The Current Situation

I have written both the mayor and the chancellor many times about this issue and never get a reply. Chancellor Klein had demanded a full investigation of these matters, but people in his General Counsel’s Office quickly squelched it.
The chancellor had been adamant that inquiry was needed, and I seriously doubt that he knows that it had been terminated. I had listed complaints against my former principal for destruction of official records, obstruction of justice and other crimes. This man was then appointed Deputy Superintendent of District 75 by the chancellor himself. He must have thought the investigation found this man innocent.
This man has been rewarded for his Gross Incompetence with promotion after promotion. Other more qualified candidates were passed over so this man could advance his career.
We need to root out some of the corruption that runs through

District 75

, the Department of Education and the rest of NY city government – to do this we need to find out how come both my assaults and the subsequent cover-ups have never been properly investigated.

Check out: WHATEVER HAPPENED TO LARRY HAYES? They NEVER have!

I want to know how the

homophobic racist maniac

who attacked me can be returned to the classroom. I want to know how a principal could destroy official records, concoct false documents, lie under oath in order to continue this cover up, and never be questioned by any of the people charged with investigating such wrongdoing.

I am pressing my case because I feel that city investigators have bought into the worst stereotypes of gay people. And, I am making it my business to make sure this never happens again!
The people who have covered this have no regard for the mayor or the chancellor. They have no regard for the people of New York City. The fact is that they are more than willing to put the children of New York at risk.
The individual who assaulted me was removed from the school and sent to the district office. But once there, the administrators wanted him out of the district office because they were afraid of him; he was stalking women who worked there and menacing anybody who crossed his path the wrong way. They wanted this person - of whom THEY were afraid - back in the classroom working with children ASAP!
THE ORIGINAL COVER-UP
How could I be assaulted twice in front of many witnesses and it has been totally ignored??? I filed the complaints with the police. Shaking with pain I dutifully filled out and filed appropriate Incident and Accident Forms. I filed my handwritten witness statement as required by law.
No one cares to investigate why there are no other appropriate witness statements collected by the principal as required by law?

Many of these critical documents are missing, yet no one asks who took or destroyed them?

How could a principal be allowed to mislead a police investigation by using vulgar homophobic stereotypes to mislead the DA’s Office?

Kevin McCormack violated every one of the Chancellor’s Regulations on reporting school violence, yet no one has ever even questioned him on the matter? He even swore under oath that he was not familiar with these well-known regulations even though he was a Supervising Principal?

This same Supervising Principal swore he did not know what the responsibilities of a principal regarding the safety of students and staff, yet he was soon afterwards promoted to the post of Deputy Superintendent????

How could a principal be allowed to mislead a police investigation by using vulgar homophobic stereotypes and use them again and again to mislead the DA’s Office?

Has no one in New York City Government ever heard of Obstruction of Justice?

I need to also know why no one has investigated this extensive series of subsequent cover-ups.

SUBSEQUENT COVER- UPS

THE CORPORATION COUNSEL

The attorney who represented the Corporation Counsel’s Office in defense of the city HAD to be in collaboration with Kevin McCormack in order to let him present such bogus evidence and such bizarre testimony at my civil case.

Both Mr. Thompson and Mr. McCormack never notified the DOE that there was to be a court hearing as required by law.
Thus, Kevin McCormack could fabricate implausible versions of events surrounding my two gay-bashings and not have his testimony vetted by anybody at the DOE, because anybody with any knowledge of educational policy would have thrown both this principal and this lawyer right out of the building.

Has no one in New York City Government ever heard of Conspiracy to Commit Fraud?
THE GENERAL COUNSEL’S OFFICE

The Chancellor’s Chief Counsel received a sharp letter of reprimand from Chancellor Klein after Betsy Gotbaum informed the Chancellor about the continued cover-up of my gay bashing. As I have noted above, there was an investigation started... STARTED.
Once progress was made the Michael Best stopped all further investigation.
The chancellor was then led to believe that this principal had been cleared – so the chancellor was duped into appointing this guy to the post of Deputy Superintendent of District 75
Oh YES, 75 is “The Chancellor’s District” !

Why weren’t the Chancellor’s clear orders followed? Has no one in New York City Government ever heard of Insubordination and Conspiracy to Commit Fraud?

Finally the DOI

If cronyism is behind his refusal to investigate Kevin McCormack and Michael Best, he is the worst offender of the bunch. This is a complete betrayal of Trust!

The chief investigator for corruption at the Department of Education, Richard Condon, has for years treated my complaints and accusations as material for what amounts to a practical joke. Each time my letters wind up on his desk he forwards them to a department that has no jurisdiction over charges of corruption; the DOE's Office of Special Investigations mainly deals with corporal punishment and verbal abuse !

