BY M. JUNAID ALAM
“There will definitely be an impact,” said PS 46 Principal Marsha Goldberg. “I am studying my budget and we lost a large chunk.”Bloomberg's proposed $58.5 billion budget for next year would cut $324 million from the city Department of Education, which was already subject to a $180 million reduction this year. Chancellor Joel Klein said schools would incur an average of more than $100,000 in cuts per school, according to a New York Times article.Goldberg, whose school received $14,000 as part of a DOE excellence program just last month, said that amount was just “a drop in the bucket” compared to the budget slash.She said she could not comment on the specific impact yet but that she and her colleagues were “just not happy” with the move, which schools have not seen in the past four or five years of budget increases.Bloomberg was quoted in published reports as saying the cuts, which register at about 1.7 percent of the DOE's current budget, will have no noticeable impact during a City Hall meeting with agency heads.He reportedly said a 1.7 percent cut should not negatively impact any functioning business. District 26 Community Education Council President Robert Caloras took exception to that remark in a phone interview, saying, “[Bloomberg] knows of no organization that's running on a shoestring budget like District 26.”He also said the city failed to get input from principals on the cuts and kept them out of the loop.”It's ridiculous,” Caloras said, “If principals are CEOs, what business doesn't discuss cuts with their CEOs?”Francis Lewis High School Principal Jeffrey Scherr said that because his school is so large, the move won't affect day-to-day operations but will impact other programs.”It will delay us in buying tech, and perhaps impact intervention services like tutoring,” he said. He said that he had made provisions to delay a new sound system and classroom computers instead of cutting five teachers.Mary Bow, parent coordinator at PS 41, said she felt conflicted as a DOE employee and a parent.”It's heartbreaking,” she said. “We're trying so hard to make good reforms and É suddenly they're taking away from the budget. Why do they feel they can always take away from education?”Reach reporter M. Junaid Alam by e-mail at malam@timesledger.com or by phone at 718-229-0300 Ext 174.
