Big Mess in Big Town

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This newspaper ad, printed a month ago in the New York World-Telegram and Sun, and paid for out of the pockets of a Harlem school staff, touched it off. The teachers begged for a cleanup of their rat-and cockroach-infested building, protesting against "sagging walls, unsanitary toilets, leaking roof, refrigerator temperatures in the winter and oven-like sweltering during spring." By last week that appeared to be a rough description of many New York City schools, and four sets of investigators were looking into far-reaching corruption in the most colossal, colossally troubled school system in the nation.

Since this is an election year in New York (see THE NATION), the teachers got fast action. Mayor Wagner personally visited the school and got more publicity than he bargained for when a rat scurried across his path in the auditorium. Pictured in the papers, this scene encouraged a rash of complaints.

Checkout & Checkup. Superintendent of Schools John J. Theobald, on a six-week Ford Foundation tour of European schools, hurriedly beached his gondola in Venice after a summons by Wagner, returned to send a 35-page questionnaire to all 860 principals, asking for itemization of urgent repairs. No fewer than 845 replied. Among their beefs:

P: Termites chewed up 228 health-education records stored in a vault at one school, and the window frames in another.

P: Concrete blocks weighing 25 lbs. crashed through the ceiling of a junior high school auditorium.

P: Aviation Trades High School, built in 1958 for $6,500,000, needed $500,000 in 22 major repairs because of short cuts permitted in meeting specifications.

P: Faulty plumbing in one school backed up waste from toilets into kitchen sinks and dishwashing machines.

Theobald's defense of the neglect, which affected almost as many new schools as old ones, was to blame the past. "I do not believe our schools have been properly maintained for 40 years," he said. Obviously, he was right. For years the ponderous bureaucracy had left unspent most of the millions allocated for repairs. Last year, for the first time, the full maintenance budget of $18 million was spent, but the backlog for needed repairs is estimated at $75 million.

But there was more to it than that. Two district attorneys, the city investigation commissioner and a bipartisan state investigation soon turned up evidence, as a foretaste of corruption, that 57 current and former school-construction employees had cashed $50,000 in gift certificates from contractors. Said Theobald: "Stupidity, skulduggery, or both."

Public Hearing, Private Gain. Last week, as the State Investigations Commission opened the first round of public hearings on its 2 1/2-year inquiry into the $100 million-a-year school building program, the smell of skulduggery was unmistakable. The former chief of the construction program said that he had accepted cameras, rare wines, steaks and cash ("in the spirit of Christmas giving"), but insisted that no one had ever tried to bribe him. An assistant supervisor was accused of charging a 5% "commission" to contractors to speed up profitable contract revisions. Two high Board of Education officials testified that they were asked to solicit political campaign contributions for District Attorney Frank Hogan (unknown to Hogan) from architects doing business with the board. The chairman of the board's Committee on Buildings and Sites was revealed as the leading stockholder in an outfit owning land on which a new school was to be built.

The scandal seemed a standard scene from the Wagnerian opera: building inspectors on the take because the Board of Education pays them too little, winks at their peccadilloes, and demoralizes them with the behavior of those higher up. But it struck the public hard; playing with the safety of schoolchildren was more than ordinarily corrupt. Said Theobald, a civil engineer whose academic-political experience as a former president of Queens College and a former deputy mayor should have prepared him for Big Town surprises: "It is quite a jolting experience."

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