City and State Mandates For Employees To Get the COVID Vaccination Goes Forward

There are three branches of government in the U.S.:

• The executive branch, which includes the president and the agencies he controls;
• The legislative branch, consisting of the two houses of Congress, which are the House of Representatives and the Senate; and
• The judicial branch, which includes the Supreme Court and all the nation's federal and state courts.

On August 24, 2021, the Commissioner of Health and Mental Hygiene ordered that Department of Education employees, contractors, and others get the COVID-19 vaccination.(“the Order”)

Two cases were filed against the mandatory vaccine for NYC Department of Education employees, one in State Court and the other in Federal Court. NY State Supreme Court Judge Laurence Love first granted a temporary restraining order and then rescinded the TRO in favor of the City mandate. 

Municipal Labor Committee et. al. decision

New York State Supreme Court Judge Lawrence Love said it right: "This is uncharted territory". 

Here are the papers in the Federal case filed by the FG Legal Group:

DOE TRO Complaint DOE TRO Memo DOE TRO Order To Show Cause DOE TRO Gelormino Declaration DOE TRO Rachel Maniscalco's Declaration Amended Class Action Complaint Reply Memo (9.20.21)

For past email updates please click here.

On Monday, September 27, 2021, anyone who works for the City and does not have at least one shot of the COVID vaccine and does not have an approved exemption for health or religious reasons, will either have to take unpaid leave for a year or be terminated.

This will propel the Courts into, as Judge Love said, a new jurisdiction: having a say in what people must do to their bodies.

The individual right to freedom of choice in all matters formerly given only to medical doctors has been taken over by the  Third Branch of government.

The winners, in the short term, are the City and State governments. The long-term winners are yet to be determined. 

Betsy Combier

betsy.combier@gmail.com
Editor, Advocatz.com
Editor, NYC Rubber Room Reporter
Editor, Parentadvocates.org
Editor, New York Court Corruption
Editor, National Public Voice
Editor, NYC Public Voice
Editor, Inside 3020-a Teacher Trials

Coronavirus Update NYC: Restraining order lifted on vaccine mandate for city teachers, staff

ABC News, Sept. 22, 2021

Vaccine Mandate for NYC Teachers, Staff Can Go Forward As Judge Lifts Restraining Order

 NBC News, September 22, 2021

The judge said he initially ordered the injunction because the city's original mandate didn't say anything about medical or religious exemptions, but said the city subsequently put out language saying nothing in the mandate would prohibit accommodations that are legally required.

A vaccine mandate for New York City's public school teachers and other staffers can go forward as planned next week, after a state judge on Wednesday lifted a temporary restraining order.

The city had announced last month that school employees would have to get at least a first dose of a coronavirus vaccine by Sept. 27, impacting about 148,000 school workers and contractors.

A coalition of city unions had filed a lawsuit against the mandate and had asked for the injunction against its implementation. State Supreme Court Justice Laurence Love put the TRO in place last week, but removed it in his ruling on Wednesday.

In a statement, the Department of Education said the ruling was “a big win for New York City children and Department of Education employees. Their health and safety is at the very core of this vaccine mandate, and we are pleased the court recognized the city’s legal authority.”

The officials with the unions said they intended to continue the legal action.

“We are deeply disappointed that the temporary injunction has been lifted," Henry Garrido, executive director of DC 37, said in a statement. “This is not the end of the road and we will continue to fight for the right of workers to make their own healthcare decisions."

The president of the Municipal Labor Committee, the group that filed the lawsuit against the mandate to begin with, said in a statement that their case "has already led to progress in protecting the rights of our members, since the city – in the wake of the court’s initial issuance of the restraining order – admitted that there can be exceptions to the vaccine mandate. The court -- while lifting the restraining order -- has not made a final decision, and we are preparing additional material to support our case."

When asked for comment, the United Federation of Teachers — the largest teachers union in the city — referred to the statement made by the Municipal Labor Committee, which they are a part of.

Love said he had initially ordered the injunction because the city's original mandate didn't say anything about medical or religious exemptions, but said the city subsequently put out language saying nothing in the mandate would prohibit accommodations that are legally required.

On Sept. 10, the city and the union representing teachers in the country's largest school district came to an agreement through an arbitrator on those teachers unwilling to get vaccinated, such as those with medical and religious exemptions. It was agreed that those educators must be offered alternative work assignments.

Non-classroom work will be offered to educators with specific medical conditions who have not been vaccinated, but also to vaccinated teachers who have suppressed immune systems, the arbitrator ruled.

Teachers who decline to vaccinate against COVID-19 and do not qualify for an exemption will be offered unpaid leave through September 2022 -- their medical insurance will still be covered. All staff who refuse unpaid leave can take a severance package instead, or face discipline, the union said at the time.

The judge said that removed the need for the injunction, and also doubted the unions' ultimately being able to succeed in their claim that their due process rights were being violated.

“The state and federal courts have consistently held that a mandatory vaccine requirement does not violate substantive due process rights and properly fall within the state’s police power," Love wrote.

Parents in the city seemed to agree with the judge's decision Wednesday night.

"I do think it's fair. It makes me feel my son's safer and we'll have more continuity in his teachers if they get sick," said parent Marcia Stern.

Even those who disagree with the finding found the logic behind the decision.

"I think it's unfair, but I also think it could protect them at the same time," said parent Randy Vazquez.

