NO CLUE FROM WU ON SCHOOL BOARD BILL
Mayor Michelle Wu isn’t saying whether she’s sticking a fork in the school-committee overhaul the council has deposited on her desk — but she’s not saying anything nice about it, either.
“I haven’t gotten to read through the exact language of what was voted on in particular and all that process, but I stated previously — we have a lot of very exciting work happening in the Boston Public Schools,” Wu said when asked about the matter at an unrelated event on Thursday.
She added: “We are under the leadership of an incredible new superintendent, who is making changes in every area imaginable. I believe we’re on the verge of some major transformations with her within Boston Public Schools, and I want to do my part to keep that going and keep the momentum going.”
This comes a day after the Boston City Council passed what would be a seismic change to the school committee, phasing out the all-mayor-appointed current setup to be replaced by a 13-member all-elected crew with two student voting members.
But the two key words there are “would be.” This bill, as a home-rule petition, would need state legislative and gubernatorial approval to go into law — but before then it would need Wu’s signature, and she’s repeated multiple times over the past couple of weeks that she opposes the idea of an all-elected school committee and has said that she doesn’t think this is the time to do a governance overhaul of the troubled district.
Asked whether it’s accurate to say that she continues to oppose this sort of move in general, Wu on Thursday simply said, “Yes.”
The council passed the measure by a relatively narrow 7-5-1 vote to send it to Wu’s desk. Even if the bill had more support, though, the council can’t override a mayoral veto on a homerule petition.
When Wu was running for mayor, she said she supported a hybrid elected-appointed committee. Asked whether she has any counter-proposals planned, she said, “I haven’t made any decisions on that.”
Boston voters by nearly 80% voted in favor of an elected school committee, though the specifics of that vary from voter to voter and politician to politician. The board has been appointed by the mayor for the past three decades following a referendum, though opposition pops up every few years.
Boston’s the only city in the state with an appointed body.
City Councilor Ricardo Arroyo, the government operations chair and main sponsor of this legislation, said it’s clear the mayor-appointed version of the school committee “has not served us well.”
“The city as a whole spoke overwhelmingly and resoundingly” in the nonbinding ballot question, Arroyo said.
Several of the councilors who voted against that measure said they would prefer a hybrid model, similar to what Wu said.
The city school district is struggling with declining enrollment, aging school buildings, a troubled special education program and various transportation issues, and it narrowly avoided state receivership last year by signing an agreement to make and monitor changes. Superintendent Mary Skipper started her job this school year.