Emails reveal Mayor de Blasio ‘abused his power’
Mayor Bill de Blasio was personally involved in a deal with
Orthodox Jewish leaders to delay a long-awaited report on shoddy yeshivas in
exchange for an extension of mayoral control of city schools, emails obtained
by The Post show.
Internal emails among de Blasio and his top aides at City
Hall and the Department of Education reveal that the mayor made key phone calls
to the powerful religious leaders to clinch the support of two state lawmakers
voting on his power to run the nation’s largest school system.
“These internal communications reveal what we suspected all
along: Mayor de Blasio abused his power by interfering with the yeshiva
investigation,” said Naftuli Moster, founder and executive director of Young
Advocates for Fair Education (YAFFED). The group filed complaints against 39
Brooklyn yeshivas in July 2015 for allegedly shortchanging children on secular
subjects such as math, English, science and history.
The DOE launched an investigation of the yeshivas, but as it
dragged on, critics charged City Hall was delaying the probe to curry favor
with the Orthodox Jewish voting bloc.
Even an investigation of the mayor’s suspected interference
was stalled, whistle-blowers told The Post. In response to that complaint, the
Department of Investigation and the Special Commissioner of Investigation for
city schools finally issued a report last December confirming “political
horsetrading” on the mayoral control issue.
The report did not air the emails, however, saying “the
evidence uncovered” did not show the mayor had “personally authorized” a plan
to delay the yeshiva report, but was “aware that the offer to delay had been
made.”
The newly unearthed emails reveal that de Blasio was far
more involved in efforts to stall and shape the yeshiva findings than the
DOI/SCI investigation claimed, the Post found.
In an email on June 29, 2017, de Blasio’s chief of staff,
Emma Wolfe, instructed the mayor to call Rabbi Chaim Dovid Zwiebel, executive
vice-president of Agudath Israel of America, a politically powerful Orthodox
group, and Leon Goldenberg, a longtime friend and major donor.
Wolfe told the mayor it was “urgent” that he tell the two
Jewish leaders to call State Sen. Simcha Felder (D-Borough Park), and
then-Senate Majority Leader John Flanagan (R-Long Island) to “tell them to approve Mayoral control,”
the email shows. At the time, Felder and Flanagan were blocking passage of the
measure.
In her email, Wolfe told the mayor to warn of “consequences”
if the school system reverted to being run by a multi-member Board of
Education, reminding them, “I started $200 million in contracts for Pre-K in
yeshivas and (Jewish) day schools,” in addition to giving yeshivas millions for
busing and security.
“I will make these calls immediately,” de Blasio replied to
Wolfe via his email address: bccd@cityhall.nyc.gov.
But the mayor, who is “B” in the emails, added, “I’m flying
too blind here.” He asked for more information on the yeshiva issue “and what
Simcha is asking for.”
Minutes later, Karin
Goldmark — then a City Hall senior education policy advisor, now a DOE deputy
under Chancellor Richard Carranza — told de Blasio the city had promised the
Orthodox leaders a delay in releasing a report on the 39 errant yeshivas,
despite publicly promising to put it out earlier.
“We said we would not issue a report this summer (though we
previously said we would),” Goldmark told de Blasio in the smoking-gun email.
The delay gave Felder more time to push an amendment to
exempt yeshivas from a 1929 law requiring private schools to provide a
“substantially equivalent” education to that of public schools. A watered-down
version of Felder’s proposal ultimately was tucked into a budget bill in 2018.
In the same June 29 email, Goldmark also emphasized that the
city would go easy on the yeshivas.
“We have made clear that when we do issue a report it will
be gentle and will cite progress (assuming progress continues). We have not
said that we won’t make findings, but we have gently hinted at that,” she
wrote, adding “we have said we care more about high standards than about
minutes on subjects.”
“Very helpful, Karin. Calling him now,” de Blasio replied at
9:11 am. referring to Zweibel or Goldenberg.
That day, state lawmakers gave final approval to a two-year
extension of mayoral control.
The report by the DOI and SCI did not name Felder, Flanagan
or the various aides who helped de Blasio get the Orthodox community’s
blessing.
Besides Wolfe and Goldmark, the aides included Simcha
Eichenstein, whom de Blasio hired in 2015 to oversee issues affecting the
Orthodox community. Eichenstein is now a state assemblyman representing Borough
Park and Midwood.
Other aides in the emails: Avi Fink, deputy director for
intergovernmental affairs; Howard Friedman, DOE general counsel; and Ursulina Ramirez, chief of staff to
then-schools Chancellor Carmen Fariña, now Carranza’s chief operating officer.
Moster called the emails damning.
“While the mayor and DOE were saying ‘We’re taking this very
seriously,’ they were worrying about
upsetting powerful ultra-Orthodox leaders,” Moster said.
“The efforts to weaken and delay the scope and findings of
the investigation make it clear that de
Blasio threw tens of thousands of New York City’s yeshiva students under the
bus.”
The DOE finally released a damning report on the yeshivas
last December — nearly 4-1/2 years after the probe began — which found only two
of 28 schools investigated provided adequate secular education to students. But
the DOE did not publicly release the findings on individual schools, saying
some were improving.
Zwiebel told The Post last week he recalled discussions in
June 2017 about mayoral control.
“Certainly there was never any suggestion that ‘you give me
support on this issue, and I’ll take care of you in this investigation.’
Whoever reached out to me was smart enough not to suggest a quid pro quo,
because that would not be appropriate.”
Goldenberg, who called de Blasio “a friend of the entire Orthodox community,”
also denied any deal.
“There was never any mention that ‘you help with mayoral
control, we’ll help you with yeshivas.’ If he said that to me, I would have a
serious problem.”
Sen. Flanagan’s office did not return a message. Sen. Felder
said in a statement, “The only thing I demanded was that they place an armed
guard in front of every NYC public school and I’m proud of it.”
De Blasio spokeswoman Freddi Goldstein said, “The DOI
reviewed the emails and made public their findings. They very clearly did not
substantiate authorization on the part of the mayor.”
She would not say who authorized the discussions.
Comments
Post a Comment