Dear Commons Community,

Following a lot of going back and forth on the issue, New York Governor Andrew Cuomo announced Sunday evening that Westchester, Nassau, Suffolk and New York City schools will close this week. Cuomo also said in a statement that New York City must put a plan in place to make sure that children who rely on school meals will still get fed and that parents, especially health care workers and first-responders, will be provided child care.

In a news conference later (see video above), Mayor Bill de Blasio said schools will close Monday and remain closed at least until April 20. The mayor said there is a chance schools could remain closed for the rest of the school year

The announcement came after widespread calls to close the schools and protests from “furious” teachers who thought it was irresponsible to keep schools open.

“It is time to take more dramatic measures,” the mayor said, adding that he knows “the full cost of shutting our schools.”

The decision came on a day when states and cities across the country took more dramatic measures to contain the coronavirus including closing restaurants, bars, and banning gatherings of 50 or more people.

Tony

Dear Commons Community,

Last night’s Democratic Party debate between Joe Biden and Bernie Sanders was a draw in my opinion. 

The first part focused almost entirely on the coronavirus and rightfully so. They agreed on how to address the coronavirus pandemic in the short-term. They didn’t agree on whether it’s time to talk about the long-term.

Biden’s and Sanders’ plans to address the pandemic looked very similar: Both called for free medical testing and treatment, establishing mobile testing sites, expanding hospital capacity, ensuring paid time off and expanded benefits.

During the debate, Biden was focused on the short-term.  Sanders wanted to talk more about the future. Specifically, he wanted to make the case for his signature “Medicare for All” health insurance system, which would guarantee government-sponsored health insurance for all Americans.

I thought Biden showed more empathy.   “People are looking for results, not a revolution. They want to deal with the results they need right now,” Biden said. “That has nothing to do with the legitimate concern about income inequality in America. That’s real. That’s real. But that does not affect the need for us to act swiftly and very thoroughly and in concert with all of the forces that we need to bring to bear to deal with the crisis now so no one is thrown out of their home. No one loses their mortgage. No one is kicked out of their house. No one loses their paycheck. No one is in a position where they have a significant financial disability as a consequence of this.”

Sanders in response had probably the best line of the night when he said:

“The first thing we’ve got to do, whether or not I’m president, is to shut this president (Trump) up right now, because he is undermining the doctors and the scientists who are trying to help the American people. it is unacceptable for him to be blabbering with unfactual information which is confusing the general public.”

They then moved to a discussion of social security, a prolonged exchange between the two over the former vice president’s history of supporting Social Security cuts. It’s a vulnerability that Sanders has sought to expose for some time, but he previously hadn’t had the chance to have an uninterrupted back-and-forth with Biden on the subject. 

Biden actually brought up the topic while claiming that one of Sanders’ television advertisements, which blasts Biden for previously supporting Social Security cuts, is inaccurate. 

But in the conversation that followed, Sanders managed to catch Biden flat-footed. Even as he denied calling for the cuts, Biden admitted that “everything was on the table” ― including Social Security cuts ― when he participated in bipartisan budget talks as part of the Obama administration. 

Biden tried to claim that the talks did not constitute support for Social Security cuts because he and the Obama administration discussed them “in order to get the kinds of changes we need on other things.”

But Sanders argued the reason didn’t matter ― the conversation had still occurred. “Maybe it’s a good reason, maybe it’s not,” he said. “All that I am saying is you were prepared to cut and advocated for the cuts.”

There followed a lengthy  discussion on climate change.  I thought both addressed this well although Biden emphasized the need for the United States to be a world leader again as it was during negotiations for the Paris Climate Change Agreement.

Perhaps the most interesting outcome of the debate was Biden’s commitment that if nominated, his pick for vice president will be a woman. 

Sanders said that “in all likelihood” he would pick a woman also to join him on the ticket.

“To me, it’s not just nominating a woman,” Sanders said. “It is making sure that we have a progressive woman, and there are progressive women out there.”

This Democratic field for the presidential nomination started out as the most diverse in U.S. history, featuring a record number of women and several people of color. But as the race went on, only Biden and Sanders ― two white men in their 70s ― gained traction with the voters.

Good evening of policy exchanges and much better than the previous free for all bickering that characterized the earlier debates.

May the best candidate win!

Tony

Dear Commons Community,

There is a heated debate brewing as to whether schools and particularly the large urban school districts should close or not due to the coronavirus.  Los Angeles, Boston and Atlanta have chosen to close their schools while Chicago and New York have kept them open.  Parents appear to be on both sides of the issue while teachers lean to closure.  Here is an analysis courtesy of the Associated Press focusing on New York City.

“As schools across the U.S. shut down in hopes of helping to fight the coronavirus, New York City officials are arguing just the opposite: They’re keeping the nation’s largest school system open to ensure that health and emergency workers aren’t tied down with kids at home.

But teachers, many parents and some health experts say the city is making a grave mistake by continuing to call more than 1.1 million children to public schools even as it calls for “social distancing” elsewhere to stem the virus’ spread.

While many families elsewhere in the country spent Saturday making hasty plans for an unexpected school shutdown, New Yorkers debated the city’s decision.

