On Monday, Sen. Simcha Felder prompted a blow-up in talks when he pushed for an exemption from curriculum requirements. | AP Photo/Hans Pennink With budget stalled, Felder pushes moratorium for yeshivas

ALBANY — State Sen. Simcha Felder is pushing for a moratorium that would prevent the state Education Department from updating its guidance on how local school districts are supposed to supervise the curricular standards of nonpublic schools — a stance that legislators say has hobbled progress on the estimated $170 billion state budget, which is stalled on several fronts.

It’s the latest iteration of a push by Felder, a Brooklyn Democrat who provides the chamber’s ruling Republicans with a crucial 32nd vote, to prevent investigations into yeshivas serving Orthodox Jews, mostly in Brooklyn. On Monday, he prompted a blow-up in talks when he pushed for an exemption from curriculum requirements.


Legislators spent Thursday waiting for deals to fall into place, but were in suspended animation as they ate dinner — senators were served Dinosaur Bar-B-Que — in their Capitol office suites. Outstanding issues include revenue from the sale of the Fidelis Catholic health insurance plan, the creation of a new state development district around Penn Station and a proposal to take away guns from people accused of domestic violence, among other things.

As the sun fell, it became increasingly unclear if the Assembly and Senate will be able to vote on a budget before leaving the Capitol for Good Friday and the start of Passover, which begins tomorrow at sundown.

State law requires students in nonpublic schools to receive a “substantially equivalent” education as those in public schools. Activists have long complained that some ultra-Orthodox yeshivas, a small fraction of the larger yeshiva community, are barely teaching English in their schools and are producing graduates who are not ready to enter the workforce.

Naftuli Moster, executive director of Yaffed, which has pushed the New York City Department of Education to investigate yeshivas, said Felder’s push was “outrageous.”

“If anything, we should be fighting in the other direction — for more oversight given that these yeshivas are getting millions of dollars of public money,” Moster said.

Felder declined to comment.

Moster and Assemblywoman Cathy Nolan (D-Queens), chairwoman of her chamber’s education committee, told POLITICO that Felder was now seeking a moratorium that would prevent the State Education Department from updating its guidance for districts on enforcing the provision.

Department spokeswoman Emily DeSantis said the new guidance was “still a work in progress” but that Education Commissioner MaryEllen Elia had met with an advisory council that includes some of the larger independent and religious school stakeholders.

The education department said it has consulted with several education groups. One was the New York State Council of School Superintendents, whose deputy director, Bob Lowry, said he heard concerns from some groups that felt the new guidance would be demanding to satisfy.

Said DeSantis: “The purpose of updating the guidance is to ensure that all New York state students, whether they attend a public or nonpublic schools, receive a quality education.”

Nolan said she was “very concerned” by the idea of a moratorium, and noted that she was open — and has previously supported — other items that have been directed to yeshivas in the past, including more funds for student busing.

“You should be proud of your schools and look to collaborate — not do an end run,” Nolan said. “I’m very concerned about this moratorium because I believe the commissioner has made a good-faith effort through this to get buy-in. … Anything that ties MaryEllen Elia and [Regents Chancellor] Betty Rosa’s hands is problematic to me.”

It’s unclear how long any moratorium would last, or even if it would be permanent. No bill language was available. Nolan said her understanding was it would “tie the hands of the department on a long-term basis.”

And as he did last year in the debate over the renewal of mayoral school control, Felder is using as leverage several items that are important to New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio, including design-build authority for the rehabilitation of the Brooklyn-Queens Expressway and the authorization of more speed cameras near schools.

New York City DOT Commissioner Polly Trottenberg traveled to the Capitol on Tuesday to meet with lawmakers and push for both issues. In an interview, she said she was hopeful about the Brooklyn-Queens Expressway — a $1.9 billion project that could be shortened by as much as two years with design-build contracting, she said.

“This is something the city really needs,” Trottenberg told POLITICO. “This is an incredibly complex and expensive project. If we could save some time and some money and reduce the impact on local neighborhoods and Brooklyn streets, that would be something really terrific for the city.”

Both the Assembly and Senate included authorization in their one-house budget bills, and a top aide to Gov. Andrew Cuomo — who has lauded design-build in other projects — signaled his support in a recent letter.

Speed cameras have less legislative momentum, but language was included in the Assembly’s budget priorities that would allow them to be placed in 290 school zones — double the existing authorization, which expires at year’s end — and allow cameras within a quarter-mile of schools, not just on adjacent streets.

A half-dozen advocates for the cameras, including Joan Dean, held a press conference Thursday morning near the Senate Republicans’ private conference room. Dean’s grandson, Sammy Cohen-Eckstein, was killed by a speeding driver near his Brooklyn home.

Dean stood beside Marco Conner, legislative and legal director for Transportation Alternatives, who said he remained hopeful.

“While other issues have been taken off the table affirmatively, we have not heard the same about speed cameras,” he said. “Hundreds of people are injured every single year and people are dying, also, in his district. Schools and yeshivas throughout New York City want this and we believe it’s not different in Senator Felder’s district.”

Spokespeople for de Blasio declined to comment. Speaking at a Thursday afternoon press conference in Manhattan, de Blasio said he was hopeful about speed cameras and wasn’t aware of the latest back-and-forth about yeshivas.

“I don’t know the latest on that, obviously those issues have been raised before by him,” the mayor said. “But you know I think the reality of the budget is there is a whole lot of moving pieces and I’m not clear honestly what is going to bring it together. I find the process in Albany very mysterious.”

Gloria Pazmino contributed to this report.