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Preferential treatment
Mar 4, 2010 6:06 PM
E-mails between Klein and Moskowitz disclose benefits her charters receive
Bosom buddies Eva Moskowitz, founder of the Succes Charter Network, and Schools Chancellor Joel Klein get cozy at a recent event. (New York Daily News)
Former city councilwoman and now charter founder and operator Eva Moskowitz has a relationship with Chancellor Joel Klein that any school leader would envy.
It goes way beyond Klein appearing at her school functions when requested; it goes beyond her successfully enlisting his support for $1 million in funding from the Eli Broad Foundation.
What they have is true collaboration, plotting PR strategy together, even working — as one Department of Education official put it — “to overcome” privacy laws to obtain mailing labels for potential applicants to her Harlem Success Academy schools.
State Sen. Bill Perkins has announced he will hold a public hearing in March to review the DOE’s policy toward charters in light of this new information, which was obtained by New York Daily News columnist Juan Gonzalez through a Freedom of Information request. The city released 125 e-mails between Klein and Moskowitz that reveal the unusually close relationship between the two.
Moskowitz, who earns close to $400,000 a year running four charter schools in Harlem that serve 1,300 kids, was able to successfully ask for space and more space, even suggesting schools to be closed — PS 194 and 241 — to make way for her academies. Those schools were supposedly low-performing — despite each receiving an A in their most recent School Progress Reports.
Moskowitz was able to get Klein’s attention when his own bureaucrats weren’t responding quickly enough to her requests.
All the e-mails can be read at the UFT’s blog, edwize, at www.edwize.org.
Below are highlights from the voluminous correspondence between the two.
March 30, 2007: from Moskowitz to Klein: “For next year, the problem seems to be that no one at Tweed wants to tell ps 149 to consolidate ... a quick and aggressive resolution would be helpful.”
April 12, 2007: Moskowitz to Klein: “Wanted to circle back on space. Though garth (Harries, then chief executive for the DOE’s Office of New Schools) contacted me right after we had breakfast and promised swift action, no progress has been made as far as I can tell.”
April 22, 2007: Moskowitz to Klein: “... you urged me to reach out to you directly when the system was dysfunctional and unresponsive ... I appreciated the offer and with the space issue for Harlem Success have taken you up on.”
July 30, 2007: Moskowitz to Klein: “As we discussed, I will need space. I have identified 5 sites, which appear (based on doe numbers and research about what else is in building) to be currently underutilized, have declining enrollment for last 5 years, and suck academically.”
Dec. 16, 2007: from the DOE’s Michael Duffy (head of the Charter School Office) to Moskowitz: “The Chancellor asked me to give you an update on where things stand with getting mailing labels to you and other charter schools so you can begin the process of recruiting for new applicants. ... I face a couple of hurdles internally in making something happen, namely privacy laws that limit the Department’s ability to make home address information available. My goal is to work to overcome these hurdles so that we can make labels available to you during the month of January. ... If you ever want to get a hold of me, day or night, you can always call me on my cell.”
Jan. 23, 2008: Moskowitz to Klein: “Though I have grit and courage am not always as good at chess moves when up against the uft. ... On space front have given serious thought to and think option discussed is the best. ... Believe timing is right and will have the armies we need. Yes will be nasty and difficult but actically (sic) I think winnable.”
April 15, 2008: Klein to Moskowitz, re: speaking at a lottery meeting: “If it doesn’t fit in for me to speak, don’t worry, I’ll just smile and do what you need.”
April 15, 2008: response from Moskowitz: “Oh no, definitely want you to speak. Will figure it out.”
Oct. 3, 2008: Moskowitz to Klein: “Would very much appreciate a good word from you with (Eli) Broad. I have a sizable funding gap that am hustling to close. The network set up to do 40 schools is not cheap ... He [Broad] contacted me after our meeting and said he was interested, but wanted to be sure I was aligned with you. Told him I had been from day 1 ... But 2 schools most interested in both got d’s and f’s. ... Those schools are PS 194 and PS 241. It would be extremely helpful to move quickly on.”
