Education issues, like politics, are local on Long Island

Daily Point

LI school coalition members talk cellphone policy, state aid, student assessments

Representatives of the Long Island Education Coalition visited with the editorial board Tuesday to discuss a range of educational issues that will come up during the new state legislative session which begins Wednesday. Some issues are long-standing such as how state aid is determined and how student performance should be assessed while others have their nexus in local control.

And on Long Island, with 124 school districts, the issue is, indeed, very local.

One of the hottest proposals circulating in Albany is a crackdown on student cellphone use. Gov. Kathy Hochul, who at first was considering an executive order, is now expected to seek legislation. Bob Vecchio, executive director of the Nassau-Suffolk School Boards Association, said the group opposes a statewide ban although it agrees that each district should have a phone-use policy in place.

"If a statewide mandate is put in place, it would have to have local flexibility on implementation and enforcement to make it effective," he said. Superintendents from the Baldwin, Longwood and Valley Stream 30 districts told us that each building and classroom often has its own policies depending on the age of the students. There was concern in the group that such a law would open the door for "the state to dictate classroom management issues," Vecchio said.

Disagreeing on the topic of a specific legal ban was Peter Verdon, New York State United Teachers' Suffolk regional staff director, who said the organization opposes cellphone use because it disrupts classrooms and because of the overall long-term negative mental health consequences of social media use. The union is planning a conference on Long Island to present data and experts on the negative effects on cellphones in the classroom.

At least, a cellphone ban doesn't have much of an associated cost, other than for secure pouches for surrendered phones if that's the district’s choice, noted Vecchio. Which brought the conversation around to what the group sees as more-costly unfunded mandates. A new state law requires schools to shut down if the classroom temperature is above 88 degrees. That means either installing expensive air-conditioning units or sending the kids home. The alternative is to supply air-conditioning units, which the superintendents said is expensive and a lengthy process. More state funding would be welcome. That led the conversation, after almost two hours, to Albany's mandate to have a fleet of zero-emission school buses by 2035. Predictably, the school boards want more time and more money. "Do you have a few more hours?" asked Vecchio.

— Rita Ciolli rita.ciolli@newsday.com

Pencil Point

Going green

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Final Point

Localities face a 'web' of lawsuits

For years, hundreds of municipalities around the nation have made use of an online system called SeeClickFix that allows the public to inform local officials of such problems as potholes and roadside trash.

On Long Island, those jurisdictions have included the Town of Hempstead, the city of Long Beach, and the villages of Garden City and Southampton, according to the SeeClickFix website. It’s basically an electronic concept of a 311 call system for reporting nonemergency complaints.

But now the ease of engagement may have costly consequences. The state’s highest court has ruled that what gets reported on SeeClickFix can make all the difference when a liability lawsuit is filed against a municipal government. Prior written warnings of a road condition in need of repair matters in court when someone sues over an injury or vehicle damage. On Dec. 17, New York State’s top court ruled 7-0 that a SeeClickFix report can be considered such a valid written warning.

The Court of Appeals decision in a case involving the city of Albany has implications for other jurisdictions that use SeeClickFix. It is not yet known how many liability claims around the state the decision may affect.

"Electronic communications fall within the plain meaning of the word ‘written,’" the court declared. "They serve as objectively observable and tangible records that are functionally equivalent to writings inscribed in a physical medium."

A man named Henry Calabrese brought the lawsuit. He was injured after losing control of his motorcycle, and attributed the accident to a road defect which Albany officials allegedly knew about but didn’t fix. The city tried to claim that SeeClickFix reports didn’t constitute adequate legal notice of a problem.

After the Court of Appeals ruling, Albany announced it would stop using SeeClickFix and urged complaints be made by phone. The court, however, had said "verbal complaints transcribed to a written telephone message ... do not satisfy the statutory requirement" for prior notice.

So the city’s government has changed plans. On Thursday, the Albany Common Council voted to amend the city code to allow the SeeClickFix program to be reinstated. At the same time, however, the council approved a bill to limit liability.

This latest measure says the city "is not liable for any damages or injuries on city property unless prior written notice in reasonable detail ... is manually subscribed, and shall be delivered to the Corporation Counsel by hand, first class, or certified mail."

In other words, it’s still got to be put "in writing" — under the traditional definition of that practice.

The question on Long Island is whether other municipalities will also try to change their processes to protect from potential liability claims. An obscure matter, perhaps — but one that could affect millions of taxpayer dollars.

— Dan Janison dan.janison@newsday.com

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