Philly's asbestos crisis
Maybe you've heard the hot goss: the School District of Philadelphia is suing Philadelphia City Council. At stake is who controls school facilities safety standards. So I was looking at the district's new budget and some of the stuff in there, along with the legal and political and economic context, make me wonder what's going on.
The lawsuit fight is really about asbestos in schools, which has been an ongoing crisis. But even more specifically, this lawsuit is about the crisis that forced multiple schools--including a flagship magnet school--to close over the last few years (though what the law actually entails seems up for debate).
That fancy school is called Science Leadership Academy, which was set to share a renovated building with a somewhat less fancy school called Benjamin Franklin. The district had to close that building after spending $50 million on its because of asbestos and it added to the constant uproar over the city's schools. Not to mention the time when a veteran teacher got a form of cancer associated with asbestos exposure. They had to knock down that building and build a new one.
So in the wake of the SLA/Franklin fiasco, city council members passed a bill that would create an independent oversight committee to monitor asbestos levels and decide if schools are safe enough to open. (One of those council member is Derek Green, who's running for mayor.) The bill's stipulation of standards isn't even that strong. What's controversial is that the city gets to control who's on the oversight board, who in turn could have the power to prevent schools from being open if the buildings don't pass muster.
Meanwhile there was a big leadership turnover at the district. There's a new superintendent, new school board president, and the longtime chief financial officer--who had just been put in charge of operations--became the governor's budget secretary.
There's also still ambiguity about who exactly is in charge of capital programs and facilities maintenance at the district. There's no executive director at capital programs. Vince Pagliaro is the executive program director so...I guess him? The new leadership and ambiguity about what to do doesn't bode well.
Behind the numbers
Now let's get into the numbers. We know how much a full asbestos remediation program costs because there was reporting on it when UPenn, instead of paying taxes, gave a flashy $100 million over ten years to the district for asbestos.
Former superintendent Hite said on the record that it would cost $125 million to make district schools safe from asbestos. But when we look at the district's 2022-23 budget, we don't get anywhere near the full number. There's a projected $4.4 million per year expenditure in the capital programs section of the budget (it's the only place the word 'asbestos' occurs).
When we look at the broader categories of expenditure on environmental services we see more money, including a $75 million item under scholarships and stipends, which could be federal relief money. Of the $31 million going to capital and env services, $11 million is going to contractors.
So I have a bunch of questions: what's the plan here? Why is asbestos spending relatively low compared to the Penn gift ($10 million/year), the need ($125 million), and the pressure from city council? Is it a revenue problem? A leadership problem?
If it's a money problem, there are some things to consider. First is that charter school costs are just so so high. At $1.25 billion, charters take 33% of the yearly budget, which has gone up and up over the decade. Like, why?
Second, the district's reliance on the municipal bond market for capital programs money has been toxic. I'm working on a paper now tracking how much the district has borrowed from Wall Street vs. how much it's spent on buildings. I've found that because of the financial crisis, rapacious go go Wall Street deals, and high fees and interest rates on bonds, the Philly district has--at most--only spent 50 cents for every dollar they've borrowed between 2005-2019.
A Green New Deal for Philly Schools?
In terms of solutions, the district can take advantage of Inflation Reduction Act programs like infrastructure tax credits and capitalization for green banks, focus on electric heat pumps/HVAC and remediation. I don't see any evidence of them doing that though, particularly with the new leadership in capital programs and finance.
I do hope things get better, but the lawsuit feels like a bad situation created by a larger bad situation, out of which I don't see any path. Maybe a lefty mayoral candidate (I'm looking at Helen Gym here) could focus on IRA funding, and get people pumped about a Green New Deal for Philly Schools?