THE WORST CITY GOVERNMENT
THE WORST CITY GOVERNMENT City Government remains a close race between New York City and Washington, but other nominations are welcome. What with the New York City school bureaucracy’s...
...What the contract does spell out offers far better reason to get up in the morning...
...NW Washington, DC 20009...
...Mop-a huge price for tiny PTAs on the Lower East Side...
...Yet today, if a PTA wants to hold tutoring sessions or parenting classes that keep the school open beyond the contracted extra six hours a month, it’s got to pony up $90 to Mr...
...But the city’s gold-broomed custodial contract illuminates how educational indifference trickles down...
...The custodian’s contract doesn’t say anything about giving a damn...
...At one elementary school, the school custodian steadfastly bars the cafeteria workers from the building until 8 a.m., which keeps them from having enough time to prepare breakfast...
...Where’s that elaborate computer/phone setup the Board of Education spent thousands on in 1985...
...While federal and local subsidies serve up a morning dose of Frosted Flakes and scrambled eggs to hundreds of thousands of America’s low-income kids, that good cause doesn’t penetrate New York’s custodial kingdom...
...Janitors do a dirty job, union officials point out rightly...
...At $70,000 a year, you might think he could afford his own...
...And that’s provided parents get the requisite paperwork in on time...
...Of course, funding all this friendly service isn’t just a matter of $90 payoffs...
...Katherine Boo The Monthly depends on its readers to keep track of the breakdown of big-city government...
...What with the New York City school bureaucracy’s killer combination of teacherless classrooms and more school administrators than the whole of France, you’d think kids would have enough obstacles to learning...
...But there’s a kicker: After five years, the ownership of that four-wheel drive or lawnmower can become the janitor’s private property...
...In 1988, the city gave custodians raises averaging $11,500 in exchange for permitting parents and teachers to conduct educational programs after hours...
...Why won’t someone cut that raging crabgrass outside of Kruse Elementary in Jackson Heights...
...The union offers a helpful 25-page instruction booklet for that...
...Please send your nominations to: Worst City Government The Washington Monthly 161 1 Connecticut Ave...
...The answer is growing in the schoolyard...
...In addition, taxpayers cover an astonishing custodial budget of $230 million a year (more than New York spends to house its homeless...
...Because the departing custodian took the lawnmower with him...
...Between the red tape and the highway robbery, the usual PTA enterprisesremedial math, fundraising for extra books, balls, and toilet paper -easily fall by the wayside...
...In exchange, the custodians have agreed to mop cafeteria floors once a week...
...New York City’s school janitors have the power to use Board of Education bucks to buy their own school “supplies...
...Janitors, you see, hold the keys to the schools...
...Within what the City Council once described as their “autonomous empire,” custodians find their perks include everything from Jeep Cherokees to Macintosh computers...
...An October Village Voice study of the local International Union of Operating Engineers shows how city janitors have managed to earn up to $70,000 a year-more, needless to say, than any classroom teacherwhile hamstringing dozens of educational opportunities for the kids who need creative help the most...
...THE WORST CITY GOVERNMENT City Government remains a close race between New York City and Washington, but other nominations are welcome...
...Try the ex-janitor’s house on Long Island...
...why not sweeten their deal...
Vol. 22 • December 1990 • No. 11
