By Eileen Buckley
Buffalo, NY – Mayor Byron Brown has voiced his commitment to Buffalo public schools. He toured Hamlin Park Elementary Thursday with Schools Superintendent Dr. James Williams.
Hamlin Park Elementary is one of the newly renovated City schools that was part of phase one of the Joint Schools Construction Project. Brown received a warm welcome from the school children. Several students representing grades Pre-K through Eighth had a chance to meet their new mayor directly and delivered a batch of hand made congratulatory cards to him.
Brown says he applauds Williams and the school board for enacting an academic achievement plan that focuses on literacy at all grade levels. Brown says the city will work hard to improve public education. Later, he told reporters that he will try to find more funding for the district. But as Buffalo continues climbing out of its fiscal mess, it may not come directly from city revenues.
"Certainly I want to support public education," Brown said. "I would like to see more funding come into this school district. So, whether it is to allocate more money from the city side or helping to lobby Albany and Washington more aggressively, we will be looking at ways to generate more resources for our school district."
Right now, the city provides more than $68 million to the schools. That's about 13 percent of the district's annual budget.
In the coming months, Superintendent Williams will be submitting his first budget as the leader of city schools. He says he will try to be creative and work in collaboration with Brown and the Common Council. But Williams says he hasn't made any specific request of the new mayor just yet.
"I support the Mayor and I'm so proud of having a new mayor and the vision we have in this school district and in this community," Williams said. "I think Buffalo is in a position to become a very outstanding community, based on the Joint Schools Construction Project, based on what you see in this building, and based on what I am trying to do to improve the quality of education."
Williams says he plans to work with the new mayor as a "team."