More than 80 percent of teachers have already been vaccinated, according to union estimates.

Middle school teacher Asa Henry said that allowing "the government to just be able to mandate anything, anytime, it sets a really bad precedent in the future," which is why he understood the reason for the unions' displeasure at it. However, he also said that keeping his daughter safe is the priority.

The ruling comes after New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio made tweaks to school COVID policy, a week after the nation's largest public school district opened its doors fully in person for the first time since the pandemic hit -- and a day after one Manhattan school announced it had to go all-remote because of an outbreak.

The two changes announced Monday involve testing and quarantine procedures and will take effect simultaneously on Sept. 27, which is also the deadline for city public school teachers and staff to have at least their first shot of the vaccine.

Starting then, schools will conduct randomized weekly testing, rather than biweekly testing, at all public elementary, middle and high schools citywide.

The mayor also said the city will shift its school quarantine approach to align with the CDC. Under that guidance, when there is a positive case in a single classroom, the unvaccinated students in that classroom will not have to quarantine if, and only if, they have been masked and keeping at least 3 feet of distance.

The Democrat said the adjustments were born from city officials' assessment of the first week of in-person classes for nearly a million students and how COVID policy could be improved going forward given the ongoing delta variant threat.

"The goal is always two crucial things -- first and foremost the health and safety of our kids and our whole school community, second maximizing the number of kids in school every day, avoiding disruption, giving our kids a chance to make that comeback that we know we're going to make this year," de Blasio said.

In an information session for UFT chapter leaders held Wednesday, union president Michael Mulgrew asked five yes or no questions regarding de Blasio's new COVID quarantine policy. The answers overwhelmingly showed frustration with the new decisions, including 98 percent of the 1,200 members present saying that the mayor has no clue what is happening inside of schools, and that neither de Blasio nor the city's Department of Education has a plan to keep the children in schools safe.

Copyright NBC New York/Associated Press

Education Law Fraud and the Omission of Probable Cause

 

Betsy Combier

betsy.combier@gmail.com
Editor, Advocatz.com
Editor, NYC Rubber Room Reporter
Editor, Parentadvocates.org
Editor, New York Court Corruption
Editor, National Public Voice
Editor, NYC Public Voice
Editor, Inside 3020-a Teacher Trials

From the desk of Betsy Combier, re-posted from ADVOCATZ.com: 

In this post, I will explain why excellent educators are charged with false allegations and then terminated for doing something that they did not do or not removed from their employment for harmful acts that they did do. The charging procedures and outcomes were very confusing when I first started examining them 18 years ago.

Education Law  §3020 states in relevant part:

No  person enjoying  the   benefits   of  tenure   shall  be  disciplined  or  removed  during  a  term  of  employment  except   for  just   cause   and   in   accordance   with   the   procedures  specified in section three thousand twenty-a  of  this article

and,

"The tenure statutes reflect the intent and purpose of the Legislature to protect educators who have successfully completed a probationary period from being disciplined summarily without the safeguards of Education Law § 3020-a. As stated by this Court in Holt v. Board of Educ. of Webutuck Cent. School Dist., 52 N.Y.2d 625 (1981): At one time, teachers in this state had only so much job security as could be bargained for in their contract of employment. When that contract expired, the decision as to whether or not to continue the teacher's employment was completely within the discretion of the school district. The Legislature, recognizing a need for permanence and stability in the employment relationship between teachers and the school districts which employ them, enacted a comprehensive statutory tenure system, the purpose of which was to provide some measure of security for competent teachers who had rendered adequate service for a number of years. One of the bulwarks of that tenure system is section 3020-a of the Education Law which protects tenured teachers from arbitrary suspension or removal. The statute has been recognized by this court as a critical part of the system of contemporary protections that safeguard tenured teachers from official or bureaucratic caprice. Id., 52 N.Y.2d at 632"

From In the Matter of Roseann Kilduff, Respondent,v.Rochester City School District, et al., Appellants, Court of Appeals No. APL-2013-0029:

"In Matter of Boyd v. Collins, 11 N.Y.2d 228 (1962), this Court had annulled an agreement between a board of education and a teacher under which the teacher would resign after a stated period in lieu of charges. The Court plainly stated that the "statutory tenure terms can be changed by the Legislature but never by a board of education." Id. at 233. As summarized by the Court in Mannix, supra, "[i]t was made clear in [Boyd] that no act of a board of education could effect a method of bypassing the tenure statute." Mannix, 21 N.Y.2d at 459. Although Boyd was subsequently overruled in Matter of Abramovich v. Board of Educ. of Cent. School Dist. No. 1 of Towns of Brookhaven & Smithtown, 46 N.Y.2d 450 (1979), it was overruled solely on the ground that the law does not absolutely forbid a tenured teacher from waiving the protections of the tenure statutes if the record establishes a truly knowing, open and voluntary waiver. Id. at 455."

