The city Department of Education is putting the brakes on millions of dollars in contracts that critics call outrageous spending amid a dire cash crunch, The Post has learned.
The DOE was poised to plunk down up to $700 million alone to keep bus companies on standby through June, despite the closure of school buildings since March 13 amid the coronavirus crisis.
But after The Post revealed the mind-boggling planned expenditure — and Mayor Bill de Blasio warned that the schools’ budget would be cut by $827 millions through next year thanks to lost revenue from the pandemic — City Hall moved to at least postpone a vote on the bus contracts and a slew of others, sources said Sunday.
“The DOE should look at every single one of these contracts in light of what we’re experiencing: Is it absolutely necessary? Is it critical for kids? And are we using the services now?” said Leonie Haimson, executive director of Class Size Matters and a school-budget watchdog..
“If the answer to any one of these questions is no, they should cancel or eliminate the contracts.
“We’re facing a fiscal crisis, and we’re wasting millions of dollars for no reason,’’ Haimson said.
A vote on the proposed new contracts and extensions is now off the table until April 29, said Isaac Carmignani, a member of the DOE’s Panel for Educational Policy, which reviews expenditures for the department.
“It’s either to get more answers … or some things might be pulled,’’ he said of the extra time to mull over the deals.
As for the bus contracts, “I want to see something for our money,’’ Carmignani said.
The department also wants to award contracts to spend up to $4.5 million a month through June on private companies to supply up to 350 nurses. Currently, the DOE is paying for only 35 contracted nurses to staff centers for children of first-responders and health-care workers, a spokeswoman aaid.
But the DOE has 500 nurses on its own payroll, with only half of them working in the centers or in hospitals. The department could not explain why the contracted nurses are needed while some 250 school nurses are sidelined.
“I have no idea why they would need to hire more nurses right now,’’ said Kimberly Watkins, president of Community Education Council 3, the parent advisory group covering schools on the Upper West Side and in Harlem.
“You would think the DOE nurse pool would be sufficient,’’ Watkins said.
The department also was set to ink a $40 million contract with IBM to install a data-storing SIM card and software in each of the 300,000 iPads the DOE it is buying from Apple for students without an online device.
A DOE spokeswoman would not say how much the DOE is shelling out for the iPads, but a City Council source said it’s $189 million — or about $630 per device.
Other contracts would allow the DOE to pay vendors millions of dollars for “professional development’’ for educators.
Also up for a vote was a two-month, $1.2 million contract with Accenture, a private firm, to provide “management consulting” on issues related to COVID-19. The DOE would not give the firm’s hourly rate.
The DOE has been asked to consult the city’s Office of Management and Budget on the proposed deals, Carmignani said.
Mayoral spokeswoman Freddi Goldstein said, “At the request of the mayor, we have postponed the meeting while we review the bus contracts.”
She declined to comment further.