NYCivic

The New York Times
April 21, 2004

Mayor Determines Focus of 2005 Race: Schools
By Michael Slackman

The City Council speaker has taken aim at the Bloomberg administration's moves to end social promotion. So has the former Bronx borough president as he, like the speaker, considers a mayoral run. And even the city comptroller has been focusing on education-related issues, faulting the administration's no-bid deal with Snapple to supply vending machines to the schools.

In staking his mayoralty on whether he succeeds in improving New York City schools, Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg has transformed the political discourse, forcing his opponents to focus on education, too.

While recent elections have typically centered on issues like crime, this time around, the focus is likely to be different. Yesterday, the education issue was once again paramount as third graders around the city took reading tests that, under the mayor's new policy, will help determine whether they are promoted.

These days, Mr. Bloomberg, a Republican, can barely make a statement about education policy without some retort from the mayoral hopeful Gifford Miller, the Democratic council speaker, who has led the pack in his comprehensive attacks on the mayor's school policies.

But he is not alone. When the Panel for Educational Policy voted last month to impose tough new promotion standards for third graders, another mayoral hopeful, Fernando Ferrer, the former Bronx borough president, was sitting in the audience and quickly rose to give his thumbs down on Mr. Bloomberg's program. And City Comptroller William C. Thompson Jr. has grabbed headlines by examining the city's deal with Snapple.

"Just as Mayor Giuliani made himself the top cop and asked voters to judge him on his efforts to reduce crime when he ran for re-election in 1997, Mayor Bloomberg has made himself superintendent of schools and told New Yorkers by the time he is up in 2005, 'The schools are going to be better or blame me,' '' said Jeffrey B. Plaut, a partner at the Global Strategy Group, a Democratic political consulting and polling firm.

And blame him is exactly what Mr. Bloomberg's challengers are hoping to do.

But focusing on schools is a risky strategy for both the mayor and his potential opponents. Trying to repair the school system can be like trying to even out the legs on a chair with a handsaw. It can be hard to improve the quality of education while also balancing the varying interests of parents, teachers, students, unions, community activists and the mayor himself.

When Mayor John V. Lindsay pushed through decentralization of the schools more than 30 years ago, he ended up angering community groups by not giving them the control they wanted, alienating the teachers' union and ultimately leaving behind a system that is widely regarded as having failed the children.

"We are back full circle, as far as I am concerned," said Councilman Albert Vann, the Brooklyn Democrat who pushed for community control during the Lindsay years.

With crime down sharply in recent years, polls show that schools have become the top concern of most city voters, with jobs a close second, political pollsters said.

So even if Mr. Bloomberg had not said, "I was hired to make the schools better," it is likely that the system, which serves 1.1 million children, would be a central element of next year's mayoral race.

Mr. Bloomberg, his aides say, will point to his accomplishments - reorganizing the system, ending so-called social promotion at the third grade - and then ask for four more years to finish the job he started.

The challenge for his opponents will be to present a critique that does not sound shrill, while also offering a convincing alternative, political strategists said. "Mayor Bloomberg has aggressively staked out a territory on this issue, and he is going to be running on this issue," said Howard Wolfson, a Democratic political consultant. "It will be incumbent on Democrats to offer a different vision, offer an alternative to the mayor's vision."

Arguably, no one knows the pitfalls of attacking an incumbent on education policy better than Ruth W. Messinger, the former Manhattan borough president, who ran against Mr. Giuliani in 1997. Ms. Messinger tried to make education the central theme of her campaign.

But in her first televised advertisement, Ms. Messinger staged a scene of children being taught in a bathroom as a means to criticize Mr. Giuliani's leadership. She was roundly criticized for the commercial after Schools Chancellor Rudy Crew accused her of "denigrating the public school system for political gain.''

Saying that the stinging criticism of her bathroom-scene commercial was "my biggest disappointment," Ms. Messinger concluded, "I think people don't want that much bad news."

Already, Democrats are saying that they hope to use Mr. Bloomberg's education policies to underscore what they see as negative public feelings about his leadership style, focusing, for instance, on his willingness to push through changes without having developed a consensus, as critics say he did when he fired two appointees opposed to his third-grade retention policy.

"The mayor's modus operandi is he hires managers, they tell him what to do, and that is where he gets his opinions from," Councilman Vann said. "He does not care for the opinions and experience of the folks who do not work for him. He gives it sort of short shrift."

One issue that has already been the subject of dispute is how much control the mayor has over the schools. While Albany allowed for the abolishment of the Board of Education to give the mayor more control, some say there should be limits. Mr. Ferrer, for example, said that he had supported giving such control to the mayor, but that he had not thought the change would work the way it had.

"I still believe there needs to be a board that does its business out in the open and that is somewhat independent," Mr. Ferrer said.

Perhaps most aggressive on the education front has been Mr. Miller, the council speaker. From his first budget proposal to his recent testimony chastising the Department of Education's use of no-bid contracts, he has consistently tried to present an alternate vision for education, calling for smaller class sizes and denouncing the mayor's policy of holding students back. He has even hired as his press secretary David K. Chai, who previously was press secretary to Schools Chancellor Joel I. Klein. That gives Mr. Miller a singular ability to shape his attack on the mayor with detailed inside information.

"There is no more important issue than our children's education, and when the speaker sees mistakes, or opportunities to do better, he is going to speak out," Mr. Chai said.

But Mr. Bloomberg has the most to gain - or lose - on the schools issue. As the mayor, he has the pulpit to call for change, and loudly claim credit for any successes. He also has the benefit of at least one fact: this will be the first year that pupils are held back under the new third-grade retention policy. Furthermore, that change will mean that next year, the weakest performers will not be taking the fourth-grade statewide mathematics and reading tests; this situation could very well mean better test scores, a handy piece of data in an election year.

The administration is clearly preparing to make its case on education as campaign season nears.

"It's hard to find a mayor so committed to taking on the challenge of fixing our schools and asked to be held accountable for the results," said Edward Skyler, a spokesman for the mayor. Signaling the strategy of the coming campaign, he added, "It's easy to find career politicians criticizing from the sidelines."

© 2004, The New York Times Company