Senator Reverend Ruben Diaz: Enough Already with the Rubber Rooms!

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
MEDIA ADVISORY
February 7, 2010

Senator Reverend Ruben Diaz: Enough Already with the Rubber Rooms!

New York State Senator Reverend Ruben Diaz (D-Bronx) is furious that New York City continues to coddle, harbor and cater to 660 teachers who are alleged to be unfit yet receive salaries and benefits for doing nothing all day in ‘Rubber Rooms’ throughout the city. 
 On behalf of his constituents, Senator Reverend Diaz has issued the following statement:
“New York City must no longer permit a gift of several million dollars for incompetent former teachers who sit in the infamous ‘Rubber Rooms’ drawing full salary while the Department of Education drags its feet and refuses to promptly address allegations of teacher misconduct and incompetence. What uniform service gets the benefit of ‘suspended WITH PAY’ without any work responsibilities?
If there are instances of unjust accusations, those teachers should be entitled to reinstatement with retroactive pay. Those teachers found to truly be unfit to teach should be fired – immediately. During this time of serious budget cuts where children may no longer have metro cards to travel back and forth to school, Rubber Rooms for teachers are a luxury no child can afford.
I call upon the New York State legislature leadership, Senator John Sampson, Assemblyman Sheldon Silver and my colleagues in the Senate to allow us to introduce and pass legislation immediately and give New York City's Department of Education the necessary power and tools to get rid of this scandalous abuse and waste of money while our children suffer."