Talk Bronx New York

City officials said Monday that they were scrapping a controversial plan to replace some vocational programs at a Bronx high school with a troubled 18-month-old charter school.

The decision, a rare instance of the city changing course on a proposal to place a charter school in a public school, was made after a meeting last Wednesday between Joel I. Klein, the schools chancellor, and construction industry representatives. The construction executives expressed concern that the charter school would not be able to replicate the construction trades programs at the high school, Alfred E. Smith Career and Technical Education High School, said Gregg B. Betheil, who is in charge of the city’s vocational educational programs.

The city still plans to close Smith’s construction trade programs — in heating and ventilation, plumbing, electrical installation, carpentry and architectural engineering — because of low graduation rates. But instead of moving the charter school, the New York City Charter School for Architecture, Engineering and Construction Industries, into the space, the Department of Education will work with industry representatives to develop an appropriate replacement school, which may be a city-run school or a charter, Mr. Betheil said. Read more..

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The city has pulled the plug on a deal to house a controversial charter school in a Bronx school building.

The surprise move came after questions from the Daily News about the charter’s current and former board members - two of whom hold powerful jobs at the Education Department.

“It’s clear the [Education Department] checked its facts and the numbers just didn’t add up,” said Dick Dadey, executive director of the Citizens Union. “This was a bad decision that raised all kinds of ethical issues.”

Last month, the New York City Charter High School for Architecture, Engineering and Construction Industries won the prized space inside Alfred E. Smith High School, which is being phased down.

Irma Zardoya, a high-ranking Education Department consultant who works at its Tweed headquarters, is the chairwoman of the charter school’s board.

Santiago Taveras - an interim acting deputy chancellor with the Education Department - was a board member for the charter until June. Read more..

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The seat of City Councilman Larry Seabrook remains empty during Thursday’s session.

 Indicted City Councilman Larry Seabrook was a no-show at Thursday’s Council meeting - leaving the spotlight on one of his Bronx colleagues still in the cross hairs.

Councilwoman Maria del Carmen Arroyo, whose nephew Richard Izquierdo was indicted on charges of looting nonprofit groups she funded, hid behind a wall of aides and security officers as she entered and left the Council.

“I have no comment, no matter what you ask,” Arroyo said.

Sources say Arroyo is a target of the Department of Investigation’s probe of the Council’s $48.8 million pork budget, in which at least seven members have been caught steering tax money to nonprofits and community groups that benefit their relatives.

Speaker Christine Quinn (D-Manhattan) said she has made the pork process more transparent since she became speaker four years ago - and insisted none of the abuses could happen now.

“All of those allegations occurred before the reforms we put in place,” Quinn said. “I do not believe that what is alleged to have happened could happen today under our new system.”

Investigators are less convinced. They have expanded their probe to include two Bronx Assembly members suspected of misusing state funds.

One is Arroyo’s mother, Assemblywoman Carmen Arroyo, who sent money to Izquierdo’s nonprofits. Prosecutors say he stole more than $180,000, using some of it to pay for tropical trips for the mother-daughter duo.

Assemblyman Peter Rivera is also the subject of an ongoing investigation by state Attorney General Andrew Cuomo.

Cuomo is looking into allegations highlighted by the Daily News regarding Rivera’s ties to a now defunct nonprofit in the Bronx called Neighborhood Enhancement for Training Services (NETS).

Rivera sponsored $1.3 million in “member items” for NETS, which happened to employ some of his campaign workers, including his son. NETS bought and renovated a building that sits empty. It’s unclear where much of the public money went. Read more..

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Council Member In Funding Flap 

Bronx City Council member Maria Del Carmen Arroyo has a unique way to get taxpayer support for her family.

Last year she sponsored $82,500 in Council “discretionary funds” into a nonprofit that employed both her sister and nephew, the Daily News has learned.

Arroyo’s sister, Iris, was “fiscal officer” for the South Bronx Community Corp., where a former employee accused her of incompetence that led to thousands of dollars of federal liens filed against the group.

Iris Arroyo’s son, Richard Izquierdo, was also listed as an executive at the agency; he claims he’s not paid.

The Arroyos’ arrangement comes as the feds charged two staffers of City Council member Kendall Stewart on Wednesday with embezzling discretionary funds through their nonprofit.

No one has been charged with a crime in the funding of the nonprofit that employed Arroyo’s relatives, and Stewart himself has not been charged with a crime.

Each City Council member is given a set amount to spend annually on “discretionary” items that are usually pet nonprofit causes within their districts.

Stewart’s aides were charged with siphoning off $145,000 in such funds through a nonprofit he funded.

Council member Arroyo is the former director of South Bronx Community Corp., which purports to “provide various services to the elderly, disabled and low income families” in the Bronx. Her mother, Assemblywoman Carmen Arroyo, was director of the nonprofit years before.

In her Council biography, the younger Arroyo claims to have been a “volunteer” at South Bronx, though records show her collecting $33,000 to $45,000 a year in 2001 and 2002.

She left the nonprofit after being elected to the Council in February 2005. Early last year, she was co-sponsor of a $75,000 “member item” and sole sponsor of a $7,500 member item for South Bronx Community Corp., records show.

Arroyo confirmed Wednesday she’d sponsored the money for the group, but insisted it was allocated only after her sister, Iris, and Iris’ son, Richard, had left.

“I know that when the Council discretionary funds were allocated, I know that they were no longer there,” she said.

Nevertheless, she couldn’t say when her sister left. As of February 2007, Iris Arroyo was signing tax documents as the group’s “fiscal officer,” records show.

Also the group received $50,000 in discretionary funds in 2006, although at the time sponsors were not publicly listed. Read more..

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