman Jonathan
19 Burman, 'because items in the 2007 test were
20 more difficult than they were in 2006.'"
21 Make it easier, drop everything,
22 the children will pass. And the mayor will
23 get, "Man, the children passed," and the
24 editorial boards and all the people say what a
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1 good job the mayor has done.
2 The mayor has ruined our
3 educational system. The mayor has done a
4 lousy job with our students. Ladies and
5 gentlemen, I could do that myself. I could do
6 that myself. Just let me lower the
7 standards -- everybody pass. Wow, what a
8 great job I have done.
9 Where's the beef, ladies and
10 gentlemen? Stop talking nonsense. Stop
11 saying, "Oh, our mayor, our education." Now
12 you want to go back to what it was? What's
13 the problem? You want to go back to what it
14 was? I would ask the mayor to give me $50,000
15 a year only. Don't pay me as much money as
16 he's paying the chancellor, just give me
17 $50,000, let me lower the standards, and I'll
18 graduate more kids. For $50,000 I will do
19 that in a year.
20 Let me tell you another story from
21 the Daily News. Comptroller Thompson said,
22 calling it the Enron of American education --
23 the Enron -- he says that about 18 percent of
24 the 197 students examined who graduated in
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1 2007 got multiple credit for passing the same
2 course. Good job. Our children are learning.
3 Oh, I got to read something here:
4 "'Ultimately these children will struggle
5 because they will find themselves in high
6 school or somewhere they are not ready for,'
7 said Carla Boyd, parent leader with the
8 New York City Coalition for Educational
9 Justice." These people talking.
10 And now, no-bid contracts. No-bid
11 contracts. You know what's a no-bid contract,
12 Mr. Finance Chairman? A no-bid contract is
13 giving contracts to everybody without a bid,
14 only to your friends maybe.
15 If I would have done something like
16 this here, if I would have done something like
17 this here as a Senator, Andrew Cuomo, the
18 Attorney General, the FBI, the AG's office,
19 everybody will be putting handcuffs on me.
20 But look at what it says here. Let
21 me read something here. "Under the tenure of
22 this Department of Education, the use of
23 noncompetitive bids has soared out of
24 proportion. In the year 2001, there were a
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1 total of 38 no-bid contracts valued at nearly
2 $50 million. By the end of 2002, after the
3 Board of Education was transformed into the
4 Department of Education, the number of those
5 contracts doubled to 96, with a total value of
6 over $47 million."
7 So it is good to get mayoral
8 control so you can give no-bid contracts to
9 everybody with no question. You didn't say
10 that, ladies and gentlemen. Squadron, you
11 didn't say that. Give me the opportunity to
12 give contracts to my friends without answering
13 to no one.
14 And people keep saying that the
15 mayor of the City of New York has done a great
16 job. And I keep asking Senator Padavan,
17 where's the beef? Where is the beef? Our
18 children are not being educated. They've been
19 passing. They have been passing, ladies and
20 gentlemen. More children are making it to
21 another grade. More children are passing,
22 yes. But they are not being educated. They
23 are being fooled. The numbers have been
24 changed.
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1 In 2007, January 8, 2007, I wrote a
2 letter to the mayor of the City of New York.
3 January 8, 2007. And in the letter, I said:
4 "Dear Mr. Mayor: As I told you in Albany, in
5 2000 I was one of the only two Democratic
6 elected officials who supported you for
7 mayor."
8 Only two Democratic elected
9 officials supported Mayor Bloomberg for mayor
10 in 2000, and I was one of them. The other one
11 was City Council Majority Leader Joel Rivera.
12 Nobody else supported the mayor. Only Joel
13 and myself, only two Democratic elected
14 officials.
15 In the letter I said: "I did that
16 based upon your promise to me that you will be
17 'The Education Mayor' and that the suffering,
18 the disadvantage, the neglect, the
19 overcrowding, the lack of material and the
20 lack of equipment, and the discrimination
21 toward black and Hispanic children by the
22 New York City Department of Education would
23 end.
24 "As a member of the New York City
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1 Council, I pushed and supported when you asked
2 for the abolition of the school boards and
3 requested mayoral control. You said,
4 Mr. Mayor, 'Give me control of the system and
5 the excuses will end.'
6 "Yesterday" -- that was February 7,
7 2007 -- "Yesterday, Wednesday February 7,
8 2007, your response, Mr. Mayor, to the anger,
9 frustration, concern and desperation of
10 parents was" -- this was his response at that
11 time. "If any one of you,' he told a bunch of
12 parents, "If any one of you thinks that you
13 can do a better job, go and apply for a job as
14 a consultant in the Department of Education."
15 That was the answer of the mayor to those
16 people.
17 And I'm saying, ladies and
18 gentlemen, obviously this is going to pass.
19 We have been brainwashed by the editorial
20 boards. And tomorrow, you read it, they're
21 going to call me a monkey, they're going to
22 call me a clown, they're going call me stupid,
23 they're going to call me all kinds of things.
24 And I'm going to ask them and I'm
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1 going to keep asking them, I'm going to keep
2 asking all of them there, where is the beef?
3 Stop the abuses with our children, stop trying
4 to pretend that the mayor has been the best in
5 education.
6 He's the worst. Our children are
7 not passing. Our children are failing. No,
8 no, no, let me rephrase that. Our children
9 are passing, Padavan. They're passing. But
10 the standards were lower. So of course our
11 children are passing, Senator Padavan.
12 They're passing. And I keep saying, give me
13 the opportunity to be a chancellor of the
14 New York City Department of Education, give me
15 $50,000 and I will drop more. The average of
16 more children will pass. I will do a better
17 job than Klein.
