Boro President Vows To Push Brooklyn Pols on Tuition Bill

Brooklyn’s borough president on Sunday promised a group of Orthodox activists that he would push the Brooklyn delegation in the Assembly to support a potentially historic bill currently before the legislature that would help parents of yeshivah students with tuition.

Borough President Eric Adams met at Leon Goldenberg’s Flatbush office with leaders of the Flatbush Jewish Community Coalition, who told him that the Parental Choice in Education Act was “the community’s number one priority.”

The bill, proposed by Gov. Andrew Cuomo, would give low-income parents of non-public school students a $500 per child tax credit. It would also allow a 75 percent tax deduction for donors to a school scholarship fund.

Brooklyn has more yeshivah students than any other county in the state. Yet, several Assembly members representing significant Orthodox constituencies in Brooklyn are not in favor of the education tax credit bill. These include Rodneyse Bichotte and James Brennan, both of whom are Democrats from Midwood.

“As the political leader of Brooklyn, which has the state’s largest Assembly delegation,” the FJCC said in a press release, “it is imperative to bring the borough president’s voice into the conversation and ask him to be publicly supportive and encourage the borough’s large Assembly delegation to stand with the needs of the non-public school community.”

The tax credit bill, a version of which already passed the Senate under the sponsorship of Sen. Simcha Felder and Marty Golden, must pass by Friday, the last day of session.

This article appeared in print on page 1 of the June 16th, 2015 edition of Hamodia.