NYC NOW - March 21, 2024: Midday news

Episode Date: March 21, 2024

Manhattan's largest school district is considering barring transgender girls from playing sports with teams that match their gender identity. And one of the bus companies Mayor Adams is suing for shuttling thousands of migrants from Texas to New York City will stop, at least for now. Meanwhile, an eligibility scandal in New York City's public high school basketball league prompted the cancellation of a championship game but misconduct is much more widespread than the education department initially let on. WNYC's Ramsey Khalifeh reports. Also, Mayor Eric Adams is proposing major cuts to the city’s early education budget. Now, parents are worrying whether they’ll get a slot in the city’s free 3-K program. WNYC’s Jessica Gould has new data showing where the competition is fiercest for those seats.

Welcome to NYC Now. Your source for local news in and around New York City from WMYC. It's Thursday, March 21st. Here's the midday news from Michael Hill. Manhattan's largest school board district is considering barring trans girls and playing sports with teams that match their gender identity. The local community education council voted last night on a resolution, urging the city to create a committee to look at the Department of Education's guidelines, on gender and sports. Chase Strangio is a district parent and a civil rights and constitutional litigator with the ACLU. As a trans person myself, as a parent, and as a civil rights lawyer, I have seen and am confronted daily with the consequences and painful impact of discriminatory

actions like what Resolution 248 represents. The move comes a month after the Nassau County Executive have signed an executive order, barring trans women from participating in women's sports teams at county facilities. One of the bus companies Mayor Adams is suing for shuttling thousands of migrants from Texas to New York City will stop, at least for now. In court documents, Roadrunner Charters says it will stop busing migrants while the suit moves through New York courts. The Adams administration is suing 17 bus companies for bringing migrants to the city.

It's seeking more than $700 million in reparation. from the companies to recoup the cost of caring for migrants over the last two years. Taking a look at your forecast now, 37 with sunshine, a sunny day on tap, a high of 43, gusty, which means the wind will keep the temperature feeling like it's in the 20s. Then tomorrow's sunny and 45, real feel again in the 20s early on, and then Saturday rain. We have an increased risk today for wildfire. Stay close. There's more after the break. An eligibility scandal in New York City's public high school basketball league prompted the cancellation of a championship game,

but misconduct is much more widespread than the education department initially let on. WNIC's Ramsey-C-Col-Kalife has more. It started with a statement that shook the local high school basketball world. School's chancellor David Banks said two teams were caught breaking the rules. One of them, Brooklyn's South Shore High School, was slated to play in a championship game last Friday. But it was canceled. South Shore student Ross Slime says their team was unstoppable. They just wanted us to get out the game.

You see, our players like 6, 7, they can't do nothing with that. Slime and his friends are mad the league wouldn't let their team play for the title. But public school athletic league records show the rule breaking went far beyond just two schools. That Eagle Academy Bronx, for example, was disqualified during the tournament's semifinals. Chancellor Banks was a founding principal at the school in 2005 and did not mention the team's transgressions in his statement. A school spokesperson says Banks's statement was meant to focus only on why the championship was canceled. Coaches and students are asking questions about what exactly happened.

New York City Public Schools' all-time winning his coach Ronan the Clario of Cardozo High says there must be more to the investigation into the league than meets the eye. You look at it like this. There's got to be some truth to a lot of this because they wouldn't have kicked them out of the playoffs. There's definitely a crime there. Evidently there's something there that's egregious. A winner of the championship game has not been crowned. Remzi Khalifa, WNYC News.

I'm Sean Carlson for WNYC. Many parents need affordable child care to stay in New York City. But Mayor Eric Adams is proposing major cuts to the city's early education budget. Now parents are worrying whether they'll get a slot in the city's free 3K program. WNIC's Jessica Gould has new data showing where the competition is fiercest for those 3K. seats and she joins us now. Jess, what are the biggest takeaways from this data? Okay, big takeaways. Demand for free preschool seats for three-year-olds exceeds supply in nearly half of New York City zip codes. So if parents are worried about whether they're going to get a seat, they're not crazy.

But in total, across the city, there were actually more seats for three-year-olds than applications. So there were nearly 53,000 seats available for a total of around 42.2.000. 2,000 applicants for 3K. That's a surplus of 10,000 seats or so. So we have two seemingly contradictory stories here. In some areas, parents are competing for seats and in other areas, there are vacant slots. So where are those hotspots where supply does not meet the demand for 3K? According to city data, the hottest spots where parents are facing a shortage of seats are

in Bath Beach in southern Brooklyn and Parkchester in the Bronx. and the places where there are a lot of vacant seats are the lower east side in Chinatown, East Flatbush, and Brownsville, among others. So we should note that you can see a map of those areas on our news website Gothamist. Mayor Eric Adams and School's Chancellor David Banks have been saying for a while now that 3K is mismanaged and that they can cut seats and save money without reducing access. Does this data back that up? It's true what they say about this mismatch of supply and demand. But these experts I talked to pointed out that a lot of the vacant seats are full-day, year-round seats, which sound great, but they require applicants to be income-eligible and show they're working. And then other open seats receive federal Head Start funding, which is another program that caters to low-income families, but also has some requirements.

The experts think the problem isn't that there are too many seats. They think that parents want them, but they need more help knowing that the seats exist. and getting through the application process. Now, there is a fight over the future of 3K. In fact, it's a key part of the budget negotiations between the mayor and the council right now. What's the latest on that front? Yeah, former mayor de Blasio wanted to dramatically increase 3K seats. But he was relying on federal stimulus dollars to do that, and that money is now running out.

Then after Mayor Adams took office, he pulled back from plans to expand 3K. And now he's proposing cutting $170 million. from early education, and that's on top of these expiring federal funds. The council opposes these cuts, and parents have been mobilizing to fight them. Rebecca Bailen is executive director of New Yorkers United for Child Care, and she said many parents in her group were counting on free 3K as a way to stay in the city. They'll have to spend $20, $30,000 or $40,000 a year per child. And for some families I've spoken to,

that would mean moving out of the city, not having another kid or making major sacrifices. What does the administration say to that? At an Education Budget Council hearing this week, schools chancellor David Bang said he thinks there's going to be good news coming on early childhood programs. This is what he said. I am fighting like heck to make sure that those cuts are restored. And I have great confidence that in the coming weeks, we will have really good news around early childhood.

But Adams was asked about this yesterday. and he wasn't quite as optimistic. He said he's going to look at the cuts, but, and these were his words, were not out of the woods yet. Okay, so brass tacks here, Jess. Will parents who want a preschool seat for their three-year-old get one? Officials say yes, but that seat may not be as close to home as they might want. And that's significant because, as parents know, getting your three-year-old to walk more than a couple blocks or taking a stroller on the subway, that can be extremely tough.

Yeah. Applications for these spots are in, and parents will be notified in mid-May. It's WNYC education reporter, Jessica Gould. Jess, thanks so much. Thank you. Thanks for listening. This is NYC now from WNYC. Be sure to catch us every weekday, three times a day, for your top news headlines and occasional deep dives.

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