18 And experts are saying that our
19 children are going to high school and they're
20 passing, and they are going nowhere. They
21 ain't going nowhere. But we're saying, man,
22 the mayor of the City of New York, Mayor
23 Bloomberg, has done such a good job, we need
24 to keep him. Yeah, you need to keep him? You
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1 know who needs to keep him? Those people who
2 are getting the no-bid contracts. They are
3 the ones that want to keep him. No-bid
4 contracts, millions of dollars.
5 Ladies and gentlemen, I was with
6 the mayor in education when none of you were
7 there. I supported the mayor to run for mayor
8 when none of you were there. And I flew in
9 his jet twice. In his jet he told me all the
10 good things that he will do for education.
11 Now I'm here telling you, the mayor
12 has failed. No matter what the editorial
13 boards are saying, no matter what other people
14 are saying, the mayor has failed our children.
15 Our overcrowding is still being there. The
16 dropout rate, the dropout rate -- oh, there's
17 no more dropout rate. Of course there's no
18 more dropout rate. Somebody drops out,
19 general accounting, somebody drops out and a
20 few years later they take the GED and they
21 pass the GED, they were never a dropout. So
22 no, you're playing with statistics. Play with
23 all the numbers and then you will see what a
24 great job.
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1 But this Puerto Rican with kinky
2 hair and broken English, I am saying to all of
3 you smart guys, show me the beef. Where is
4 the beef for you to be calling the mayor the
5 best mayor in education that we ever had?
6 Where is the beef? The Daily News always says
7 there's no beef. Comptroller Thompson said
8 there's no beef. Who all is saying there's no
9 beef? Everybody is saying there's no beef.
10 Oh, Wendy's, there's the beef. And
11 McDonald's, maybe.
12 But there's no beef.
13 Mr. President, there is no beef. Don't let
14 yourself be fooled. Join me, Mr. President.
15 Join me. Join me. Protect our children. Our
16 black and Hispanic children they all have been
17 used. They all have been used.
18 I don't know why they're doing so
19 bad because everybody is doing it -- everybody
20 is doing it because of our children. You know
21 that, Senator Hassell-Thompson? Everybody is
22 doing it because of our black and Hispanic
23 children. Everybody is helping our children.
24 Everybody, all the editorial boards and
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1 everybody says, we're doing it because the
2 black and Hispanic children, we're helping
3 them. And they call me that I am against my
4 black and Hispanic children.
5 But all of you who are going to
6 vote for this today -- and it's going to
7 pass -- and you're going to do it because of
8 our black and Hispanic children. Oh, please.
9 Give me a break. And show me the beef.
10 I'm voting no on this thing. With
11 pride, with dignity, with my morale high, with
12 my head high, I'm voting no and I'm saying the
13 mayor has been the worst mayor for education
14 in the City of New York.
15 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: Thank
16 you, Senator Diaz.
17 Senator Hassell-Thompson, on the
18 bill.
19 SENATOR HASSELL-THOMPSON: Thank
20 you, Mr. President. Just briefly.
21 Six years ago I stood in this
22 chambers on that side of the chamber and felt
23 coerced into voting for this, primarily
24 because I listened to members of my colleagues
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1 talk about how bad the school board system
2 was. I was relatively new to representing
3 portions of that district, and so there
4 were -- I was hesitant to rail against people
5 who apparently had had more experience working
6 with their school boards. And so I tried to
7 reserve judgment when it came to making this
8 major change.
9 But the two things that I had the
10 most concern about -- and I had hoped that in
11 the initial stages of this that we would
12 address this very early on, and that is about
13 parent participation. And while I see in the
14 bill itself that there is an effort to put
15 parents on the boards, it still gives the
16 mayor total control by having a majority of
17 members, number one.
18 And the other is because there are
19 no terms, it still allows the mayor, when he
20 is disagreed with, to dismiss people from the
21 board, which I'm very unhappy about. And I've
22 said that consistently. I continue to say
23 that.
24 I had hoped that in this language
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1 of -- even in the chapter amendments that we
2 would be able to address that issue. But
3 apparently the power of the mayor is too
4 great, and so therefore it did not get
5 included in the chapter amendment.
6 I am happy to see the other pieces
7 of the amendment that in some ways address
8 what it is that we want to have happen.
9 I am deeply concerned that while no
10 bill that we ever do here is perfect, I had
11 hoped we had six years to really investigate
12 and to look at what it is that we were going
13 to be doing before we made this major
14 decision.
15 Many of you in here don't represent
16 children from New York City, and obviously for
17 you, while they're relevant issues, they're
18 not the most relevant because they're not your
19 kids.
20 I like to believe when I stand here
21 that I speak for all the children in the State
22 of New York and every child in this state is
23 my child. Because when people say to me, you
24 represent the state, they say I represent the
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1 state. I don't just represent my district,
2 the 36th. I am concerned and must be
3 concerned about what I do that affects all the
4 children. And somehow I had thought that we
5 would have used this six years in a better
6 way.
7 Let me just say to you that I hope
8 that we're putting this bill in place now and
9 that we will do a better job with the systems
10 that we have tried to put in place with our
11 amendments today. And we'd better hope that
12 the Governor passes these bills, the
13 amendments. Because if not, we will go back
14 to something worse than what we had, than we
15 ever had.
16 It has nothing to do with this
17 mayor, but it has everything to do with the
18 ultimate power that we give to people
19 unchecked. And there is no one that I know,
20 no one that I know that, unchecked, can check
21 themselves. It's not in the human condition
22 for people to use the power within them to be
23 controlled. If we did, we wouldn't need
24 police departments. If we did, we would not
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1 need military. We would not need people to
2 make rules to keep us in line; we would
3 therefore be able to keep ourselves in line.
4 Power corrupts. Absolute power
5 corrupts absolutely. And if in fact we do not
6 take seriously, on the presumption that the
7 Governor does pass all of these and that the
8 Assembly comes back and sees the wisdom of
9 what we've attempted to do, we will have
10 another runaway train.