I have spoken to Mr. Hyland and others in OSI and they told me that they do NOT investigate such things as cover-ups and malfeasance by administrators.

When I asked Mr. Condon why his office repeatedly sends my complaints to an office that is not equipped to investigate it, he sent me a letter stating that his decisions were at his discretion and he does not have to explain them to others.

Has no one in New York City Government ever heard of Edward F. Stancik???


Perhaps by passing on this information both the mayor and the chancellor may see that having a real Board of Education acting as advocates for our children will enable them to have ALL the information they need to properly run the schools.

Felix Culpa

Congratulations to all our borough presidents. You have each shown Unity in the face of disaster!

Now it is time to show the mayor that the inclusion of the borough presidents in the decision process for educational reform has great benefits.

A SIMPLE 12 STEP PROGRAM
1) It is time we admitted that our school system has become unmanageable.

Each borough president’s office can serve as the troubleshooter for matters of education policy. Each borough president’s office can serve as the troubleshooter for matters of education policy.
Your offices could cite programs that are working in your boroughs hand help them be replicated throughout the system.
Initiatives such as those taken by Helen Marshall, Queens BP, which have dramatically reduced class size and reduced overcrowding in her borough will become even more effective as the other borough presidents take on this issue with unified action.

2) Strength comes from united action. However, unity is strongest when there is a diversity of opinion! And it might just restore us to sanity!
Ideas become strengthened as people of differing views see a common need and work in unity to achieve these goals.

3) While each of you might agree on general principles such as one put forward by the Brooklyn BP “Parents must have a say in their children’s education. It will not only strengthen public participation ⎯ it will ensure that we continue to improve student outcomes”!

4) There will be different assessments on implementation. There should be!
For example Marty Markowitz believes that “one of the most successful accomplishments to come out of mayoral control is school-based parent coordinators”.

5) Others while seeing the establishment of school-based parent coordinators as a step forward might still see shortcomings.An investigation by Scott Stringer, Manhattan BP, has revealed, for example, that the Department of Education has failed to provide the legally-mandated support and training for parents serving on Community Education Councils.

6) So by airing differences the Board might eventually follow Scott Stringer initiative, and exert pressure to provide the CECs with the resources and training which will allow them to do their work.


7) Despite the placement of a parent coordinator in every school, the creation of CECs, and the hiring of a Chief Family Engagement Officer, the Manhattan BP sees that there continues to be wide-spread sentiment that parental and public involvement is not a priority.

8) I would go even further and suggest that the borough presidents look for innovative ways that students can have a stronger voice in their education. I remember that there was a very effective student board that used to meet regularly with the previous chancellors to work toward the goals the students saw as a common need.


9) Each and every school in New York City could be turned into a Green House of Democracy. By learning to help make the decisions that shape the culture of a particular school, students will learn skills that will carry over to later life. As the years go by, students will learn the joys of taking on real responsibilities and working with others to achieve realistic goals.

10) They will learn the communication and networking skills they will need to advance in the 21st Century job market. They will actually be creating communities of shared values. People worry about the students “lack of respect” but what respect do we show them - if all the decisions are handed down to them from on high? How can we expect them to develop self-esteem if they are not trusted to have a say in how their schools are run.

11) And what might we learn from these students… well, we might just learn how to run a school. Recent studies show that even in elite private schools up to 70% of a teacher’s time is actually taken up with maintaining order and keeping the class under control. Truth is I have seen better ratios in some of our system’s schools – even with hard to manage populations. But we never hear of these successes, worse we never get a chance to have them replicated.

12) Believe me, the students know what works. And if they had a chance they’d help us set up systems that work. Besides the waste of so much valuable teaching time – can you remember how boring it is to have teachers who have to spend so much time trying to maintain order???

Using their social networking skills and their tech savvy today’s students could help transform schools from factories of learning to thriving communities. BUT, only if they are let in on the action!

The borough presidents must fight for greater transparency.

There may well be wide-spread agreement by the Board to follow through on the demand by Brooklyn BP, Marty Markowitz, for the creation of an independent education office that will provide non-partisan reporting and analysis of the combined $18 billion capital and operations budgets, and also provide a complete analysis of student outcomes

I would also suggest that it is NOW the time to return to an independent Department of Investigation for our school system.

For years I have tried to get Richard Condon’s office to look into a long-standing scandal in the school system. It involves corruption, patronage and outright malfeasance. But these charges keep getting sidetracked even as the betrayal of the public trust spreads.

You office could serve as a funnel for information the mayor and the chancellor need to know, but might not otherwise make it to their desks.

Without a FULL INQUIRY all reform is futile!

How do you fight City Hall when it turns out to be Tammany Hall??????



The mayor is truly a good man! He is sincere. He wants educational reform to be his legacy.


