It's called "mayoral control."
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The school system is facing its most significant challenge from Albany in years.
Schools Chancellor David Banks painted a dire future for public schools if mayoral control were to end, and he wants no part of it.
"I have no interest in serving as the chancellor in a system where you don't really have the authority to make real decisions. I have no interest in that whatsoever," Banks said. "We would be taking 10 steps backward if we said, 'The mayor is actually no longer in charge.'"
He said decisions, instead of being based on educational considerations, would be subject to "politics."
"I do not think that that would be good for the school system. I certainly did not sign up for that," Banks said.
Gov. Kathy Hochul supports an extension, but state legislators left mayoral control out of their budget proposals. Negotiations are ongoing, which Banks admitted "is a process."
The United Federation of Teachers union is among those who also oppose an extension of the mandate its current form, which expires June 30.
"If they don't do an extension of this law by June, the system naturally will revert back to what it was before," with schools controlled by the Community Education Councils.
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Banks remembered that system as "rife with corruption."
"I knew personally people who had to pay for their positions to become a principal. You didn't even have a shot at being a principal in a particular district unless the head of the community board, you were close to them or you were prepared to pay money for your position. That's not made-up stuff. That was real. That was happening. There is a reason we went to mayoral control in the first place," Banks said.
He said public schools would have never been able to accept children of asylum seekers under the old system, abolished during the Bloomberg administration.
"35,000 students have come here from all around the world. Imagine if you did not have mayoral control, and every CEC if it was left to them to make a determination of whether or not they were even going to accept some asylum seekers into their schools. It's ridiculous," Banks said.
Additionally, the chancellor said the city is still not ready to have a remote learning day with public school students and staff all logging on simultaneously.
If there was a remote day, more than 900,000 users would have to have to utilize staggered login times.
Banks said elementary school students would log in at 8:15 a.m., middle school students at 8:45 a.m., and high school students at 9 a.m.
The education department is planning a "pressure test," where everyone logs on at pre-scheduled times, to see if the system is ready and "narrow that stagger window as much as possible," Deputy Chancellor Emma Vadehra said.
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"Ultimately the goal would be that we could get a million at one time. But if we have to do this tomorrow, we don't think we are ready for that," Banks said.
Banks said the login system crashing on the February 13 remote learning day was "deeply disappointing."
"No one was more upset than myself, don't let my smile fool you. It was deeply disappointing to me. I had been waiting for that day," he said. "We are going to be moving more and more deeply into remote and virtual learning opportunities for young people." He added that the system needs to be able to handle students and staff.
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