11 And we can talk about how good we
12 think this mayor is, or any other mayor, but
13 he in fact is the mayor. He is not the
14 chancellor. And he has hired someone who has
15 no educational qualifications. And while he
16 may think that running the Department of
17 Education is a business matter, the education
18 of our children requires a multiple
19 discipline. And this chancellor has not, does
20 not have the multiple discipline necessary to
21 be able to do everything well.
22 I am deeply concerned, in passing
23 this bill. I came today prepared to do
24 something because the alternative -- which is
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1 we have done nothing. We let the deadline
2 come and go, and now we're doing something at
3 the last minute.
4 From the day after we pass this
5 bill, we need begin to put in place a
6 structure that we can relate to and depend
7 upon, to ensure in a better way that the
8 education of our children -- and we'd better
9 do that in a way that demonstrates that we
10 really do care about the future generation of
11 our children.
12 It's not an accident that most of
13 our better jobs are in India and other places
14 where education and higher education is a
15 criteria. It amazes me that we are the Empire
16 State and we failed to make a commitment to
17 education.
18 And when I hear people stand on
19 this floor and tell me that we have a
20 budgetary crisis and so therefore we should
21 not do those things that will implement and
22 give resources to the future of the
23 development of this country -- these children
24 are going to be responsible for the future
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1 development of this country. They're going to
2 be the future doctors. Good Lord. I'm going
3 to be old and need them. Yes, Shirley, going
4 to be. Older than I am. Disabled and in need
5 of trained people.
6 And we sit and talk about how many
7 of our children are unemployed and
8 unemployable. And that is a factor that is
9 continuing, and it is not changing. And this
10 is just an example. I mean, this is New York
11 City. Well, who -- you know, you don't live
12 in New York City, you don't care.
13 But you'd better damn well care.
14 Because people don't just stay in their
15 neighborhoods. They move around. They're
16 going to become your contractors that can't
17 measure. They're going to become your doctors
18 that can't administer. They're going to
19 become your nurses that can't read the numbers
20 of cc's of the medication that you're supposed
21 to get. These are the people that we're
22 responsible for educating.
23 And we're not taking it seriously,
24 no matter what you tell me. Because if we
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1 waited until the deadline to begin a dialogue
2 about something as critical and as important
3 as the numbers of children that are going to
4 be educated and how they're going to be
5 educated -- which is a part of an educational
6 policy that we must begin to develop. We are
7 still educating our children in the 1800s --
8 we have not addressed the issue.
9 And those of you who are concerned
10 about charter schools, parents in this state
11 have a right to make a determination about how
12 their children are educated, particularly when
13 you're failing them. And so we can be high
14 and mighty about we want to keep public
15 education, but more than a million of our
16 children in the State of New York are at
17 independent and parochial schools every day
18 because we are failing to educate them. And
19 most of those children are coming out of
20 New York City.
21 We'd better get a grip on it,
22 because this is our future that we're
23 ignoring. Thank you, Mr. President.
24 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: Thank
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1 you, Senator Hassell-Thompson.
2 Senator Huntley, on the bill.
3 SENATOR HUNTLEY: Thank you,
4 Mr. President.
5 So much has been said already. I
6 agree with Reverend Diaz. I agree with Ruth
7 Hassell. There's been a lot said.
8 When I hear us talk about public
9 education, let me just talk about, instead of
10 the State of New York, let me talk about my
11 district. In my district there are many
12 different segments. There are the poor, the
13 middle, and the upper. Those are the people
14 that I service.
15 There are some schools in the upper
16 that do well all the time, because they will.
17 If there was no chancellor, no Senate, no
18 anyone, they would do well.
19 In the middle of the district,
20 where you start to move toward the poorer
21 districts, our schools are unbelievable. They
22 have made very little improvement. I mean, I
23 heard Senator Padavan talk about Obama's
24 Secretary of Education in the letter which
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1 frankly is not worth the paper it's written
2 on. The man's been in town 10 minutes. He
3 knows absolutely nothing about the education
4 of children in the City of New York.
5 So that is not impressive. There
6 are certain issues that perhaps the President
7 needs to know more about so he will know
8 exactly how to handle.
9 I have felt pressured this whole
10 two months, pressured because of people
11 pressuring me. And when I get pressured, it's
12 a whole new Shirley Huntley. I work harder
13 for what I want when I'm pressured. And I can
14 understand -- I listened to Senator Squadron,
15 who seems to know an awful lot about schools
16 and children. It's amazing when he's barely
17 an adult himself.
18 But the bottom line is I must say
19 all these people -- and also from upstate, on
20 the island -- know absolutely nothing about
21 city education.
22 And I have to say what Senator Diaz
23 just said, and also Ruth Hassell. The
24 majority of children in the public school
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1 system are Afro-American and Hispanic. And
2 it's just so great that all of you care so
3 much about Afro-American and Hispanic
4 children. Maybe some of you would like to be
5 foster parents.
6 I just think that when it comes to
7 issues that we know about -- they talk about
8 school boards. There was a mechanism in place
9 to remove bad school board members, just like
10 there's a mechanism in place to remove bad
11 Senators, bad presidents, whatever. No one
12 ever used it. So therefore every school board
13 became something that was awful.
14 Now I heard the other evening on
15 television where the mayor's person was saying
16 that Billy Thompson was once the president of
17 the Board of Education. And he was. And I
18 was once the president of Community School
19 Board 28. But we were not the educators. We
20 were presidents. It was like a corporation.
21 We did not educate children. The chancellor
22 educates children, not the president of a
23 school board or the president of the central
24 board. That is not how it goes.
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1 And I think that all these people
2 who now know so much about education, we
3 really should have done a better job, we
4 really should have talked about this months
5 ago, like Ruth Hassell-Thompson said. But
6 when you have people in a position where it
7 does not consider them or their county or
8 their community, frankly they don't give a
9 tinker's damn. And that's what's happened
10 here.
