GothamSchools — daily independent reporting on NYC public schools

On Wednesday, members of the Panel for Educational Policy will vote on several controversial Department of Education contracts totaling millions of dollars.

But the panel’s 13 members won’t be able to see the details of the contracts, which the DOE cannot finalize without their approval.

Department officials said this state of affairs is typical.

The DOE provides panel members with various parts of the contracts being drafted if available, but often contracts up for approval are still under negotiation when the panel members vote, DOE officials said.

Panel members who believe they received insufficient information about a deal may vote against it.

“No” is how Patrick Sullivan, the Manhattan borough president’s PEP appointee, said he plans to vote on Wednesday, when two high-profile contracts are up for approval: a $120 million two-year deal with Verizon Wireless, and contracts of roughly $1.5-3.5 million each over three years with six ”restart partners” — nonprofit Education Partnership Organizations set to take over operations at 14 struggling schools.

“They’re definitely putting the cart before the horse,” Sullivan said. “Approval is pretty much expected. They want the panel to approve in advance what they intend to do, and they will decide the details and specifics.” (more…)

Mayor Bloomberg said today that if he’s able to convince Albany to reduce the city’s deficit, he won’t promise to use the money to avoid teacher layoffs.

During his presentation of the city’s budget for 2012 this morning, the mayor blamed deep cuts from the state and federal governments for his decision to layoff 4,100 teachers. Saying that it was unlikely that lawmakers in Albany would increase aid to the city at this point, he called on them to trim public employees’ pensions and cut programs it mandates the city offer, but doesn’t help the city pay for.

But if he succeeds in extracting cuts and more funding from Albany, that money isn’t necessarily going to save teachers’ jobs.

“Any moneys that Albany manages to get back to us…don’t automatically go to education,” Bloomberg said today.

“There are a lot of first priorities. There are a lot of agencies that are very important to the city. You may decide that you need one more policeman or one more fireman… there are plenty of things in addition to education,” he said. (more…)