Both our mayor and his chancellor have made serious sacrifices to help the children of New York City!

Yet, their legacies will come to nothing if the reforms they try to institute are not protected.

There is a spiritual adage: Half measures availed us nothing.

Unless Mayor Bloomberg and Chancellor Klein look into this scandal and root out all the corruption - these scoundrels and their successors will win out!

Who are the folks who have continuely promoted Kevin McCormack’s career in District 75?

Even the people who supervised his student teaching when he was at NYU felt McCormack unfit to be in the classroom with children. They were told they HAD to pass him, but that he would spend little time in the classroom he was being groomed for bigger things. Who was grooming him? Why was his rise to power pre-ordained even before he started teaching?

McCormack was removed from his position at the School for the Deaf in part because of protests by the parents. Why did district 75 decide he’d do better at a school totally unrelated to his teacher training? Why were they able to promise the MOTC Principal Selection Committee that he would only be at the school for a minimum of time because he was moving on to “bigger things” at the district office?

If he were so incompetent - as he testified under oath - that he did not even know basic things such as the Chancellor’s Regulations on reporting school violence, how was he selected to be Supervising Principal by District 75?

With the pile of grievances against him for refusing to report school violence how was he selected to become Deputy Superintendent for District 75?

Who stopped the investigation into Kevin McCormack’s corruption which the chancellor himself ordered? What was the chancellor told the outcome was of this inquiry?

It is very disconcerting that with all the uncertainty concerning Kevin McCormack’s integrity that the chancellor would go ahead and appoint him to the post of Deputy Superintendent of District 75!

Who are the people behind the continuing cover-up of Kevin McCormack’s corruption?
Why have they pushed him ahead of more qualified candidates for promotion after promotion?

ABOVE ALL – WHAT QUID PRO QUOS HAVE BEEN EXCHANGED FOR THIS ACCESS TO POWER???
Without a FULL INQUIRY all reform is futile!

Best bests Klein -

This all started with an investigation into a series of gay bashings at a NYC public school. But one thing led to another and now we can see who pulls the strings at the New York City Department of Education.

How could they get away with it in one of the most “liberal” cities, and right in the heart of Greenwich Village itself? It appears for all the reforms NY City is still in the grips of 19th Century political machines.

I have emailed, called and written Chancellor Klein and other city officials time and again, and have never had any response. If any of you can get around the “gatekeepers” for Michael Bloomberg or Chancellor Klein it would be greatly appreciated!

The system of patronage and malfeasance that led to McCormack’s phenomenal rise to power has also taken on the task of protecting him. It has a venerable linage which extends way back over the ages.

The people who have helped Kevin McCormack are in direct apostolic succession right back to the grubby little hands of Boss Tweed.

The charges of corruption and malfeasance hardly stood in the way of Kevin McCormack’s ascension to the pinnacles of power in District 75 – the Chancellor’s District!

Yes, I and others had brought charges against Kevin McCormack for misappropriation of funds, covering up assaults on staff and students, perjury, destroying official records, creating bogus records and other assorted pranks. But he was the fair-haired boy of those quaint little Ancient Hibernians so what the Hell!

I bet the Chancellor would laugh if he knew the prank these Hibernians pulled off !

Our Public Advocate, Betsy Gotbaum, was the only official in city government who had the guts to tell the chancellor what was being done in his name. Chancellor Klein looked into the matter and was outraged that there could be an on-going cover-up of two gay-bashings and all sorts of malfeasance bu Kevin McCormack and his cronies. He wrote Michael Best a sharp letter of criticism and demanded an immediate investigation.

Kevin McCormack's cronies at the Chancellor's Office quickly put a halt to this on-going investigation into McCormack’s various shenanigans mid-summer 2006.

Chancellor Klein was somehow convinced that Kevin McCormack had somehow been cleared of the uninvestigated charges. The Chancellor elevated McCormack to the post of Deputy Superintendent for District 75.

Traumatic Brain Injury

If you are interested in learning more asbout what it is like to live with a Traumatic Brain Injury please visit our Blog:
TBI SNAFU

Fourth of July 2009

This is the Fourth of July. I think it is time to focus on having a government that is responsible to the needs of the people - ALL THE PEOPLE!

July 1, 2009 NYC BOE is back!

Plus ça change, plus c'est la même chose.
Jean-Baptiste Alphonse Karr (Les Guêpes, January 1849).

The more we think things change, the more we are deranged.
Larry Hayes (RottenRottenRotten, July 1, 2009)

What is that line of Robert Preston in Victor Victoria???

Fantastic! A Board of Education pretending
to be a Department of Education
pretending to be a Board of Ed.

"
Sadly the lawyers take over in New York City!" Michael Bloomberg