NYSUT lists changes to tenure in Chapter 56, 2015

In NYC, there is no voluntary waiver, and the Constitutional protection of tenure has been modified to fit the whims and fancy of a principal or superintendent who says to the legal department, "get rid of that person." Yet the NYC Department of Education pursues termination at the §3020-a arbitration under color of law, without any authority or waiver of a teacher's rights. No change has been made to Education Law §3020-a(2)(a), citing a probable cause determination by a vote of the Board of Education (PEP in NYC). The PEP BYLAWS do not give the Chancellor authority to vote on any issue, rendering any delegation of the vote to a Superintendent or principal by the Chancellor meaningless paper. Most shocking of all is the fact that the New York City Department of Education ("NYC DOE") and the Unions (UFT/NYSUT, CSA) have collaborated in this scheme that deliberately violates lawful procedures, is arbitrary and capricious, an abuse of discretion, and affected by an error of law. I believe that extortion might be the right word. 

Educators are brought to §3020 hearings without being told any of this. This is the fraud that I write about here, and what we - all of us in the community of the world - have to change. False statements published in bad faith against a person destroy that person's life forever. No apology after the fact can change that.

Nonetheless, if you know who you are, you will get to where you want to be. Knowledge is power but you need to know what to do with it.

As Lewis Carroll wrote,

"If you don’t know where you’re going, any road will get you there."

Many educators ask, "How could this happen?" "How could I be terminated/given a fine/suspended for something I did not do?"

Tenured employees of the NYC DOE at any level, unaware that their tenure rights under the  §3020-a statute have been illegally implemented or omitted, rely on the same people at their Union who have created the procedures cited here as illegitimate. Suppose an accused educator demands that their Union attorney or advocate submit a Motion To Dismiss the arbitration hearing based on this argument. In that case, the lawyer or representative will immediately quit or threaten to drop your case.

I always suggest that accused educators rely on their own beliefs and common sense. Just rely on yourself. Find out and believe in who you are and what you want, and if your intent is strong and your goals are "right" - as opposed to unlawful or harmful to another person or animal - you will reach your goals. This process must be constantly renewed, so do not rest on what you have done. Keep planting new ideas on your path. Who you are now will change tomorrow, just as you were a different person yesterday.

The Backstory of Education Law §3020-a in New York City

In the compulsory Arbitration known as Education Law Section §3020-a ("§3020-a") in New York City, there are significant and unlawful procedural and substantive deficiencies in the pre-hearing process that interfere with the public policy protections for teachers with tenure. These blatant violations of the tenure law deny a fair hearing to all individuals who are accused of an act of misconduct or incompetency and are charged with §3020-a charges (called “Specifications”).

"New York public employees enjoyed disciplinary due-process protections long before they won collective bargaining rights with the 1967 passage of the Public Employees Fair Employment Act, also known as the Taylor Law. But in requiring public employers to negotiate “terms and conditions” of employment, the state Legislature set the stage for union contracts to become obstacles to disciplining public employees."

Tenure is public policy in New York City. New York State unions are supposed to be the warriors who protect Constitutional rights to a full and fair hearing. But employers want "at-will" employment for everyone, and therein lies the problem.

Questions union members should be asking are, "Why doesn't my Union fight for my rights?" "Why do my Union Reps. seem to play along with the Department of Education?"

You can see this struggle between employer-unions here:

See Double Insulation: How New York  Law Shields Public Employees From Accountability

What happens then is that policymakers write "manuals" on what to do, devoid of circumstances, which people are supposed to use as a Guide. General statements of rules of law or Agency Agreements are only as good as their implementation.

See New York Department of Civil Service Manual For Administrative Law Judges and Hearing Officers (2002):

"Chapter 3: Due Process of Law
Introduction
Both the United States and New York
Constitutions guarantee that no person shall be deprived
of "life, liberty or property, without due process of law."
The concept of due process imposes a fundamental
obligation upon all organs of government, including state
agencies. At its base, due process means that no person
can be subject to an individualized proceeding in which
they stand to lose one of the protected interests – in
the context of administrative law, either property or liberty
– without sufficient procedures to ensure that the
governmental action is fundamentally fair."

The New York City Department of Education ("NYC DOE"), with the support of the Unions, has instituted a deceitful practice of skipping over the proper determination of probable cause codified in Education Law §3020-a(2)(a). The Statute has been ignored in favor of a false and misleading process that does not give an arbitrator subject matter jurisdiction to hear and decide any case or find “just cause” for the charges.

Here is Education Law §3020-a(2)(a):

"2. Disposition of charges.  a. Upon receipt of the charges, the clerk or secretary of the school district or employing board shall immediately notify said board thereof.  Within five days after receipt of charges, the employing board, in executive session, shall determine, by a vote of a majority of all the members of such board, whether probable cause exists to bring a disciplinary proceeding against an employee pursuant to this section.  If such determination is affirmative, a written statement specifying (i) the charges in detail, (ii) the maximum penalty which will be imposed by the board if the employee does not request a hearing or that will be sought by the board if the employee is found guilty of the charges after a hearing and (iii) the employee's rights under this section, shall be immediately forwarded to the accused employee by certified or registered mail, return receipt requested or by personal delivery to the employee."

Yet all NYC DOE employees receive a page with the title "Notice of Determination of Probable Cause" that does not have a date for an Executive Session in the box on the right. I started asking about this in 2004, and I remember Former NYSUT Counsel Claude Hersh telling me, "that's the way it is." I stayed with the thought that "that's the way it shouldn't be" and kept researching what happened.

In 2016 I was lucky to have received a lot of information about 3020-a procedures after filing a Freedom of Information request (FOIL) for all attendees and the content of an unpublished meeting of all the arbitrators, NYC DOE, and NYSUT Attorneys held on February 24, 2015. See documents posted on the blog NYC Rubber Room Reporter (2016) and Parentadvocates.org.