11 And I'm annoyed because I felt
12 personally we could have had our own bill.
13 But why didn't we have our bill? Because it
14 was stifled. I might be a new Senator, but
15 I'm not stupid. It was stifled for the mayor.
16 Okay?
17 I will not support this bill
18 because, first of all, I don't like to be
19 pressured. Second of all, it is not my
20 problem that we now have to sit at a table of
21 32 with Mayor Bloomberg at the table with us
22 on every round. That bothers me. That really
23 seriously bothers me.
24 So I would say to my colleagues,
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1 2010 is coming and we must find a new way.
2 This is not good. This is not good. In all
3 due respect to my members and all respect to
4 Senator Squadron, who got the miracle
5 letter -- which was wrong, and I told the
6 leaders, no one writes a letter that I'm
7 committing to anything. And I certainly don't
8 commit to another colleague. It's not my
9 fault that he had a vested interest with his
10 wife working for the mayor.
11 Thank you.
12 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: Thank
13 you, Senator Huntley.
14 SENATOR HUNTLEY: You're very
15 welcome.
16 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN:
17 Senator Adams, on the bill.
18 SENATOR ADAMS: Thank you,
19 Mr. President.
20 I just want to talk about just
21 three aspects of the bill. And I thought
22 Senator Diaz, who's not here now, talked about
23 the numbers.
24 If I were to run a marathon in five
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1 hours and then someone comes a year later and
2 they top my score by an hour, they will have
3 the crown. But if we discover that they
4 didn't run a 25-mile marathon, they only ran a
5 15-mile marathon, then of course their score
6 is going to be better than mine.
7 Because of the complexity of
8 education and the different scoring systems,
9 it is difficult for parents -- parents
10 actually believe that their children are doing
11 better. Because that's all a parent desires,
12 is to know that their child is going to be
13 educated.
14 And I was -- I felt betrayed and
15 angered when I found out there are two levels
16 that a child can have in education, a Level 3
17 or a Level 4. Level 3 is meets standards;
18 Level 4 is excellent.
19 The mayor has been telling us
20 through the chancellor that the children are
21 doing better because more are meeting Level 3
22 and Level 4. They did not tell us that what
23 it took to be a Level 3 or Level 4, that they
24 dropped the standards for them.
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1 And so what troubles many of us is
2 that when we give the money and the resources
3 to educate our children, we also give the
4 trust that the numbers are going to be
5 correct. And no one is denying the fact that
6 they dropped the standards. This was the
7 administration that stated it was wrong to do
8 social promotion. This was the administration
9 that stated we must make sure that our
10 children are educated.
11 I talked about the different
12 methods and ways that we use to graduate
13 students. But I think we're doing a good
14 thing today on the chapter amendments, as I
15 stated earlier, because now the power is
16 within us to make sure the numbers are valid.
17 True studies of our educational system are not
18 based on what's wrote by editorial boards.
19 That is not a true study of an educational
20 system.
21 The true study of the real numbers,
22 putting together members of the academic
23 community and state, are we moving in the
24 right direction. That's what this is about.
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1 Because the system we create should be
2 successful no matter who the mayor is. If we
3 put the right system in place, we will be
4 successful.
5 No one can tell me it's okay to
6 give a $90 million no-bid contract to a
7 company that's not in New York State and that
8 does not have an office, that has a P.O. box.
9 I recall some kind of con game in policing
10 that people used to do something like that.
11 We cannot continue to have a system
12 where we don't check. We have a
13 responsibility. It's not about just passing a
14 bill and stating we're going to leave it up to
15 them. We have responsibilities as legislators
16 to make sure, whatever bill we pass, that
17 we're going monitor year to year to year.
18 I don't want to wait until this
19 sunset. Every year we need find out are the
20 numbers right, have you changed the numbering
21 system, are we doing something different? We
22 need to monitor the success of our students.
23 Because these are not merely students, they
24 are our future scholars, and we have to treat
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1 them as such.
2 And so I share the commitment and
3 passion of Senator Huntley, Senator Diaz,
4 Senator Perkins, who will follow, and even
5 Senator Parker. People criticize them because
6 this is a real issue for us.
7 And I'm going to vote no on this
8 bill because I don't believe that this great
9 state needs one individual to save us. I
10 don't believe in that concept. I believe that
11 we have a countless number of great systems in
12 place. No matter what happened on 9/11 when
13 the center of trade was attacked, on 9/12
14 teachers knew to get up and go teach.
15 Sanitation men knew to go and pick up trash.
16 Police knew they had to protect the city. Bus
17 drivers knew they had to drive buses.
18 We're not great because of
19 individuals, we're great in this state because
20 we have professional systems in place of
21 great, everyday New Yorkers coming together
22 ensuring the system runs.
23 And that's why I cannot vote for a
24 bill that empowers one man to distribute
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1 billions of dollars, that empowers one man
2 that believed in the same concept that
3 although the people spoke twice on term
4 limits, he woke up one day and said "Term
5 limits are not for me because I'm a
6 billionaire." I cannot empower that person
7 with my vote.
8 This bill is going to pass. We
9 will move forward. I hope that the committee
10 we put in place will ensure that we have the
11 correct oversight. But we should never
12 believe, if it's this current mayor or if it's
13 any other person of economic stature, believe
14 that they are more important than the everyday
15 New Yorkers. We run the state, the cab
16 drivers, the teachers, the cooks, the clerks,
17 the messengers. There are more thousandaires
18 than there are billionaires. And if we
19 surrender our children to people because of
20 their checkbook, we're making a mistake.
21 I'm not going to do that. I
22 believe our chapter amendments were important.
23 I believe it was going to help strengthen this
24 bill. But I'm going to cast my vote no for
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1 this bill for the countless number of parents,
2 unions and other groups who support a quality
3 education, a well-rounded education where our
4 children will be able to compete in the global
5 community. And that is why I'm going to vote
6 no on this bill.
