New York City Mayor Eric Adams on Tuesday denied telling students and teachers to “shelter in place” during Friday’s biblical rain storm, leaving his education commish to clean up his mess.
During Adams’ first weekly off-topic press conference, Hizzoner was asked why the principals at the city’s 1,400 public schools were not made aware of the “shelter in place” order before he announced it during a late-morning press conference.
Adams said during the Friday briefing, “If you are at work or school, shelter in place for now,” invoking a city Education Department protocol that means no one is allowed in or out of any school buildings.
The lack of a heads-up to city schools prompted panic among administrators, teachers and parents.
About two hours later, as rain continued to pour from the sky at an historic rate, causing flooding in at least 150 schools, the city seemed to pull back on the edict when school administrators received an email from the DOE advising them there was no official order, apparently because the mayor may not been exactly precise in his language.
On Tuesday, the mayor denied issuing the order in the first place when asked about it.
“No, no, we said the safest place for children is in schools, that’s what I said,” Adams claimed.
Adams then let schools Chancellor David Banks apologize for the confusion.
“We should have had clearer communication, let me say that at the outset,” Banks said at Tuesday’s press conference. “All our kids were safe. We had no issues with any of our kids. But I think this incident does suggest that we needed to have a clearer level of communication all the way through.
“I think what [the mayor] was trying to say to everybody was, ‘Stay where you are. Don’t send kids in … you know, out into the streets,’ but shelter in place, essentially the terminology that says nobody’s allowed into the school as well, which could in fact, create a lot of chaos, and parents and families who are rushing to schools to get their kids as well,” the commish said.
“So we have to be clear that going forward. We’re doing our own internal review,” Banks said. “The main thing is that we communicated clearly enough with our superintendents that nothing happened, but we can do better. I think we will certainly be working to do better next time.”
Adams then explained he would let Banks make the call on a shelter in place declaration if one is needed in the future or decide if schools need to be closed due to inclement weather.
“We have never proclaimed once that we are perfect,” Adams added.
