Peoples-Stokes Seeks Mayoral Control of Buffalo Schools, but no Support Guaranteed

As Assemblywoman Crystal Peoples-Stokes pushes to bring mayoral control to Buffalo public schools, it remains unclear if she will even enjoy the support of her own party, let alone find enough votes in the Republican-controlled Senate to make her plan a reality.

Peoples-Stokes, a Buffalo Democrat with close ties to Gov. Andrew Cuomo and Buffalo Mayor Byron Brown, plans to introduce a bill Monday that would establish a mayoral takeover of the Queen City’s school system, which has struggled mightily in recent years with graduation rates hovering around 50 percent and a dysfunctional school board where infighting and personal attacks are commonplace.

But members of the Western New York delegation, on both sides of the aisle, are ambivalent.

State Sen. Patrick Gallivan, a Republican whose district stretches from the suburbs of Buffalo to the suburbs of Rochester, said his conference has yet to make a determination as to whether Peoples-Stokes' bill would be considered.

“It’s something over the next couple of weeks that I certainly will be discussing and trying to learn more on where the leadership is and where the conference is traditionally,” Gallivan said in a phone interview this week.

Another Senate Republican echoed Gallivan’s comments, telling City & State that expanding mayoral control to upstate cities has not been widely discussed in the conference, and remaining non-committal about the bill's chances of making its way into a final deal. 

Gallivan said that regardless of whether Peoples-Stokes' bill goes anywhere, something must be done to address the persistent problems plaguing the Buffalo school system. Even as the city's economy shows signs of improvement and more people look to move there, families with young children are moving to the suburbs for lack of quality educational options inside city limits.

“I think there’s the obligation to look at every potential avenue before you make the decision,” Gallivan said. “What’s the best way to go?”

While many Western New York Democrats have remained silent on the issue, Peoples-Stokes is facing opposition from at least one member of her own party. Sen. Marc Panepinto, a Buffalo Democrat, introduced what he describes as a compromise bill that would give the mayor input through two additional seats on the school board—currently a nine-member body comprised of six district seats and three at-large seats—to boost the city executive’s influence in the school system without handing over the keys.

Panepinto, a freshman lawmaker who has enjoyed the support of the statewide teachers union but did not receive an endorsement from the governor in his campaign, also suggested in a recent interview with Capital Tonight’s Liz Benjamin that there could be larger forces at work.

“Obviously the governor has had issues on the education front as we saw played out during the budget, and I think he’s got good institutional support from the assemblywoman (Peoples-Stokes) and the mayor (Brown),” Panepinto said in the interview. “So if (Cuomo) wants to do a test case for upstate mayoral control, Buffalo is the place to do it.”

As for the mayor, he has said repeatedly that he is not pushing to control the schools, but would take on the responsibility if Albany lawmakers were to pass the Peoples-Stokes bill.

Brown told City & State last week that, despite the school system's dysfunctional appearance, there are many areas where key stakeholders—unions, business leaders, parents—are in agreement. And with his reputation as a consensus builder, the mayor believes he would be able to bring these groups together and move the ball forward.

“I would love to see those things that people agree on be adopted and then move in unison on those things,” Brown said.

With Assembly Speaker Carl Heastie set to visit Buffalo this weekend to attend a fundraiser for Grassroots, a political organization that has supported both Brown and Peoples-Stokes throughout their careers, the debate is sure to continue in Buffalo and Albany. But it remains to be seen whether the assemblywoman's proposal will be the fix that ultimately sticks.