NY Senate Leader Reiterates Vow Not to Allow Ramapo Overseer

ALBANY
Senate Majority Leader John Flanagan on Wednesday in the Senate chamber. (AP Photo/Mike Groll)
Senate Majority Leader John Flanagan on Wednesday in the Senate chamber. (AP Photo/Mike Groll)

New York state Senate leader on Wednesday repeated his promise, made last month to a Jewish group, not to allow the state to appoint an overseer over an Orthodox-majority school board.

Senate Majority Leader John Flanagan said at the start of the 2016 legislative session that some ideas in a state report on the East Ramapo school district are “palatable,” but not the proposal to allow a monitor with veto power.

“It’s a duly elected school board. That’s why we have elections. That’s why we have a democracy,” said Flanagan, according to a Lohud.com report. “These are local residents who get elected by their own peers and neighbors.”

Assembly Democrats last year passed a bill to allow the state education committee to appoint a monitor over the school district, which represents Monsey, Spring Valley and New Square, with powers to overrule the board. Flanagan led his chamber’s republican majority in beating back the bill.

This will now be a major issue in the current session, which ends in June. A group opposed to the orthodox community’s expansion in Rockland County, Strong East Ramapo, is planning a rally next Wednesday outside Gov. Andrew Cuomo’s State of the State address in Albany to press for a monitor with veto power.

To Read The Full Story

Are you already a subscriber?
Click to log in!