7 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: Thank
8 you, Senator Adams.
9 Senator Perkins, on the bill.
10 SENATOR PERKINS: Thank you so
11 much.
12 I want to talk about the elephant
13 in the room. You know, race and class. The
14 fact of the matter is that in communities of
15 color, they're obviously not getting the facts
16 that supposedly are so evident, because
17 they're fleeing the public school system.
18 You've seen them. Thousands lined up to get
19 into what they consider to be a better
20 opportunity.
21 Usually when people flee a
22 building, something is on fire, something is
23 wrong, not right. Nobody is like lining up to
24 get into the schools of Harlem or the schools
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1 in communities of color. Maybe they're lining
2 up to get into the schools on the East Side.
3 Maybe they're lining up to get into schools in
4 Queens, coming from Harlem.
5 But for the most part, in those
6 communities the facts are very clear. Every
7 day you see it on TV. Thousands lined up,
8 fleeing their school, their neighborhood
9 public school across the street from where
10 they live. Why? Because somebody said that
11 this school is a bad school and that that
12 opportunity, today called a charter school, is
13 the way to go.
14 You don't find those schools below
15 96th Street or the 96th Streets of our city.
16 You don't find charter schools, you don't find
17 people lining up for charter schools from
18 those communities. You only find them lining
19 up from my community and the communities that
20 some of us represent.
21 Now, why is that? If the numbers
22 are so outstandingly good, why is nobody
23 fighting to get into the school around the
24 corner from where people live?
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1 This city has been so beautifully
2 designed that a parent only has to take their
3 kid down the steps and they walk across the
4 street and there's a public school right
5 there. Why is that parent deciding to go
6 outside of their neighborhood instead of
7 across the street if mayoral control has been
8 so successful?
9 And why does the Times report that
10 the gap between black kids, Latino kids, and
11 white kids has not shortened, that it's as
12 stubborn as ever? With all of this
13 extraordinary success, why is that? And why
14 is it that parents in my district are so
15 strongly against mayoral control if it's been
16 so good for them?
17 So we are obviously in the tale of
18 two cities. Do you understand? Part of our
19 city is suffering failing public schools. If
20 they're not failing, send your kids to them.
21 Because I know any parent -- black, white,
22 rich or poor -- will take their kid anywhere
23 to get their kid into a good public school.
24 It happens all the time. You see
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1 it, parents sleeping out at night someplace in
2 Queens, claiming that they live out there,
3 knowing full well they don't live anywhere
4 near there, but nevertheless tenting out to
5 get into that school because it offers an
6 opportunity for their child to have a decent
7 quality education. Public school.
8 See if there's any such schools in
9 Harlem, East Harlem, the Bronx, South Bronx
10 and other such communities. You won't find
11 them, because mayoral control is failing our
12 children. And in fact, it is creating a
13 racially segregated school system where you
14 have one set of the city attending one type of
15 school and the other part of the community, a
16 community of color, only being given charter
17 schools.
18 Fact. That's the elephant in the
19 room that we don't want to face. We have a
20 racially segregated situation in New York
21 City. And we're going to continue that under
22 this thing called mayoral control. No one
23 wants to hear that, but that's a fact. We
24 want to believe the statistics that they
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1 provide us, but we don't want to believe what
2 we see on TV. We don't want to believe what
3 we read in the papers.
4 Listen to the New York Times.
5 Isn't that the paper of note? Isn't it still
6 the number-one paper, the number-one voice,
7 the one that we all want to be quoted in, the
8 one that we want the endorsement of? Read the
9 New York Times. They'll tell you just this
10 week.
11 So why are we telling ourselves
12 that what we have is successful? Let's tell
13 it like it is. He wants to control it. He
14 wants to control that budget for his own
15 purposes. But our children are not succeeding
16 under this system. And he can't say that they
17 are with any real clear evidence. And you can
18 ask them, because they know where these kids
19 are doing.
20 And when they do build these
21 charter schools, they're having them built in
22 the neighborhood public schools and the
23 parents are fighting their neighbors. So you
24 have two parents, normally hanging out, kids
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1 are hanging out, enjoying each other, one goes
2 to P.S. 123, and all of a sudden here comes
3 Eva Moskowitz to take over their school,
4 unauthorized. Because she is a charter school
5 developer and she has been given somewhat of a
6 carte blanche to do so.
7 Now, who else is around here
8 experiencing that kind of mayor control, that
9 kind of success that their schools are being
10 taken over by charter schools? There is not
11 one school in the white community that's been
12 taken over by a charter school in New York
13 City. Why is that, if they're so good? Why
14 is that?
15 We can't continue this. It's
16 dividing our city along racial and class
17 lines. We don't want to face that, but that's
18 a fact.
19 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: Thank
20 you, Senator Perkins.
21 Senator Golden.
22 SENATOR GOLDEN: Thank you,
23 Mr. President.
24 I rise first to -- my prayers to
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1 Senator Thompson's mom and Olga Mendez, who I
2 had the privilege of working with, a great,
3 great lady and a great legislator.
4 We're here today to talk about the
5 mayor of the City of New York, I guess. And
6 we should be talking about the children of the
7 City of New York. What we've seen here is
8 Joel Klein, a chancellor, under the direction
9 of the mayor of the City of New York take
10 1.1 million children and bring them into the
11 twenty-first century. What we see is
12 leadership and what we see is education,
13 education across the board for all of the
14 children of the City of New York.
15 We wouldn't have a committee run
16 the police department. We have Commissioner
17 Kelly. We wouldn't have a commission or a
18 body run the Department of Parks, Department
19 of Transportation, or the Fire Department. We
20 give that right to the mayor of the City of
21 New York so that he or she can make the best
22 decisions for that city. And now we've done
23 that with education, and that's what we should
24 have done.