Hearing Request-Waiver

In the charging packet is a form with two boxes on it, one for requesting a hearing and one saying that a hearing is not requested. (See above document, with accused educator's name deleted). One box must be checked and delivered to the UFT/CSA within 10 days of receipt. If the 10 days' deadline is not met,  the accused will be terminated by members of the PEP meeting in an Executive Session. Welcome to a Catch-22:  either participate in an unlawful arbitration or lose your job without going to a hearing. I always suggest that you hire a private attorney or legal team and testify to your side of the story, then Appeal the decision if you think it is incorrect.

See Chancellor's Regulations C-205 (24):

"24. Dismissal for Cause, Resignation, or Retirement While Charges Are Pending -

This subdivision applies to persons who were dismissed pursuant to Section 3020a of the New York State Education Law or who resigned or retired while such charges were pending. All licenses and/or certificates held by such a person at the time of separation from service shall terminate permanently. No such person shall be eligible to apply for any new license or certificate, nor for reemployment by any unit of the City District or of any community school district without the recommendation of the Executive Director of the Division of Human Resources and the express written authorization of the Chancellor."

In other words, if you retire or resign after you are served with §3020-a charges, your license to teach in the NYC school district is revoked permanently.

Instead of complying with the Education Law §3020-a(2)(a), the NYC DOE, CSA (Union for administrators, principals), and NYSUT (gives free representation to UFT Members for §3020-a hearings, lawsuits) have collaboratively relied on so-called "Delegation Memos" (I have collected them, see my collection: Delegation Memos 2011-2018) which  DOE attorneys INSIST (I put this in caps because the perseverance to these memos is so fierce) removes the vote of the Panel For Educational Policy (PEP) in an Executive Session from the charging procedure in Education Law §3020-a(2)(a) in NYC. Oh, really? The truth is that nowhere in the memos is "probable cause" mentioned because the Chancellor cannot delegate a vote on probable cause to anyone. Also, there is no law, rule, or regulation that permits the NYC DOE to deny a Constitutional right, as the vote in Executive Session is, without the signed waiver of the person who is being denied that right. No educator brought up on charges has ever signed such a waiver, as far as I know.

Also, the insistence by the unions and NYC DOE that the Executive Session and vote on probable cause are unnecessary and that they were given the right to change the procedures for charging tenured teachers in NYC by the State legislature is a false statement. In the Commissioner's decision #15,482 (Appeal of the New York City Department of Education, on behalf of Community School District 13, concerning a disciplinary proceeding brought against Alfonzo Forrest, a/k/a Alphonzo Forrest, Principal of P.S. 256, under Education Law §3020(3), October 1, 2006), the Commissioner was very clear that Education Law Section  §3020-a could be modified or replaced by agreements negotiated between the city school district and the CSA after December 1, 1999, except the provisions of subdivisions one and two shall not apply to any agreements negotiated pursuant to this subdivision" (emphasis added - Ed.). 

See:  Decision No. 15,482

Yet NYC DOE, CSA, and NYSUT attorneys go along with the premise that the so-called "Delegation" memos have replaced the Executive Session with a constructive, but silent, waiver, to give the power and authority to find probable cause for the charges to the exact same person who created these charges in the first place, namely the Principal (or, in some cases, the Superintendent). 

It is patently absurd to think that the Legislature intended for the Chancellor, a singular individual, to have the authority to "find" probable cause, create the charges, and testify to the veracity of these exact charges. There is nothing ambiguous in the statutory text of Education Law §3020a or Education Law §2590h. The statutes say: (1) there must be a determination of probable cause by a vote in an executive session; and (2) the Chancellor, a nonvoting member of the PEP, cannot delegate a vote to anyone at any time. (PEP BYLAWS, Article 3.2). 

In the first paragraph of §2590-h, you can read the following:

"He or she shall exercise all his or her powers and duties in a manner not inconsistent with the city-wide educational policies of the city board."

There you are. End of the subject, proof that only the process described in detail in Education Law §3020-a(2)(a) to comply with the State-mandated due process for educators in NY State and City.

Even if the law said that a vote on probable cause is not needed (the law never suggests this, but the NYC DOE makes this one of their main arguments supporting the fraudulent charging papers), an Executive Session must be held. A determination of probable cause must be made by two or more people, never a single person.

When an arbitrator makes a decision in a case, they act outside of any lawful authority and choose to put the $1400/day salary above the facts or law of the case they are about to hear. Instead, the arbitrator should withdraw all charges, recuse themselves from the matter, or adjourn the case until a proper determination of probable cause is made by the PEP vote in an Executive Session. 

But this is never done. All arbitrators agree with their employer, the NYC DOE, and deny the Motion To Dismiss For Lack of Subject Matter Jurisdiction to keep their position on the hearing panel. They also agree that the finding of probable cause can be delegated to a single person as per Education Law §2590-h(19),(38). Sorry, but no.

Sadly, no arbitrator will jeopardize their $1400/day hearing cases brought to them by the NYC DOE at least 5 days/month, making their decisions appealable.

