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The job status of more than 700 Department of Education employees remains in limbo after a meeting between City Council members and education officials yesterday yielded no progress towards a deal to prevent layoffs, according to people who attended.

Council members said they remained optimistic that the layoffs, which affect school aides who are among the lowest paid workers in the city could be averted. But they said any deal would require more energy from education and City Hall officials.

“I know that there’s a strong effort being made on the members’ part,” said Leroy Comrie, of Queens. “I’m not sure that the administration feels wedded to the need to get anything done.”

The meeting was convened by the council’s Black, Latino and Asian caucus. They invited Chancellor Dennis Walcott to explain why the layoffs were primarily affecting low income minorities, according to several members who attended. Council members also complained they were not given notice before the layoffs were announced in August.

Letitia James, of Brooklyn, called the process “an attempt to circumvent the City council. They could have come to us before and asked for some assistance and approval.”

The layoffs actually came from individual principals, who had to cut an average of 2.4 percent from their budgets in July. Rather than eliminate teacher positions, which were spared as part of concessions made by the United Federation of Teachers, many principals chose to cut the school aides. (more…)

Front row, from left: Mayor Bloomberg, Gov. Paterson, Manhattan Borough President Scott Stringer, and Schools Chancellor Joel Klein.

If the still-splintered State Senate doesn’t get to work and renew mayoral control, the city is in for a summer of litigation, Mayor Bloomberg warned this morning.

He made his comments at a hastily organized press event held in Harlem today to urge state politicians to pass a new school governance bill before the current law, giving control of the schools to the mayor, expires on Tuesday night. The senate has not held a legal vote since early June, when a leadership coup ended its regular session.

Should the school governance law expire, technically the system would revert to its pre-2002 structure. But the law doesn’t include instructions for reconstituting the old school boards or dismantling the current system.

“The bottom line is that the schools chancellor would have to run the school system for the next day,” Bloomberg said. “And you know right away that that would be in court.”

Schools Chancellor Joel Klein did not speak at the press conference, but he echoed Bloomberg’s warnings to me afterwards. “I don’t want to spend my summer meeting with the lawyers,” he said. “That’s what would happen.” (more…)