JERSEY CITY – The Jersey City Branch of the NAACP (National Association for the Advancement of Colored People) at the Feb. 18 Jersey City Board of Education meeting criticized the appointment by Gov. Chris Christie of former Jersey City Mayor Bret Schundler as the state’s education commissioner.
Schundler, 51, is a Westfield native who served from 1992 to 2001 as Jersey City mayor, the first Republican elected to that seat in nearly 100 years.
Jersey City NAACP Branch President Kabili Tayari, currently a Jersey City deputy mayor who coincidentally was hired in 1997 during Schundler’s tenure, issued a statement against Schundler that was read by NAACP officer Lorenzo Richardson.
In the statement, Schundler was criticized for his lack of “public, private, parochial or charter school” experience. Schundler served most recently as the COO of King’s College, a private Christian college in Manhattan.
“His appointment gives the appearance of an attack on Public Education, not that our education system is perfect,” stated Richardson from Tayari’s statement. “But he is clearly not the best choice to solve the problems of our Public Education system.”
During his time as mayor, Schundler gained a reputation as an advocate for giving parents vouchers to help them send their kids to private school rather than public. He is also pro-charter school, having founded the Jersey City Golden Door Charter School in 1998, located on Ninth Street in downtown Jersey City.
But he ran into controversy during the construction of the school, as $9.5 million in public bonds were utilized to erect it. There is a state law prohibiting public funds from being used for the construction of a charter school. The building instead was built as a community center to get around that problem. – RK