As he named a new schools chancellor Wednesday, Mayor-elect Zohran Mamdani reversed course on a key but controversial campaign promise: to end mayoral control of the New York City public schools.
“I will be asking the Legislature for a continuation of mayoral control,” Mamdani said during a news conference in northern Central Park to formally appoint Kamar Samuels, a local Manhattan superintendent, to the post.
But he said it might look different under his watch.
“I will also be committed with my incoming schools chancellor to ensure that the mayoral control we preside over is not the same one that we oversee today,” the mayor-elect added, hours before he was set to be sworn Thursday.
On the campaign trail, Mamdani expressed interest in sharing more authority with students, parents and the adults who make schools run every day — principals, teachers and other school staff members. But he stopped short of sharing his plans to remake the current system of school governance, including whether that could involve giving up his power to unilaterally appoint a chancellor or otherwise weaken that individual’s sway.
Currently, the mayor picks the chancellor and appoints a majority of members to the Panel for Educational Policy, a citywide body most similar to a school board in districts across the country.
The mayor’s role in determining the makeup of the panel means it usually votes in accordance with City Hall’s directives. But at the end of the Adams administration, that practice started to break down, with the board most recently pushing to abbreviate an extension of outdated school bus contracts. The state Legislature has also made a number of changes in recent years to add more perspectives to the panel, including parent members elected by local community districts.
David Bloomfield, a professor of education law and policy at Brooklyn College and the CUNY Graduate Center, called Mamdani’s appointment of Samuels a good pick, while also “a strong show of mayoral control, which is unexpected.”
Mamdani acknowledged the discrepancy: “With the appointment of Kamar, I want to acknowledge I have been skeptical of mayoral control in the past, even at times going as far as wanting to end the system entirely.”
“So, though I have concerns about mayoral control, I also acknowledge that New Yorkers need to know where the buck stops: with me,” the mayor-elect said.
He continued to promise more engagement with families, including empowering parent coordinators at each school and restructuring how meetings are run so that working parents “can actually attend them.”
Leonie Haimson, a prominent local education advocate, called the reversal “very troubling.”
“Every mayor has promised more parent input and then, when push comes to shove, they just do what they want,” Haimson said.
Prior chancellors have lobbied — forcefully — to maintain control of city schools, with former schools chief David Banks going so far as to announce he had no interest in remaining in the post without that structure in place.
The outgoing chancellor, Melissa Aviles-Ramos, who after Mamdani’s win sat down for an interview with the Daily News to make her case for staying on in the position, said she “accomplished a lot under mayoral control,” and could do “much more” if the system remained in place. Some advocates had called for temporarily keeping Aviles-Ramos on for stability, while involving more people in the selection process or planning for more sweeping changes to school governance.
There appears to be little appetite in Albany for significant changes. That said, supporters of Samuels, a veteran education official with more than two decades of experience in the city’s school system, say he is uniquely positioned to lead the school system through a time of transition.
Samuels started his career as an elementary school teacher, then middle school principal, both in the Bronx. He later led District 13 in Brooklyn — where he was best known for overseeing a districtwide middle school integration plan — before moving to District 3 in Manhattan for the last few years. He is also a public school parent of two children.
In his current position, he has overseen an increase in literacy rates and access to rigorous International Baccalaureate programs. He also secured more than $10 million across the two districts to promote racial integration through admissions policies and school mergers.
“I have had every role, and in every role, my focus has been the same: delivering results rooted in care, clarity and high expectations for our students,” Samuels said.
Wednesday’s news conference came after the mayor-elect was initially supposed to make an appointment Tuesday at the same Central Park location. But that news conference was canceled on short notice, and Mamdani instead went to Elmhurst Hospital Center in Queens to announce a few other picks, including Helen Arteaga as his deputy mayor for health and human services.
Tuesday’s switch caused many Mamdani transition team sources to speculate that the chancellor announcement had for whatever reason been postponed at the last minute.
But Arteaga told The News on Wednesday that was not the case, saying her appointment was expected to be announced at the Central Park site, but she requested it be moved.
“I asked the mayor-elect’s team last minute if we could hold the press conference at my beloved hospital, Elmhurst Hospital, for all the meaning it holds to me and my professional journey,” said Arteaga, who has been the hospital’s CEO since 2021.
Samuels was set to step into his role as chancellor Thursday, just days before classes resume after the winter break next week. Aviles-Ramos has agreed to keep advising the school system for a month to help with the transition, Mamdani said.
