{news} New Britain Herald reports on mayoral debate

[David Bedell]

New Britain Herald
10/06/2005

Candidates square off

By GEORGE MOORE, Staff Writer

NEW BRITAIN -- The three mayoral candidates squared off in a debate 
Wednesday night in which each offered a distinctive strategy to address New 
Britain’s insufficient early childhood education capacity.

Republican Mayor Timothy Stewart, Democratic challenger Jason Jakubowski and 
Green Party challenger Miguel Nieves participated in the first mayoral 
debate held by the New Britain Discovery Collaborative at the Special Care 
Community Center.

The nonprofit organization advocates for all-day kindergarten and increased 
support of pre-school programming. The Discovery Collaborative estimates 
that 47 percent of New Britain children attend a pre-school program -- a 
large disparity when compared to Meriden at 78 percent, Bristol at 86 
percent and Berlin at 98 percent.

To address this disparity, Stewart emphasized the importance of providing 
funding for capital school projects, which create much needed space for 
pre-school activity. Current construction work at Vance and Lincoln 
Elementary schools, he said, will create new pre-school slots.

"We’ve done everything we can to ensure that those are quality programs," 
Stewart said, "and that they have the right facilities for our kids to 
learn."

Stewart said he worked with the Human Resources Agency to obtain an 
$8.2-million grant, which will allow it to renovate its building and, 
therefore, increase its Head Start capacity.

Jakubowski praised the Human Resources Agency and mayoral support for school 
expansion projects, but said money needs to be secured to provide staff 
support.

"I think that is terrific news, but even when those classrooms do come 
online, we’ll still be 20 percent behind the state average," he said. "This 
is really a two-pronged problem: There is a facility problem, but there is 
also a personnel issue."

Nieves said he wants to work with local organizations in addition to funding 
school expansion projects. "My plan will be working with the assistance 
programs we have now -- the HRA program and the YMCA program."

While all three candidates agreed that parent involvement was crucial, they 
differed on how to increase it. Nieves said more support and dedication from 
parents to parent teacher organizations was needed.

"I will work closely with the PTO," he said. "In the time that I’ve been 
here in New Britain since 1990 ..I have found that the PTO does a great job 
in the city dealing with parents. It is sad to see that the parents neglect 
to be part of the PTO."

Jakubowski said the issue was more of a socioeconomic problem.

"The problem is a lot of parents don’t have the means to do that," he said. 
"What we need to do is to start focusing on ..innovative ideas that open up 
our schools after hours."

Stewart, who served on the Board of Education from 1995 to 1999, said 
schools across the board are finding ways to open their doors after hours. 
He said that he will consider mandating parent involvement in some 
subsidized programs.

"Maybe we can even mandate parent involvement if your kid is in a program," 
he said. "I think it’s a wonderful thing for us to do, along with providing 
transportation to help parents to get there, because that is a big problem."

Asked about all-day kindergarten, Nieves said he supports it and will work 
with HRA to increase its enrollment. Jakubowski said the federal government 
has to fulfill its promise to fund such programs and that he will push for 
such funding. Stewart noted that, as the mayor, he has no direct control 
over the BOE’s policy, but supports all-day kindergarten.

Shermane Fletcher, who attended the debate, said she’s been concerned about 
education in the city ever since she fought for her daughter’s education. 
Last year, Fletcher had to enter her daughter, Zhenia, into a lottery to get 
her into a full-day kindergarten class. Fletcher eventually got her daughter 
into that class. She brought Zhenia, 6, who is now in first grade, to the 
event Wednesday night.

"There are a lot of issues we’re facing," she said. "We have to get our act 
together."

The entire debate was recorded by Nutmeg TV. It will air on Channel 21 on 
Tuesdayat 6 p.m. and Oct. 22 at 7 p.m.

George Moore can be reached at gmoore@ newbritainherald.com or by calling 
(860) 225-4601, Ext. 225.

©The Herald 2005