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School Capital Plan Postpones Most Projects

By HEATHER HADDON

Most local school construction and repair will be postponed for at least a year under the latest version of the city’s capital plan, sparking an outcry when it was announced last month.

But what is actually being cut, and what was delayed or revised, depends on who you ask. City Council members allege the plan postpones most projects and cuts others, but the city says it’s simply revising the document to reflect funding limitations and more detailed information on school needs.

“The whole point is that it is a plan, and plans have to change,” said Katherine Grimm, deputy chancellor for the Department of Education (DOE).

Many advocates weren’t pleased with the latest amendment to the five-year capital plan, issued last month. On paper, the revision shaved $1.3 billion from the ambitious $13.1 billion proposal approved last June. According to a Council analysis, Bronx school repairs suffered a $267 million cut and delays of at least a year for $205 million worth of projects.

“What kind of message are we sending out children about the value of education when we continue to send them to antiquated buildings?,” asked Council Member Oliver Koppell in a statement. “We must not allow this to happen.”

A closer analysis presents a more complicated picture. Millions of dollars in projects for several local schools weren’t listed in the revision, including lighting and electrical work for MS 45 and its annex; lighting for PS 56; an auditorium upgrade, flooring repairs and other building work for PS/MS 95 and its annex; lighting for MS 206; and lighting and a gymnasium upgrade for MS 399.

Grimm insists that many of these cuts reflect a better understanding of building needs, which the city has begun assessing annually. The city surveyed individual schools since last year’s capital proposal, and found that some of the repairs, especially concerning lighting, weren’t necessary.

“This is a living document,” Grimm told the Norwood News. “Some of the original designs called for replacing lighting that has nothing to do with where the children actually are. Why replace a school’s lighting when it’s in the basement?”

In the reassessment, some area projects had slight additions, like repairs for PS/MS 20, PS 46, and PS 315.

Though she didn’t have specifics, Grimm guessed that the other local changes reflected projects that had to been pushed out of the plan for a year or two. “We did have to make some delays,” she said.

But all of the work detailed under the capital plan was postponed a year, and it now spans from 2005 until 2010 instead of 2009. Most local repairs are now slated to begin in 2006 or 2007, instead of this or next year, as originally proposed.

Joseph Solanto, principal of MS 45 in Belmont, can stomach the postponement of a promised refurbishment to his school’s playground. But he wasn’t thrilled about the other delays.

“All the other things are important for my school,” said Solanto, who said his building could, in fact, use better lighting. “I have an old building. They did good work repairing my roof last year, but my infrastructure still needs to be upgraded.”

In addition to the specific delays, the entire plan had to be put off a year while the city waits for the portion that the state is supposed to pick up. A State Supreme Court judge ruled last year that the city’s schools are shortchanged millions of dollars in state aid, and last month put that figure at an extra $5.6 billion annually for operations and $9.2 billion for capital improvements. The court, however, did not specify who should pay what, paving the way for further disagreements among the mayor, governor and state legislature.

That’s not very comforting for schools waiting for improvements. “We needed to have that work done yesterday,” Solanto said.

As far as new construction, the revised plan includes a highly-anticipated addition: a separate site for the Celia Cruz High School. The revised proposal states that a 500-seat school should take root in a leased facility by the fall of 2006.

Celia Cruz parents, who have fought hard to move from their current location in Walton High School, should be pleased by the news. But according to the School Construction Authority (SCA), which finds new school sites, things are far from certain.

“While a project was added for Celia Cruz, there is no site for this school at this time,” said Alicia Maxey, a DOE spokesperson. Maxey said there was no solid timeline for the project, as of now.

The Jonas Bronck Academy is the only other local project named out of a total 10 new schools slated for District 10. Under the amended plan, the project’s completion date was delayed three years until 2009.

The SCA has been hunting for sites for the middle school, according to Daniel Leist, a Community District Education Council 10 member. Leist said the SCA had examined a car factory near the Bronx New School, but determined it was too small. More promising is the old Stella D’Oro factory near 238th Street and Broadway in Kingsbridge.

“We’re going to try to get parents involved in finding spaces,” said Leist, during last month’s Council meeting.

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