It gets worse. To speed up the removal of teachers from the rubber rooms during the early period of Mayor Michael Bloomberg's reign as chief of the Department under Mayoral control, the UFT took away the right of any tenured, accused teacher to choose the arbitrator for their §3020-a hearing. (NYCRR, Title 8, Section 82-3.5). See (h): "The provisions of this subdivision shall not apply in city school districts in cities with a population of one million or more with alternative procedures adopted pursuant to section 3020 of the Education Law."

This is true only for UFT members. CSA members in NYC (Assistant Principals and Principals) charged under §3020-a pick their arbitrator for their §3020-a hearing. How did this law become so narrowly defined, and why are teachers treated differently from administrators? No one complains, or the accused are not told they have this right.

The NYC DOE, CSA, and UFT/NYSUT adherence to this fraud is shocking.

See the decision by Judge Desmond Green in the case of Rosalie Cardinale (Article 75, Index number 85165/2017), who vacated the termination given to Ms. Cardinale by her §3020-a Arbitrator, Michael Lendino. I wrote the Petition papers for the Attorney.

No one at any agency or Union will represent anyone who makes the arguments I have made here. See my post on the "Gotcha Squad": the TPU (Teacher Performance Unit) or ATU (Administrative Trials Unit)

But the denial of the Motion can be used to show bias by the arbitrator in an Appeal. See "Appealing 3020-a Decisions."

So what? You say.

The reasons why the points made above are essential for purposes of understanding the denial of rights at a §3020-a: first, the person accused is automatically assigned a problem code with a permanent flag on their fingerprints; second, the arbitrator can give any penalty they want to provide, despite the facts and circumstances, which becomes a permanent part of the accused person's personnel file. 

The Department supports arbitrators who terminate for minor acts of no consequence. The Department also supports the arbitrators if they ignore the evidence and terminate the accused because the educator was "not credible."  Rules of law for evidence and witness tampering are not considered. The Department has the right of way, and most arbitrators abide by the terms of the agreement with New York State and New York City to serve on the panels in NYC if, and only if, they give termination as the choice of penalty. Any arbitrator who gives decisions that are "too lenient" is taken off the panels and misses out on the $1400/day salary.  Thus, I believe a bias is embedded in the hearing officer before, during, and after the arbitration concludes.

Thus the omission of probable cause in the charging procedures for §3020-a arbitration in New York City allows the Department to bring charges against a tenured educator that are serious and valid, or silly, untrue, the product of retaliation, discrimination,  or just plain hate because no comprehensive, factual investigations are done to validate any charges before the hearing begins. There are no investigators who look into most of the charges at any of the "investigating" agencies: the Office of Special Investigations (OSI), the Office of Equal Opportunity (OEO), and the Special Commissioner of Investigation (SCI). Please note the OSI official name on all Investigative Reports: "Chancellor's Office of Special Investigations" at the bottom of every page.

OSI, SCI, and OEO  "investigators" are anything but that. See some of the cases I have written about on this website and my blog NYC Rubber Room Reporter: Glen Storman; David Suker; David Pakter (pictured below waiting to go into his 3020-a hearing at 51-49 Chambers Street with Arbitrator Martin Scheinman); Teddy Smith; Eileen Ghastin. I have worked on more than 120 cases and have won decisions that saved the tenured employment or exonerated most of the accused.

In all misconduct cases where there is an "Investigative Report" submitted into the record, an in-depth review always shows some error of the investigator or false statements and documents used to support the conclusion. Why? Because the NYC DOE can and do present whatever they find/create to terminate the accused, which is the goal 100% of the time. Arbitrators have asked me why the NYC DOE always goes for termination, even for the most ridiculous charge. I tell them that it seems to be a situation where the top of the ladder needs to stand on a firm ground no matter how weak it is because they are already on the roof and/or if the charging party throws enough mud at the wall, something may stick.

 Most of the so-called "investigators" at OSI, SCI, and OEO are retired detectives getting their second pension by setting up employees at a school whom someone has complained about and the principal wants to get rid of. There is a set procedure where a parent, child, staff member, AP, or principal can make up that they saw someone do something to somebody, then (1) the principal must report it (no students are reported to OSI); (2) OSI sends someone to the school to find out from the principal what they want to prove; (3) the principal gives permission for students to leave class who will agree to write statements making the targeted person guilty; (4) the principal writes a disciplinary letter which is handed to the accused at a meeting with a representative from the accused person's Union - or not, this is up to the accused to decide; and (5) the technical assistance conference (TAC) memos are created which end up as §3020-a charges.

The title "investigator" does not define what the hired guns at OSI, SCI, and OEO do. I have many stories of unfair, incomplete, and corrupt investigations. See the Wei Liu case. I also wrote about what happened to Glenn Storman after Investigator Dennis Boyles got involved. Here is a big problem. Without a complete and accurate investigation, an arbitrator must decide on the truth of the charges and the credibility of the testifying witnesses. I have found that this does not work, particularly if the Respondent does not speak English very well. The arbitrator has an implicit bias against the Respondent, the accused educator because the Department has put a lot of money and time into creating a case that superficially makes sense. (Thanks to R.W. for giving me the information on this crucial issue). Truth and facts are not relevant to an arbitrator whose goal is to seem fair while doing what the NYC DOE wants.

Most importantly, accused educators must do their own investigation or have their legal team do it and then present the report at the hearing. Bottom line, anyone charged with anything MUST write a rebuttal if there are false statements made against him/her. If the UFT representative or administrator suggests that an accused should not write a rebuttal, ignore this advice.

