Latina Mother Reflects on Past Hartford Mayor’s Non-Response to Call to Stop Her Child’s School Closure

A few weeks ago, I explained how the mayor appoints the majority of the Hartford school board. Thus, the mayor has power over board policy and practice, which includes decisions to close schools. Hartford – a mostly Black and Latino district – is the only city with this regressive political setup in Connecticut.

This political setup matters because board decisions to some degree reflect a mayor’s political ideology. As a recent interview with Reese on the Radio showed, the past mayor believes being elected means making unilateral decisions without working people’s collaboration or input as citizens.

After viewing that recent interview with Hartford’s past mayor, one Latina mother and an American citizen wrote me about their experience meeting him to call for their children’s school not to close. At this meeting, families asked for the past mayor to intervene in the school board that had a majority of his appointees. Despite their request to the mayor and the Board, their school closed. Here was this mother’s recent reflection nearly a decade after the meeting and closure.

Reflecting on the recent radio interview and meeting with the past Hartford mayor about the school closure:

Wow …. He said the quiet part out loud. The day we had the meeting with him We all felt like he HEARD what we were saying but he wasn’t LISTENING to us. He knew what we wanted and what we were fighting for but he already knew what route he was going to take. He is not a mayor for the people of Hartford. We told him that we put him in office and we can vote him out.

Reflecting when the meeting happened and what was past mayor’s response to their call:

I don’t remember the exact month . Just remembered it was cold outside. There were like 10-ish of us there to meet with him. Basically he just sat there to listen and nodded his head. Said he will discuss it with the Board. I don’t remember much because he didn’t say anything that interested me or the group.

Reflecting on what happened after their children’s public school closed and they were displaced:

I moved out because I didn’t like the way things were. I felt teachers, parents and students were not taken into consideration. The mood and enthusiasm wasn’t like it was before. I don’t know how others felt, if they stayed or moved. I have visited the area and it looks different.

This school closure decision matched the past anti-democratic approach to ruling Hartford and its schools. It’s a pattern. and this pattern persists in this city with a majority of Black and Latino people living in it.