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1 If I listen to my colleagues here,
2 the one reason we did, I believe, give the
3 education to the mayor of the City of New York
4 is because everybody in this room seems to
5 know how to educate child except for the
6 Department of Education in the City of
7 New York under its chancellor, Joel Klein,
8 under the mayor of the City of New York.
9 But yet if you take a look around
10 the country and the world, they're all taking
11 the SOP, the standard operating procedure of
12 the City of New York, and they're implementing
13 it in their school districts.
14 So I just want to straighten out a
15 couple of facts. And I don't want to go on
16 too long, because I know a lot of you want to
17 go home. But I think it's important to point
18 out that this wasn't a last-minute bill. This
19 bill has been around since the year began.
20 And in May, it was finalized.
21 And when is the last time the
22 Assembly actually passed a bill before the
23 Senate? The Assembly passed this bill two
24 months ago.
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1 And then we hear that the President
2 of the United States, his Secretary of
3 Education, that the paper he wrote on saying
4 that the school system is good and it's
5 working and it's a model, that it's not worth
6 the paper that it's written on. I guess we
7 forget that he is or was the CEO of the
8 Chicago school system. I guess we forget
9 those little facts.
10 And then I hear that education is
11 so much better in foreign lands, that they're
12 doing so much better in India. I think it has
13 a lot to do with what they're paying the
14 people in India to do the job, not the
15 education.
16 We hear about charter schools.
17 Charter schools are competition for the public
18 school system so that we can have a barometer
19 so that we can look and look at the checks and
20 balances within the public school system,
21 compare them, and get a better result.
22 But I guess we left out that the
23 UFT has some charter schools. I guess we left
24 that little piece out. Because the UFT
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1 understands that they can do a good job in
2 charter schools, and they are doing a good job
3 in charter schools. That is part of
4 competition.
5 1.1 million children, $22 billion
6 budget, 140,000 employees, 1500 schools -- the
7 largest school system in the world. Where's
8 the beef? The New York statewide test for
9 fourth-graders in the City of New York was a
10 20-point increase for reading. Not for white
11 children, not for black children, not for
12 Hispanic or Asian children, for children
13 across the board. For all children, the boat
14 has been lifted in the City of New York.
15 The New York statewide test for
16 fourth-graders again, on math, 30-point gain.
17 Never seen before.
18 That's why the people around this
19 nation and around the world are using the City
20 of New York as its SOP so that they can get a
21 better education for their children.
22 I was impressed with Senator
23 Squadron and his presentation, and with
24 Senator Padavan's presentation. I was amazed
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1 to hear that we would attack another Senator.
2 But we send our men and women to battle and
3 they get killed in war at the age of 18, but
4 yet a Senator elected by his community here in
5 the State of New York, elected by a majority.
6 And he represents 350,000, couldn't make an
7 honest and educated decision in voting for a
8 bill that works for 1.1 million children in
9 the City of New York and 8.5 million people.
10 Because he made the right decision.
11 He made the decision for the children. He
12 remembers, as all of us do, in 1998 and 1997
13 the patronage mill in the New York City school
14 system and how our kids were failing. We all
15 remember that.
16 And now we've seen the gains. And
17 we see the graduation-rate gains too.
18 Fifteen percent graduation rate increase in
19 the City of New York.
20 And of course we leave out crime in
21 our public school system. That's only down
22 44 percent in our public school system since
23 our mayor took control of the City of New York
24 under Joel Klein, its leader.
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1 So I just wanted to set some facts
2 straight and to say we should all work
3 together as a body to help to educate the
4 children of the City of New York. And point
5 out how the boat has been lifted for all of
6 its children.
7 And we are great. Not because of
8 government, we are great because of our
9 individuality. We are great because we live
10 in the greatest city in the greatest state in
11 the greatest nation in the world. And we give
12 the opportunity to those kids and those
13 parents like nobody else has ever done before.
14 I'm proud of this system, and I'm
15 proud of this city and state. We should all
16 be. I vote yes, Mr. President.
17 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: Thank
18 you, Senator Golden.
19 Senator Carl Kruger.
20 SENATOR CARL KRUGER: Thank you,
21 Mr. President.
22 That was a paid political
23 announcement by the Friends of Mike Bloomberg.
24 (Laughter.)
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1 SENATOR CARL KRUGER: You know,
2 today we've been hearing some amazing
3 statistics about some amazing facts from my
4 colleagues in government. And if we were to
5 take those amazing statistics and those
6 amazing facts and bring them back to school
7 districts outside of the City of New York and
8 suggest to sell them around an unelected
9 school board, I would like to see which of my
10 colleagues in government would be the first
11 one to propose that prescription for success
12 in their local schools.
13 So today as we move forward and we
14 recognize the fact that we've been bludgeoned
15 to death in accepting this bill, and it's
16 another sad day on the calendar of days here
17 in Albany, that this bill will probably pass.
18 But in the process of this bill passing, we
19 have a dawn of a new tomorrow. We have a dawn
20 that says that this house will be empowered
21 with the mechanism, the methodology, the
22 resources and the subpoena power to reach into
23 the Department of Education to really see what
24 lurks under those rocks.
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1 We will be able to, as a body, move
2 forward and find out once and for all whether
3 we should support the position taken by the
4 Department of Education, which seems to treat
5 the school system like a failing restaurant --
6 when business is bad, you make the portions
7 smaller and you charge more. So when the
8 school system seems to be going in the wrong
9 direction, let's just screw around with the
10 numbers, change the complexion of the way we
11 are developing our educational programs, bring
12 in and outsource whatever we can, hide behind
13 consultant budgets and no-bid contracts, put a
14 prosecutor in place of a professional
15 educator, call them a chancellor rather than a
16 commissioner, try to run an agency and treat
17 it as a city department but refuse to
18 recognize that as a city department it should
19 be run as an agency, by a commissioner, with
20 accountability, with transparency, with a
21 reporting mechanism, with an inspector general
22 that actually does their job and actually goes
23 back to the electorate with some real hard
24 facts.
