While stadiums, museums, and private schools find space in the city somehow, NYC's 1.1 million schoolkids are being set up for relocation in the brownfields of NYC. Leonie (of Class Size Matters) and regular poster Patrick have heard denials of such plans.
Why then, would a press release like this one show up?
Next week the City will ask the City Council to approve its plans to build
four schools on a contaminated property in the
. The proposed South Bronx property, referred to as the Mott Haven Site, contains many dangerous
toxins buried underground including mercury, lead, and the suspected
carcinogen benzene.
While the City has a plan to clean the site, independent environmental
engineers have raised significant concerns about aspects of the plan, and
have suggested that more could and should be done. To date the City has
displayed an unwillingness to address these issues to the satisfaction of
community members from a community already overburdened by health
issues related to asthma and cancer.
Furthermore studies show that exposure to certain chemicals, including those
found at the Mott Haven site, are linked to learning disabilities and other
adverse health effects.
Funny, ain't it? They claim Pataki blocked CFE, when they did. They claim to have reduced class size, when they haven't. They focus on higher test scores in fourth grade, and ignore the lower ones in 8th.
Yet they have nothing but good PR. If my union had 10% of Bloomberg's canniness, teachers would all be able to quit their second jobs, and possibly their third ones too.
And perhaps the highest class sizes in the country would be a mere unpleasant memory.
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