Additionally, §3020-a  is codified in Education Law Article 61, whereas §2590 is placed in Article 52(a). This placement dichotomy is not a trivial distinction but instead reflects a legislative determination (and intent) to separate the powers of the Chancellor from the statutory due process template applicable to the termination of tenured teachers. (Attorney Roger Adler's Statement). The New York State Legislature never intended on giving any arbitrator the right to ignore the omission of a proper finding of probable cause to pursue a penalty for an educator. Yet, the Department, CSA, and NYSUT lawyer representatives always ignore this defect in the charging procedure, to the detriment of the accused employee.

Having been involved in these hearings for 18 years, I have seen everything from false statements, lies under oath to actual harm. In the cases where the accused has committed some allegedly "abusive" act, I will help them fight for a just and fair penalty, considering all circumstances. If the accused has done something extremely harmful without any justification, I choose to decline to take the case at all. These people should leave the profession of education with the NYC DOE.

The §3020-a arbitration described above has a foundation in fraud. An accused educator is found guilty before entering the door or starting the first Zoom meeting. From that point on, the educator must convince the arbitrator of their innocence. Huh? This is backward. The accused educator is supposed to be innocent until proven guilty.

In sum, do not let the NYC DOE step on your parade. Despite all the shoddy acts cited in this post, the solution is not to resign, retire, not tell your side of the story, or not show up at the hearing. All employees accused of whatever bad acts someone charged them with should stay focused on winning the §3020-a arbitration, clearing their name in the record, and going forward with their life and career as they, no one else, planned.

NYC Moves All 5,500 School Safety Agents From the NYPD to the Education Department, Leaving Many Unhappy

 

School safety officers at the New Bridges Elementary School in Brooklyn. ‘I’m excited that their role is changing,
’ restorative justice experts Kellsie Sayers said. Photograph: John Minchillo/AP

New York City already tried putting safety officers under the NYC Department of Education, and it did not work. 

NYC Education Dept. officials, City Council members rip plan to hire nearly 500 new school safety agents

Union leader says school safety agents should remain under NYPD

Civic Groups Call for NYPD to Retain Control of School Safety Officers, To Hold Rally Saturday

Union chief blasts proposal to switch NYC school safety oversight to Education Dept., warns it’s already been proven ‘disastrous’

We agree with Mr. Floyd. Hopefully, when Eric Adams becomes Mayor he will reverse this policy and move the school safety officers back to the NYPD, with a budget to train the SOs in "restorative justice", whatever that is.

Betsy Combier

betsy.combier@gmail.com
Editor, Advocatz.com
Editor, NYC Rubber Room Reporter
Editor, Parentadvocates.org
Editor, New York Court Corruption
Editor, National Public Voice
Editor, NYC Public Voice
Editor, Inside 3020-a Teacher Trials

New York will reassign 5,000 school police officers

by Erum Salam, The Guardian, September 17, 2021

School safety officers will be transferred out of the police department and trained in restorative justice practices. But for some, ‘retrofitting’ the job isn’t enough

New York City’s school system is beginning to remove the police from its corridors and classrooms in a move welcomed by advocates as a de-escalation of a system that is often seen as imposing harsh punishments that disproportionately target students of color.

In all, about 5,000 New York City school safety agents (SSAs) will be transferred from the supervision of the New York police department to the Department of Education (DoE) in June 2022. The city’s school system is the biggest in the US.

The change follows similar programs from other major US cities. According to Education Week, 33 school districts in places like Oakland, California and Madison, Wisconsin, defunded their school police force or changed their relationships with school safety officers in the wake of racial justice protests after the murder of George Floyd.

An ACLU report using data collected by the Department of Education found that referrals, suspensions, detentions, and arrests disproportionately affect students of color and disabled students. It found that in some states disabled students were 10 times more likely to be arrested, while Latino students were arrested at a rate 1.3 times that of white students. Meanwhile, Black students were arrested at a rate 3 times that of white students, rising as high as 8 times in some states.

In a statement, the New York City Department of Education’s deputy press secretary Nathaniel Styer said: “This transition ensures that SSAs are fully aligned with DOE training and values when it comes to caring for students in crisis, deescalating situations, and ensuring that students get the mental health support that they need when they need them.”

For some advocates advocating the removal of policing from schools, there is a hope that this transfer of power will encourage the use of restorative justice – the practice of resolving conflict through communication and collaboration rather than by punishments such as suspensions and detentions.

For example, instead of suspending a disruptive or bullying student, they would be encouraged to enter into a circle with their teacher, counselor, or peers and engage in a dialogue to address the problem they are facing.

Styer said SSAs began training in conflict resolution, mediation, restorative justice, and implicit bias with the DoE this past spring and any new agents will undergo similar training.

“The goal of transitioning SSAs back to the DoE is specifically focused on ensuring that SSAs are deeply integrated into the school community, are aligned with the school’s social-emotional work, and are true partners of educators, parents, and students in ensuring the wellness of the entire community.”

Kellsie Sayers is the director of restorative practices at the Center for Court Innovation. In the 2018-2019 school year, she and her team launched a restorative justice pilot program in five Brooklyn public schools in partnership with the Department of Education, with funding from an arm of the Department of Justice. She said she learned school safety officers were integral to executing restorative justice.