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1 So today I say that although the
2 bill may pass -- without my support, I might
3 add -- and even though there will be people
4 here that will say that we have turned the
5 corner, I have to reiterate the fact that not
6 only have we not turned the corner, but we've
7 come to a real fork in the road. The fork in
8 the road is saying to us today that we are
9 going to have to seize the opportunity to go
10 into the Department of Education ourselves,
11 basically armed for hand-to-hand combat for
12 the 1.1 million kids that are part of our
13 school system, for the 8.5 million New Yorkers
14 that call New York City their home, and find
15 out why we are spending more than any other
16 school system in the country and finding
17 ourselves in a failing atmosphere.
18 And no matter how we twist and no
19 matter how the numbers are manipulated and no
20 matter how we degregate the system in order to
21 be able to say that we're doing better, we're
22 worse. Our kids are not getting educated.
23 The system is failing. Our dropout rates are
24 unbelievably high.
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1 Our ability to take high school
2 students and send them on into community
3 colleges, not alone as matriculated students
4 at four-year colleges that do not go through a
5 remedial program, says yards about the failure
6 of the Department of Education.
7 So from high on the hill here in
8 Albany to the folks down south in New York
9 City, I just want to say to them that have no
10 fear. Under the Democratic leadership of John
11 Sampson, Malcolm Smith and Pedro Espada, we
12 will take that committee and bring it to every
13 one of the boroughs, to every one of the
14 districts. We will go to every one of the
15 superintendents. We are going to take
16 information that's supplied to us and we will
17 even, if necessary, hire our own investigators
18 and our own auditors. We will do what has to
19 be done in order to expose what's happening at
20 the Department of Education.
21 Thank you, Mr. President.
22 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: Thank
23 you, Senator Kruger.
24 Senator Liz Krueger.
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1 SENATOR LIZ KRUEGER: Thank you,
2 Mr. President.
3 I've listened very carefully to
4 many of my colleagues today. And I have to
5 say I agree with many of my colleagues who are
6 choosing to vote no for this bill.
7 Senator Perkins, highlighting the
8 enormous differences between what is happening
9 in black and Latino communities in the City of
10 New York and my own community, which is
11 primarily a white community. I agree, Senator
12 Perkins, it is a real concern.
13 I agree with Senator Diaz that you
14 have to find out the facts. And it is not
15 okay to do no-bid contracts. And yes, the
16 mayor asked for a responsibility which
17 requires accountability and scientific
18 evidence.
19 Where I don't agree with my
20 colleagues is one personalizing it to who
21 might be the mayor or who might be the
22 chancellor. Because in fact those people
23 might change January 1, 2010.
24 And where I think my colleagues
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1 might agree with me is that the bill that I
2 will vote for today, along with having voted
3 for the chapter amendments -- and I think they
4 are important -- the bill we are voting for or
5 against today is not the exact same bill that
6 became law in 2002. The bill we are voting on
7 today has many of the corrections and
8 protections built into it that my colleagues
9 demanded.
10 There isn't going to be the same
11 story about no-bid contracts and no review.
12 The Department of Education, like other city
13 agencies, will go through the contracting
14 process with the comptroller, the city
15 comptroller's office having review and
16 oversight on authority.
17 This bill builds in a role for the
18 city's Independent Budget Office, with the
19 mandate to review, to be able to ask
20 questions, to be able to get data. So that
21 there will be more transparency for parents
22 and us and our communities to look and see
23 what is happening in and what is not
24 happening, including very serious questions
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1 that have been raised about what do the test
2 scores actually mean. Because we all know you
3 can lie with numbers.
4 And actually, if you get a good
5 enough education -- and I hope every child in
6 New York City does -- they will actually know
7 how to figure out what does it mean if you're
8 lying with the numbers.
9 And so I can vote for this bill
10 even while I agree with so many of the things
11 that were said by my colleagues today. It's
12 not a perfect bill. But perfect is often the
13 enemy of accomplishing anything we hope to do.
14 It does give us more ability to not only ask
15 the hard questions that we must but get
16 answers to the hard questions.
17 It's a huge system, the New York
18 City school system. There are 1.1 million
19 children. Nothing is ever as clear-cut as it
20 seems. There are always different stories
21 within the system. I am hoping that
22 regardless of who the mayor or the chancellor
23 is today or tomorrow or next year, that the
24 legislation we're passing today will ensure
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1 that moving forward we can continue to improve
2 the New York City school system for the sake
3 of every child.
4 Because as Senator Hassell-Thompson
5 said, as a legislator from the City of New
6 York, I feel my responsibility is to every
7 child in New York City. And as a legislator
8 in the State of New York, I share her view
9 that one of the most important roles we have
10 as elected officials is ensuring that our next
11 generation of children, whether it's on the
12 Canadian border or in Long Island or down in
13 my home city, gets the best public education
14 and opportunities they can ever, ever receive.
15 Because that is a fundamental responsibility
16 of this chamber.
17 So I have concerns. And it is not
18 perfect. But I will be voting yes.
19 Thank you, Mr. President.
20 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: Thank
21 you, Senator Krueger.
22 Senator Stavisky.
23 SENATOR STAVISKY: Thank you,
24 Mr. President.
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1 I am a very proud product of the
2 New York City public schools. I attended the
3 public schools, sent my son to the public
4 schools. My husband was a graduate of the
5 public schools. And my father spent 48 years
6 teaching in the New York City public schools.
7 All on the Lower East Side of Manhattan, I
8 might add.
9 And I have taught, and I think I'm
10 one of the few people aside from Senator
11 Marcellino who have been in a classroom. We
12 know what it's like from really both sides of
13 the -- I was going to say chalkboard, but I
14 don't think they use chalkboards anymore --
15 smartboard, excuse me.
