Updated at 11:40 a.m.
MELISSA CHAN AND MAGGIE HAYES
All New York City public schools will remain open Wednesday, education officials announced, dashing hopes city students might have about getting a second snow day this month, and angering parents who had to send their kids off.
“Keeping my kids home. Unsafe and crazy to keep school open. Guarantee plenty are doing the same as well as teachers having a hard time getting in,” Margaret Gomez said on The Courier’s Facebook page.
Schools Chancellor Carmen Fariña made the call Tuesday night at about 11:20 p.m., but warned “travel conditions may be difficult.”
“Families should exercise their own judgment when taking their children to school,” the notice said.
Mayor Bill de Blasio said he participated in the decision to keep schools open and that it was “the right thing to do.”
“We only close schools when it’s absolutely necessary,” he said. “We judged that we could go forward with school effectively today.”
School buses and mass transit are functioning “not perfectly, but well enough,” as of Wednesday morning, de Blasio said.
All after-school programs, field trips and PSAL games are also back to operating on a normal schedule, the schools chancellor announced.
The city closed public schools just a little more than two weeks ago on Jan. 3, during “Hercules,” the first major snowstorm of 2014.
Mayor Bill de Blasio said Tuesday’s snow storm – with its predicted 10 to 14 inches of flakes and freezing temperatures – was on pace to be larger than the first.
The National Weather Service (NWS) issued a winter storm warning from 12 p.m. Tuesday until 6 a.m. Wednesday. The snow was not expected to taper off until 3 or 4 a.m. Wednesday.
Queens accumulated up to 11 inches of snow in some neighborhoods, according to the NWS.
RECOMMENDED STORIES
