BROOKLYN WEATHER

Gov. Cuomo To Withhold Funding From Any Schools That Remain Open in Red Zones

Gov. Cuomo To Withhold Funding From Any Schools That Remain Open in Red Zones

by Yehudit Garmaise

 Gov. Andrew Cuomo told Jewish community letters last night and reporters this morning at a press conference he will withhold all state funds if local governments do not enforce the New York state law that all public and private schools must be closed in the state’s red zones in New York City, Ramapo, Spring Valley, and in Orange County and Rockland County.


   Gov. Cuomo also said that unless shuls comply with his executive order to admit only 25% maximum occupancy or 10 people in shuls, the governor will shut down all shuls completely.

     “For the schools who have been identified as violating the closure order, they will be served today with a notice mandating that close and that we are withholding funding from those schools,” said Gov. Cuomo, who said that New York state yeshivas received a significant amount of funding.


    “I have passed budgets that increased funding to yeshivas. Rabbis have additional funding per child. That all went up [under me]. If the [yeshivas] violate the health order, they will not receive funding.”

     Gov. Cuomo said that he doesn’t like to withhold funding, but that keeping the schools open in red zones “affects the health of people all across the board.


   Although last Tuesday, Gov. Cuomo appeared to want to work with the Jewish community by asking 12 Jewish leaders to help to ensure that shuls did not exceed a 50% capacity and to increase proper mask compliance and social distancing, those leaders, who agreed to comply with Gov. Cuomo’s requests, felt betrayed when just a few hours later, Gov. Cuomo announced, without warning in a press conference that shuls’ maximum capacities in red zones could not exceed 25% capacity or 10 people maximum.


   Rabbi Yeruchim Silber, Agudah’s Director of New York governmental affairs who frequently works with members of the Cuomo administration, said that the governor could have perhaps reduced the blow of the increased restrictions just before the last days of Yom Tov, if he would have said something like, “To the Jewish leaders I just spoke with, in the past few hours, I just spoke with an epidemiologist who said that we are in an urgent situation in which we have to take extreme measure. I am so sorry, but I have to amend what I said to you earlier, that you should keep your shuls at 50%, but now we have to go down to 25%/10 person maximum for 14 days.”

     “Gov. Cuomo in no way said, ‘I am sorry I have to go back on that,’“ Rabbi Silber said. “He just surprised everyone with the new intensified restrictions.”


    Rabbi Silber said that in his position as Agudah’s director of New York governmental affairs, he tries to communicate with members of Cuomo’s administration that his approach to continue to use the strong arm of the law to force compliance is not the most effective way to work with the frum community.


  “I tell them [members of the Cuomo administration],” explained Rabbi Silber, who says he is constantly in conversations with people who work for Cuomo. “We have to work together; You can’t just keep coming down on us like this. It is not going to work.”

   In terms of the schools, Rabbi Silber said that the schools “have a legal opinion that they can call themselves child-care centers.”

    Gov. Cuomo, however, disagrees.


   “There is a difference, just so you know, between providing childcare and operating a school,” said the governor this morning at a press conference.  “You cannot operate a school and then tomorrow, say, “Well, I turned it into a childcare center, so now I am operating a school, but we are calling it a childcare center.”


    “There is an apple and an orange,” the governor said to distinguish between a school and a childcare center, which has separate licenses, separate regulations, and separate operating guidelines. “Child-care facilities can operate, but they have to be licensed childcare facilities, and then they have to be inspected to make sure that they are following the rules. But a school is not a childcare facility.


  “You have fooled no one by saying, ‘Oh no, [these kids] are not walking into a school, they are walking into a childcare facility.


  “Maybe you can fool some people, but you can’t fool the state of New York.”


   In response, Rabbi Silber, who lives in Kensington, said, “The yeshivas don’t believe the schools are causing a problem. The schools are not where it is spreading. The schools are doing everything right.”


  Rabbi Silber explained that before opening after the summer, schools had to submit their plans for COVID safety protocols.


    “I assume they are doing it,” said Rabbi Silber, who added that his wife is a teacher, and she wears a mask all day, and the school maintains social distance in the classroom. “But, I have not been inside the schools.”


   “There is no indication that schools are going to cause any kind of spread of the virus,” Rabbi Silber said. “There are very small numbers in schools.”


   This morning, at his daily press conference Mayor Bill de Blasio said that out of 1,600 New York City schools, only two have been closed due to COVID outbreaks.


   Mayor de Blasio also said that although, “we all need to work together,” he was “open to creative ideas” as to how to get all the COVID numbers down so that all the restrictions in all parts of the city can be lifted.


    One “creative idea” may be to return to what Gov. Cuomo told Jewish leaders a week ago: 50% maximum shul capacity, increased mask compliance, and increase social distancing.

   Gov. Cuomo deflected charges of anti-Semitism by saying that he is only cracking down on restrictions in areas where data clearly show that COVID cases are up.


     “We don’t look at zip codes, we don’t look at census tracts, or at districts in any arbitrary way to determine where to enforce restrictions,” the governor said. “We look at where the actual cases come from.


     “And then at the end of 14 days, if there are some areas where the cases drop, we will relax the regulations on those places. If there are places where the cases have gone up, then we will increase the regulations on those places.


   “If we are talking about Brooklyn or Boro Park, we can distinguish [the COVID numbers and compliance] block by block, and we will.

     “For those groups who are getting the numbers under control, G-d bless, and if the numbers are under control, we will reduce regulations, for areas that are not, we will increase regulations.”

 

(Kevin P. Coughlin / Office of Governor Andrew M. Cuomo)

 


NYPD Chief of Patrol Fausto Pichardo Suddenly Resigns
  • Oct 14 2020
  • |
  • 8:03 AM

BDE: Reb Feivel Kaufman Z”l
  • Oct 14 2020
  • |
  • 6:04 AM

Be in the know

receive BoroPark24’s news & updates on whatsapp

 Start Now