Tag: politics

Reckless Facilities Plan Will Devastate Philadelphia Communities

by Lisa Haver and Deborah Grill

Moffet Elementary parent Katy Donoghue testifies at March 12 district town hall.
(Photo: Lisa Haver)

You didn’t answer my question.”
Parents, teachers, students, community members at district facilities meetings

‘This is not a budget issue.”
From the District’s  2024-25 facilities plan presentation

School District of Philadelphia Tony Watlington Sr. has released a $2.8 billion Facilities Master Plan that, if passed by the Board of Education, will have a devastating effect on communities in every part of the city. The latest draft of the plan, issued on February 27, recommends 18 permanent school closures, 12 co-locations, 8 buildings to be given to the city at no cost, grade band changes in 34 schools, 16 catchment areas redrawn affecting approximately 33 schools in over 20 zip codes, and modernization projects at 159 schools to begin in 2032. Schools targeted for closure are fighting to stay open. With a couple of exceptions, no meetings were held at schools facing grade conversions or catchment area changes. Most of those recommendations, in fact, were issued weeks after the original plan. 

There are no projected costs for any of the recommendations or modernization projects in the plan. 
The Watlington administration and its consultants have assembled a house of cards. If a middle school is built in South Philadelphia, then students would feed into certain high schools. If a school is built in Kensington, then the catchment maps would be redrawn for the three high schools in that neighborhood. If the district creates an honors program in one high school, the students who transfer to the school after theirs was closed might get into that program. And the one that the entire plan balances on: If the district receives more funding from the state and if the district raises funds from unnamed philanthropic sources, they might be able to make improvements to over 150 school buildings. At almost every meeting, board members implore the public to call their representatives in Harrisburg and ask them to fully fund public schools. Yet this plan assumes that Harrisburg will fund a large part of it.  How can the district base a comprehensive 10-year plan on imaginary funding?

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Board Postpones Votes on Tax Abatements for Developers

Board of Education Action Meeting: August 21, 2025

by Lisa Haver

Photo: Lisa Haver

In his remarks at the August action meeting, Superintendent Tony Watlington warned of the impending SEPTA service cuts that are scheduled to go into effect on Monday, the first day of school for students. He promised that schools would not mark students late, at least for the first week or so. Yet Watlington presented no plan for getting to school the 52,000 district students who use SEPTA if the transit system goes through with eliminating over thirty of the city’s bus routes; no member of the board asked Watlington for any plan. He encouraged parents to carpool and to make use of the district’s $300.00 allotment for driving their children to school, but he provided no details on that program. Nor did he provide any guidance for parents and guardians who do not own cars. Many parents will walk their children to bus stops at which they will see a notice that no bus will be coming–that day or ever. Is the administration coordinating in any way with SEPTA to direct students and parents to a working bus route? Is the district planning to email parents and guardians–many of whom may not be aware of the service cuts? What’s the plan? Where is the leadership?

Ilene Poses contributed to this report.

Board Hears Only One Side on KOZ Abatements
Continue reading about the meeting here:

Public School Board Bars Public School Parents, Educators from Speaking and Attending

Board of Education Action Meeting: June 26, 2025

by Lisa Haver

“The Party told you to reject the evidence of your eyes and ears. It was their final, most essential command.” George Orwell, 1984

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CASA President Robin Cooper testifies at June 26 action meeting. (Photo: Lisa Haver)

A governing body convenes an action meeting. They listen to a presentation from the director of a department they oversee. The president of the board raises each issue, and members of the board comment and question. The president then calls on each member to give their position. He tallies the responses, then directs the department chief to carry out the action that the majority of the board voted for. Except when the Philadelphian Board of Education does this, according to Board President Reginald Streater, it’s not voting. True, the terms “motion”,  “roll call” , and “vote” were not used. But the board came to decisions on the futures of six charter schools in the renewal cohort after listening to Charter Schools Chief Peng Chao and deliberating on the information presented.  Streater called on each member to state their position on whether the school would be granted a 5-year renewal, a 1-year renewal, or no renewal. He counted their responses, then directed Chao on what type of document to draw up. How is that not voting? Every time APPS members called out that the board was voting, even though none of those charter items had been placed on the agenda, Streater insisted they were not.  The dictionary definition of the word “vote”: a formal indication of a choice between two or more candidates or courses of action, expressed typically through a ballot or a show of hands or by voice. The public’s faith in this board continues to erode because of its lack of transparency and public engagement, along with its reluctance to hold the administration accountable. Now they want to tell people not to believe what they see and hear with their own eyes and ears. 

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