“School safety officers were actually a big part of what we did. They are adults who aren’t limited in their time because they don’t have classes to run,” Sayer said. “We leaned on them heavily when we did harm circles. They often had the strongest relationships with the students in our school, different from the teaching staff or administration. They knew when a fight was going to happen because they could see in the kid’s face.”

Sayers said she is interested to see the effect of moving SSAs away from the NYPD.

“Some of the ways their job is described under the direction of the NYPD is that they’re not supposed to fraternize with the students, but a lot of their strength was that they were building those relationships,” Sayers said. “I’m excited that maybe their role is changing.”

But the transfer of power is not enough for some. Tiffany Cabán, a democratic socialist projected to win a seat on the city council, said the role of school safety agents or any kind of police in schools, should be dissolved altogether.

“The presence of school safety officers leads to the increased likelihood of arrest or charging children for minor problems into really serious legal issues. I can say this from the perspective of being a public defender in the past,” Cabán said. “We see it all the time. We say, ‘We just need to get police officers more training in mental health response.’ No, we need to make sure we have dedicated, skilled workers and not retrofit that job. There’s no place for that in a school.”

A long-term advocate for restorative justice practices, Cabán said there are other ways to achieve restorative justice than by transferring school safety agents away from the NYPD – ways that don’t leave current agents “out to dry”.

“I know the majority of SSAs are Black and brown women. These women live in the same community. How can we create a transition into work that these women are best suited to do, to support young people in their communities?” Cabán said. “We need to be funding and transitioning folks into those jobs and restorative justice programs.”

Two-Year Plan for School Safety Transition Leaves Few Happy

Two-Year Plan For School Safety Transition Leaves Few Happy

BY JILLIAN JORGENSEN, NY 1, July 7, 2020

One of the most contentious aspects of the new city budget, moving all 5,500 school safety agents from the NYPD to the Education Department, will take two years and the creation of a task force to complete.

"The fact is the transition of something as large as school safety is not going to happen overnight,” Mayor de Blasio told NY1 this week.

The city said the task force will help determine the new roles of the school safety agents, who are unarmed. But advocates are frustrated. Some of them already served on a task force that renegotiated the contract between the DOE and NYPD just a year ago.

"I think the mayor’s budget deal is really more about checking a box than about really doing something that’s going to improve lives for kids,” said Johanna Miller, director of the Education Policy Center and the New York Civil Liberties Union. “As far as I know, he hasn’t reached out to any of us to see what our ideas are.”

In moving the school officers to the DOE, the city is joining a growing list of communities reducing the presence of police in schools after the death of George Floyd.

The officers were put under the NYPD in 1998 in response to violence in the schools and corruption in the School Safety Division, then under the Board of Education.

Proponents of returning them to the DOE point to statistics showing Black and Hispanic students are disproportionately arrested, handcuffed or given summonses at school.

Some advocates wanted the positions removed altogether, with funding instead going to social workers. Councilman Mark Treyger, who chairs the education committee, wants the agents to keep their jobs, but undergo what he called a “just transition” to become DOE employees better integrated into their schools. He said getting there will take time and input. And he blamed the mayor for the conversation not being further along.

“No one should be declaring victory here,” Treyger said. “This is a process. I do note for the record that the mayor was opposed to it up until the very end, and when people ask why wasn't there more discussion, well the mayor was against it up until the very end of the process.”

Treyger said while he supports the task force, the two-year timeline seems too long and he said he hasn’t gotten answers on what, if anything, will change in the meantime.

"One of the things I think they could immediately do is they could work on removing their handcuffs and removing their arrest power,” Treyger said. “I am told that that’s a conversation, but that also might impact their labor agreement.”

Mayor de Blasio told NY1 the agents will get DOE training in areas like restorative justice.

"We want school safety to more and more focus on developing real relationships with young people, nurturing relationships, supportive relationships,” de Blasio said.

But more major changes — like the ones Treyger mentioned — would likely require negotiations with the union representing school safety agents, Teamsters Local 237.

Those negotiations may not be easy. Union president, Gregory Floyd, has opposed the plan to move his members to the Education Department and says it’s up to elected officials to figure out a way forward.

“I don’t have to figure out anything, because this is not my problem. This is their problem. I’m going to wait and listen to see how they're going to navigate these choppy waters that they find themselves in. And do I offer any assistance to them? No, absolutely not. They created this problem, they’re going to have to fix it,” Floyd said.

In the days since the budget has been passed, Floyd has ripped City Council Speaker Corey Johnson, saying the speaker cut him and his members out of the talks about their future. Floyd noted his members were 90 percent non-white and 70 percent women.

“If I was a white labor leader with a white membership would he have spoken to us? And the answer is yes,” Floyd said.

Floyd went on to accuse Johnson of “governing by social media,” and said he’d given him a nickname: “Tweetie Bird Johnson.”

Asked to respond to Floyd’s comments, a spokesman for Johnson, who is white, did not address Floyd’s concerns about being shut out of talks but sent a statement from City Councilman Donovan Richards who, like Floyd, is black.

“This is a terrible attack on Corey. We want to listen to communities most affected by over-policing,” Richards said. “That means communities like mine and other ones that have been hurt for decades. We want to eliminate the school to prison pipeline, and that is what we are fighting for.”

Floyd argued the Education Department is not equipped to effectively manage school safety.

