ALBANY, NY (March 30, 2018) — New York State today announced a 2018 education budget that includes only an $859 million overall school aid increase including only $618 million in Foundation Aid (these are the increases included on the school aid runs). In addition, Governor Cuomo insisted on taking an unprecedented level of control of local school budgets. In response, public education advocacy organization the Alliance for Quality Education released the following statement:

“Governor Cuomo has put multi-millionaires over school children with this year’s state budget. Governor Cuomo’s woefully inadequate school aid increase will mean classroom cuts in many communities across the state, especially those serving predominantly Black, Brown and low-income children. This is because Governor Cuomo rejected the Assembly’s proposed tax hikes on people earning more than $5 million a year and their plan to increase school aid by $1.5 billion this year,” said Jasmine Gripper, legislative director, Alliance for Quality Education.

“Governor Cuomo wants voters to believe that he is addressing inequity in schools, but in reality he is entrenching educational racism. Governor Cuomo’s policies have caused the spending gap between rich and poor school districts to grow 24 percent to a record setting $9,923 per pupil. His budget will leave Black, Brown and low-income students in high need school districts further behind.

“The legislation includes an unprecedented power grab over local school budgets by the Governor. It allows Governor Cuomo to define criteria for how school districts set their budgets and then to refuse to provide the school funding increases voted by the legislature if his office does not approve these local school budgets. No Governor has ever attempted to exert so much control over local schools.”