Every year, Team de Blasio tells a bunch of charter schools it just can’t find room for them at any of the city’s school buildings — and every year, the School Construction Authority issues its Blue Book showing that the system has more empty space than ever.
The latest annual Enrollment, Capacity Utilization Report shows that the number of buildings with at least 300 empty seats rose to 218 in the 2018-19 school year, up from 185 in the mayor’s first year. Buildings with more than 1,000 empty seats have nearly doubled, from six to 11.
Open seats across some 218 buildings total 111,501 — up 18 percent in three years.
The report “underscores the mayor’s appalling refusal to provide a permanent middle school for our Queens families,” said Eva Moskowitz of Success Academy Charter Schools, which is desperately trying to get the mayor to honor his promise to hundreds of fourth-graders that they’ll have a Success school to go to next year.
At least six buildings in southeast Queens have more than 400 unused seats, and two with more than 700 — but de Blasio and Chancellor Richard Carranza are hiding behind a process that makes no sense.
How, Mr. Mayor, can space be too tight, when there’s more of it year after year after year? Stop the games, and do right by the kids.