"Can the Department of Education supervise, screen process, hire and do all the things necessary for our schools as far as security? And the answer is no,” Floyd said.

If the city simply wanted officers to get more training, that could have been handled without moving the officers, he said.

"At this point, they created a big mess, they’re not going to make anybody happy."

It’s a mess that the city is giving itself two years to sort out.

The NYC Department of Education Refuses to Investigate Claims of Corruption and Fraud Against Former Chancellor Richard Carranza

Richard Carranza

 The corruption just keeps getting worse. We know that Richard Carranza resigned after a sob story about family COVID hardships which I doubt ever occurred. Then he moved to Texas to work for an organization he was prohibited from working for due to rules of engagement with a company that does business with the NYC DOE. Then, we find out his wife was ditched for a woman who Carranza hired for a lot of money to work for the NYC DOE in a title that is an unofficial writeoff, and Carranza never was approved by the Conflicts of Interest Board (COIB) to hire this woman, Rachel Sosa-Gonzalez, and others, in the first place. Finally, our wonderful Mayor Bill de Blasio has blocked any investigations into any of this.

Raquel Sosa-Gonzalez and Former Chancellor Richard Carranza

 But SCI's job is to do just that, and there are many stories of corrupt people being investigated while at the NYC DOE (see the case of Peter Quinn, February 22, 2021). Add this substantiated report to the others, cited in this blog - David Hay, SCI report on David Hay, Miosotis Ramos, Maspeth High School, etc. But Richard Buery was not given any fine. SCI Reports. 

DOI (Department of Investigation), what have you to say about this? Taxpayers and parents want to know....need to know...have a right to be told what happened, and whose pockets were lined other than Mr. Carranza and Rosa Sosa-Gonzalez.

Such a disgrace for the Mayor and all of us for electing him (I did not vote for him).

Betsy Combier

betsy.combier@gmail.com
Editor, Advocatz.com
Editor, NYC Rubber Room Reporter
Editor, Parentadvocates.org
Editor, New York Court Corruption
Editor, National Public Voice
Editor, NYC Public Voice
Editor, Inside 3020-a Teacher Trials

City mum on Carranza corruption complaints, no probe for affair with underling

NY POST, Conor Skelding, September 11, 2021

City investigators are not probing whether ex-Schools Chancellor Richard Carranza had an affair with a subordinate he hired — and won’t say if they are still looking into multiple corruption complaints filed previously against the former Department of Education boss.

Carranza was accused of hiring several pals from around the country for six-figure DOE jobs that were never posted publicly in 2018, the year he arrived in NYC.

Carranza is now shacked up in San Antonio, Texas, with one of those pals, Raquel Sosa. The pair met years ago in Houston, when Carranza was superintendent there and she was an elementary-school principal.

It isn’t clear just when their relationship became more than professional, but Sosa moved into Carranza’s Texas home months before she quit her DOE job in late August. She registered to vote from the Lone Star love nest on March 20, just five days after Carranza stepped down in NYC.

The city charter prohibits financial relationships, such as cohabitation, between superiors and subordinates.

Carranza, 54, is still technically married. His wife, Monique, filed for divorce in August 2020. Sosa, 47, formerly Sosa-Gonzalez, was divorced by the time she moved to New York in 2018.

When Carranza quit the top DOE job, he said he needed time to mourn relatives who died with COVID-19. Less than a month later, he took a job at an educational technology company with millions in city business, IXL Learning.

The city charter prohibits government employees from soliciting, negotiating or accepting a job at a city vendor while in city service. It also limits how former public employees working for city vendors can interact with the city.

Councilman Robert Holden (D-Queens) called for an investigation into Carranza’s job negotiations by the Conflicts of Interest Board and the Department of Investigation in April. DOI said at the time it referred the matter to the Special Commissioner of Investigation for schools, or SCI.

Holden said he also lodged a formal complaint against Carranza’s hiring of cronies — and SCI confirmed to The Post Friday that this case was closed and no action taken.

Regina Gluzmanova, an SCI rep, told The Post that “during the course of his tenure, and in the immediate aftermath, SCI received numerous complaints regarding former-Chancellor Carranza and his administration.”

She said that “certain matters” have been closed, while others may be pending. She refused to say which other matters were open.

Gluzamanova said SCI never received a complaint regarding Carranza and Sosa’s relationship, and would not be investigating it.

“SCI never received a complaint regarding Chancellor Carranza’s romantic involvement with Ms. Sosa, or anyone else for that matter, nor did any allegation of such involvement surface during the course of a previous investigation,” she added. “As Sosa and Carranza are no longer employed by the City, nor do either reside within the jurisdiction, we feel that the best use of our limited resources is to continue with the important investigations that benefit the students, families, and taxpayers of New York.”

SCI has in the past investigated ex-Department of Education employees.

“It stinks to high heaven,” Holden said, demanding that the Carranza/Sosa affair be probed. “The fact that the mayor’s not interested speaks volumes about his administration.”

A DOI rep, Diane Struzzi, refused to comment on the Carranza probes, or lack thereof, referring The Post to SCI.

A COIB rep, Chad Gholizadeh, said that confidentiality rules prohibited him from discussing complaints or investigations.

Mayor Bill de Blasio has blocked SCI investigations into Carranza, whistleblowers alleged in 2019. The mayor’s office didn’t return a request for comment.