16 I know what it's like to work with
17 young people. And I think many people
18 attribute a high calling to that mission.
19 I've taught at some of the best high schools
20 in New York City and some of the most
21 difficult, and I found it a very exciting
22 experience.
23 Secondly, I voted against the bill
24 in 2003. I thought there were many problems
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1 with that bill. There are still problems even
2 with this bill. I appreciated the mention of
3 absolute power corrupting absolutely, and I
4 think that is a point well-taken. Lord Acton
5 I think would be proud that we have been using
6 his phrase.
7 But I think we have to draw a
8 distinction between the word "control" in
9 mayoral control and absolute power, because we
10 cannot continue with even the concept of
11 absolute power. That is a mistake. And
12 that's a mistake that I think everybody makes.
13 This is a question to me not of
14 control, but of governance. And there is a
15 distinction there. The federal government was
16 mentioned here. And what has the federal
17 government done, with all due respect, to
18 education? They've given us No Child Left
19 Behind. Except they forgot to send along the
20 money. The money. If we ever had a mandate
21 without money, that's what No Child Left
22 Behind is.
23 It seems to me that when New York
24 spends more than on education in New York
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1 State than the federal government does in all
2 50 states -- that used to be true; I believe
3 it is still true -- then we have a lack of
4 concern on the part of the federal government.
5 And incidentally, with No Child
6 Left Behind, I think that's the root of some
7 of our problems when it comes to testing.
8 They're now talking about testing children in
9 kindergarten. To me, that's insane. Little
10 children at the age of 5 are going to start
11 taking exams?
12 It seems to me also that the
13 amendments that we pass today are important,
14 particularly the ones dealing with the
15 superintendent and the other three as well.
16 But particularly the superintendent. Because
17 the job of a superintendent is not to be a
18 glorified complaint bureau. The job of a
19 superintendent should be in a superintendent's
20 office in a district, administering to that
21 district, not wandering around the city
22 willy-nilly.
23 And lastly, I think it's important
24 that we passed the resolution on the select
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1 committee, because there are many defects in
2 the current system. And it's my hope that the
3 select committee will do its homework, so to
4 speak, and find these defects, meet
5 periodically, and remedy what's wrong.
6 I could vote either way on this
7 bill. I truly could go either way. I intend
8 to vote for it because I'm an optimist and I
9 hope that we will be able to fix the most
10 glaring defects in the bill.
11 So, Mr. President, I will vote aye.
12 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: Thank
13 you, Senator Stavisky.
14 Seeing no other Senators who wish
15 to be heard, the debate is closed.
16 The Secretary will please ring the
17 bells.
18 Read the last section.
19 THE SECRETARY: Section 17. This
20 act shall take effect immediately.
21 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: Call
22 the roll.
23 (The Secretary called the roll.)
24 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN:
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1 Senator Diaz, to explain his vote.
2 (Groans; catcalls.)
3 SENATOR DIAZ: Thank you,
4 Mr. Chairman.
5 Where's the beef? Where's the
6 beef? Where's the beef?
7 Mr. President, Mr. President,
8 ladies and gentlemen, I received a letter from
9 the Central Brooklyn Independent Democrats --
10 President Lucy Koteen, First Vice President
11 Raul Rothblatt, Second Vice President Bobby
12 Carroll, Treasurer Marty Bernstein, Recording
13 Secretary John Keefe, and Corresponding
14 Secretary Joy Romanski. They're asking me to
15 vote against this thing.
16 I have a letter from constituents,
17 a letter from Harlem Commission on School
18 Governance, and they say: "As your
19 constituents, we urge you to vote against the
20 Padavan-Silver bill even with the proposed
21 chapter amendments. Its provisions are
22 inadequate in terms of ensuring checks and
23 balances and giving parents and teachers a
24 seat at the table."
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1 So listening to my constituents,
2 even the Central Brooklyn Independent
3 Democrats -- they're not from my district, but
4 thought that I could say something today. So,
5 Mr. President, I am proudly voting no.
6 And I am telling you have a nice
7 rest of the season, because I'm on my way to
8 the Bronx.
9 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: Thank
10 you very much, Senator Diaz. You will be
11 recorded in the negative.
12 Announce the results.
13 THE SECRETARY: Those recorded in
14 the negative on Calendar Number 958 are
15 Senators Adams, Diaz, Duane, Huntley,
16 C. Kruger, Montgomery, Parker and Perkins.
17 Absent from voting: Senator
18 Stachowski.
19 Ayes, 47. Nays, 8.
20 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: The
21 bill is passed.
22 Senator Klein, that completes the
23 controversial reading of the bills on the
24 calendar.
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1 Let's have some order. The summer
2 is upon us. Please.
3 SENATOR KLEIN: Mr. President, on
4 behalf of Senator Sampson, I move to recommit
5 Calendar Number 953 to the Committee on Rules.
6 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: So
7 ordered.
8 SENATOR KLEIN: Mr. President, is
9 there any further business at the desk?
10 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: No,
11 Senator Klein, there is no further business.
12 SENATOR KLEIN: We do have one
13 announcement, if you could just call on
14 Senator Ruth Hassell-Thompson for a brief
15 announcement.
16 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN:
17 Senator Hassell-Thompson.
18 SENATOR HASSELL-THOMPSON: Thank
19 you, Mr. President.
20 Immediately following today's
21 session there will be a conference in the
22 Majority Conference Room, 332.
23 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: There
24 will be a conference of the Majority in Room
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1 332 immediately after.
2 SENATOR KLEIN: Mr. President,
3 there being no further business, I move that
4 we adjourn the Senate at the call of the
5 Temporary President, intervening days being
6 legislative days.
7 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: The
8 Senate is adjourned at the call of the
9 Temporary President, intervening days being
10 legislative days.
11 (Whereupon, at 2:30 p.m., the
12 Senate adjourned.)
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