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Speaker 1: This is a podcast from wor Now more of the

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Speaker 1: WR Saturday Morning Show and Larry Minty Welcome Back.

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Speaker 2: Kids in Staten Island were told to return to school,

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Speaker 2: but with the roads not plowed and the school buses

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Speaker 2: or the plows not able to get through them, Staten

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Speaker 2: Island City council member Frank Morano says something has to change. Frank,

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Speaker 2: good morning to you.

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Speaker 1: Larry, good morning. Thanks for having me on. Great to

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Speaker 1: talk with you, even if it's to talk about less

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Speaker 1: than pleasant circumstances.

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Speaker 2: It is less than pleasant second circumstances. And the nice

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Speaker 2: thing is that at least on the news last night,

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Speaker 2: they were focusing on Staten Island and it didn't look good.

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Speaker 2: And I just can't understand why Mayor Mom Donni is

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Speaker 2: sending kids to school today. Especially he must see what's

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Speaker 2: going on in Staten Island.

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Speaker 1: Frank, it's absolutely crazy. I've reached out to the mayor,

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Speaker 1: as has a bipartisan group of elected officials, not just

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Speaker 1: in Stettlland but especially in state Lolands, so this is

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Speaker 1: not a partisan thing at all. The irony of all

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Speaker 1: ironies is the school's chancellor was supposed to have an

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Speaker 1: event today and he canceled it for inclement weather. You

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Speaker 1: know the CSA, the union that represents the principles. They

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Speaker 1: were supposed to have an event today. They canceled it

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Speaker 1: due to inclement weather. The UFT is telling their members,

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Speaker 1: if you don't feel comfortable and safe getting to work today,

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Speaker 1: stay home. You have to wonder what's the constituency for

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Speaker 1: not pursuing remote learning today? You still have and especially

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Speaker 1: as of an hour ago, you had streets that were

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Speaker 1: totally inadequately plowed. People and teachers and parents couldn't get

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Speaker 1: off their block, and especially in the teachers and principals cases,

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Speaker 1: they had nowhere to park once they got to school.

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Speaker 1: It's nuts. It is absolutely nuts. I had parents reaching

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Speaker 1: out to me last night saying that they were really

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Speaker 1: concerned that they had no way to get their child

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Speaker 1: to school, but that their kids were worried about jeopardizing

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Speaker 1: their perfect attendance record. There's no reason that there's no

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Speaker 1: reason for this. It's just it's needless. It's it's cruel.

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Speaker 2: To be honest, Frank, at the top of the show,

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Speaker 2: I just said, don't go. Yeah, you need to send

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Speaker 2: the message, don't go to school today, don't send your

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Speaker 2: kid to school because it's dangerous.

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Speaker 1: You know, I heard you and the and I think

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Speaker 1: you're exactly right. Look, I mean some schools may be fine.

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Speaker 1: If you live up the block from a school and

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Speaker 1: it's perfectly plowed and you can get to school and

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Speaker 1: you need help with childcare, fine, But you bring up

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Speaker 1: such a good point in that how much education is

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Speaker 1: really going to be happening today. There's all sorts of

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Speaker 1: teachers that are out, there's all sorts of kids that

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Speaker 1: are going to be out. So functionally, I understand you're

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Speaker 1: getting to check one of those days off for the

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Speaker 1: one hundred and eighty day calendar. Functionally, what educational purpose

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Speaker 1: is being served today? It's crazy. The other frustrating thing

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Speaker 1: is the incredible lack of public response from the MTA.

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Speaker 1: Right now, I have constituents waiting for a train in

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Speaker 1: Staten Island, unsure of if it's ever coming. We have

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Speaker 1: people just totally in the dark about their commute. The

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Speaker 1: MTA's website, the app, it's inconsistent, it's not giving people

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Speaker 1: any information. And look, I'm relying on information that I'm

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Speaker 1: getting kind of secondhand and from commuters about what's running

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Speaker 1: in terms of trains as best we can tell, nothing

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Speaker 1: is running between Tottenville and Huguenot. And again, Staten Island

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Speaker 1: doesn't have a subway. We're reliant upon cars, and we're

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Speaker 1: relying upon the one rail system that we have, which

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Speaker 1: apparently is not really running.

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Speaker 3: Rank This is Natalie, As you know, I grew up

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Speaker 3: in Staten Island as well as you were living there now.

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Speaker 1: Absolutely not always wearing our shared sweatshirt most of the day.

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Speaker 1: As I was shoveling.

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Speaker 3: Go Tottenville pirates, I always wondered, is there a reason

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Speaker 3: why we can't look at the New York City public

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Speaker 3: schools system as separate districts at sometimes because sometimes Staten

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Speaker 3: Island has an issue that the Bronx doesn't have, or

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Speaker 3: Queen's is having an issue that Manhattan is not having.

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Speaker 3: And to say that you have to close everybody when

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Speaker 3: somebody might be specifically having an issue always seemed insane

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Speaker 3: to me.

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Speaker 1: Natalie, You're exactly right a couple of things. One is,

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Speaker 1: we do have a separate school district, District thirty one.

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Speaker 1: And I do think that the superintendent here, doctor Poulton

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Speaker 1: is his name, should have a great deal of autonomy,

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Speaker 1: as all the superintendents should about making local decisions. Speaking

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Speaker 1: of Tottenville, by the way, the principle of Tottenville wrote

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Speaker 1: to me and all the other elected officials saying that, look,

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Speaker 1: they knew this storm was coming, and they made preparations

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Speaker 1: for remote learning for exactly this, and then all of

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Speaker 1: a sudden they're scrambling to try to figure out how

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Speaker 1: they're going to have school today. A lot of their

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Speaker 1: staff members weren't able to make it back from the

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Speaker 1: vacation last week because last week was President's Week. A

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Speaker 1: lot of them are stranded in places like Florida or

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Speaker 1: out of state, out of the county, and a lot

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Speaker 1: of other staff members, both in Staten Island and New Jersey,

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Speaker 1: are not able to come in because of their streets.

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Speaker 1: The custodial teams at a lot of these schools. I

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Speaker 1: only mentioned Tottenville not only because we went there, but

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Speaker 1: because it's so large and has such a large student body.

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Speaker 1: They've been working really around the clock, but there's still

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Speaker 1: substantial snowpiles. This is what the principal is saying. I think,

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Speaker 1: in terms of greater autonomy for school districts and for Burroughs,

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Speaker 1: that's one of the things that I mentioned again to

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Speaker 1: the Mayor this morning that I think, not personally but

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Speaker 1: via tech, that we need better borrow flexibility, but we

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Speaker 1: also need a charter change. You know, there's going to

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Speaker 1: be a Charter revision commission this year that was actually

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Speaker 1: appointed by Mayor Adams, And one of the things that

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Speaker 1: I'm hoping that their look at is if they want

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Speaker 1: to pump the brakes on parts of this city wanting

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Speaker 1: to secede, is allowing more borrow autonomy when it comes

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Speaker 1: to parking rules, when it comes to transit rules, when

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Speaker 1: it comes to schools. So yeah, I mean, Staten Island

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Speaker 1: is a very different place than Borough Park, is very

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Speaker 1: different place than Harlem, is very different place than you know,

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Speaker 1: than the Bronxes. So why should it be one size

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Speaker 1: fits all when you have different transit infrastructure, different weather

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Speaker 1: conditions as we're seeing with the latest storm. I completely agree.

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Speaker 1: I think there needs to be a change to the

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Speaker 1: charter to allow greater borrow autonomy. But I think even

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Speaker 1: within the current framework, the possibility exists where a District

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Speaker 1: thirty one, which is the Staten Island School district, can

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Speaker 1: make different decisions than the other school district.

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Speaker 2: It sounds like a great idea. But I say, with

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Speaker 2: all due respect, good luck with that. I don't think it.

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Speaker 2: I don't think they're going to go for that. But

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Speaker 2: we were talking to Hovey or Lohan, the acting Sanitation Commissioner,

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Speaker 2: a little while ago, and he says, there are a

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Speaker 2: lot of resources in Staten Island right now. They understand

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Speaker 2: the problem and they're trying to deal with it.

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Speaker 1: Have you seen this, Yes, there has been an uptick

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Speaker 1: in the number of trucks that we're sent here. But

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Speaker 1: I'll just say and again, And I think Commissioner Lohan

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Speaker 1: is a great commissioner. And I think if the mayor

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Speaker 1: wants to do the right thing by the hard working

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Speaker 1: men and women of New York strongest, he should take

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Speaker 1: the acting title away Lohand's title, because he really worked

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Speaker 1: his way up through the ranks. But if you looked

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Speaker 1: at the imagery either of the plow map at Plow

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Speaker 1: and yc. Or the overhead cameras that exist in places

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Speaker 1: like Midtown, and you compare that to what was going

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Speaker 1: on in Staten Island, it was the difference between East

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Speaker 1: and West Berlin. You had one part of the city

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Speaker 1: that looked like it was perfectly paved perfectly clean, functioning normally,

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Speaker 1: and another part of the city that was totally paralyzed

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Speaker 1: by snow. So there was an uptick not only in sanitation, trucks,

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Speaker 1: plows and a lot of vehicles that they had contracted

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Speaker 1: to do some plowing as well, which is a good thing.

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Speaker 1: But part of the problem is some of the plows

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Speaker 1: and you can't make it. But you can see if

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Speaker 1: you go to my Facebook page, people can see the

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Speaker 1: images they were getting stuck or were getting stuck in

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Speaker 1: the snow.

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Speaker 2: I saw it on the news. You can't make They're

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Speaker 2: too big for the streets too. It is all ridiculous. Frank,

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Speaker 2: I could talk to you all day, but we gotta go.

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Speaker 2: Thanks so much and I hope that the problem is

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Speaker 2: fixed soon. Frank Morano, City council member from Staten Island.

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Speaker 1: This has been a podcast from WR