“You’re not going to have a functioning health care system if the folks in the medical field, the doctors, the nurses, the techs, everyone has to stay home with their kids,” Mayor Bill de Blasio said on MSNBC.

Parent Anna Gold didn’t see it his way.

“It would be a hardship if they closed the schools, but I think it’s a necessary one we need to take in the space of this emergency,” said Anna Gold, who pulled her third-grader and kindergartner out of public schools in Brooklyn on Friday and plans to keep them home next week.

Another parent, Dori Kleinman, said she wishes the mayor would allow individual schools to make a decision about whether to close.

“I don’t want my children at risk,” she said.

New York City became a big outlier as other major U.S. cities, including Los Angeles and Boston, and several states decided to shutter schools for a week or more.

New York health care workers’ unions said the city shouldn’t close schools without a plan to care for the children of those staffing hospital wards. The unions and city officials fear that even New York’s massive health care system could be quickly overwhelmed by a surge in serious cases of COVID-19, the disease caused by the new coronavirus.

“If it’s apparent it’s the safe thing, then it must be done, but it’s going to have a big impact on nurses,” said Eileen Toback, executive director of the New York Professional Nurses Union, which represents nurses at Manhattan’s Lenox Hill Hospital. “They’re on the front lines. They need to be here in shifts. They’re single mothers or single fathers sometimes, so they don’t have many backups, and the hospital is 24/7.”

De Blasio, a Democrat, has not ruled out closing schools eventually and said city officials would continue a day-by-day examination. But he has noted that the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention say that while there can be reasons to shut schools, it’s not clear that closures will make more difference than other measures, such as hand-washing and isolating the sick.

But Dr. Dena Grayson, a researcher and infectious disease expert who works in the private sector, called de Blasio’s decision so far to keep schools open “incredibly foolish.”

“The virus will spread like wildfire among the children. They get infected, and they can spread that virus easily to older people who are at a much higher risk,” she said.

The city has confirmed coronavirus cases in at least two public school students and at least one teacher. Their schools have been closed for cleaning but are expected to reopen.

For most people, the virus causes only mild or moderate symptoms, such as fever and cough. For some, especially older adults and people with existing health problems, it can cause more severe illness, including pneumonia. The vast majority of people recover, but the outbreak has caused more than 5,000 deaths worldwide.

Teachers’ unions are pressing de Blasio to close the schools, saying they’re worried for their students’ families, their own and New Yorkers at large.

“To have 1.1 million students and countless employees crisscrossing the city, it feels to me beyond irresponsible,” says Derek Stampone, who teaches physics and computer science at a Manhattan high school where only about 2/3 of students showed up Friday, a dropoff echoed in the system as a whole. Stampone found himself spending much of Friday’s classes talking about the virus and such prevention tips as hand-washing.

“I can see the anxiety in the room,” he said.

So did social studies teacher Elise Ritter, who works at a different Manhattan high school that happens to focus on emergency management.

The students who did attend, she said, were “really looking around and saying, ‘Why are we still here?’” Many live with grandparents and worry about them contracting the virus, she said.

Teachers suggest the city could find ways to provide child care for health care workers — and supply food to the hundreds of thousands of poor students who depend on school meals — without keeping the entire school system open.

De Blasio has said that any alternative would recreate the problem that closing schools would seek to solve: People congregating.

Gov. Andrew Cuomo, a Democrat, said school closings remain “purely a local decision” unless a student tests positive, in which case a school must be closed for cleaning.

“The closing of schools is a significant trade-off of benefits and burdens,” he said Saturday in a conference call with reporters. “If you close the schools, there are people who will not show up for work the next day. The public education system is also a day care, in many ways.”

This is a difficult decision.  Prudence favors closing the schools but de Blasio makes important counterpoints.

Tony

Dear Commons Community,

Italians in a neighborhood under lockdown due to the deadly coronavirus gathered on their balconies on Friday evening to express solidarity and encourage each other by singing the national anthem together.  Then came the piano chords, trumpet blasts, violin serenades and even the clanging of pots and pans — all of it spilling from people’s homes, out of windows and from balconies, and rippling across rooftops.  And yesterday afernoon, a nationwide round of applause broke out for the doctors on the medical front lines fighting the spread of Europe’s worst coronavirus outbreak.  As reported by the New York Times.

Our prayers are with them and with people all over the world whose lives have been disrupted by this virus.

Tony

Dear Commons Community,

Jack Ma

Dear Commons Community,

Billionaire Jack Ma, China’s richest man and founder of the e-commerce giant Alibaba, is lending a hand to the United States by donating 500,000 coronavirus testing kits and one million masks.

His namesake charity announced the donation yesterday on Twitter, pledging to “join hands with Americans in these difficult times.”  As reported by the New York Daily News.

“Drawing from my own country’s experience, speedy and accurate testing and accurate personal protective equipment for medical professionals are most effective in preventing the spread of the virus,” the Jack Ma Foundation said in a statement. “We hope that our donation can help Americans fight against the pandemic!”

The U.S. government hopes to ramp up testing after failing to produce enough test kits to handle the number of people experiencing symptoms in this country.

As of Thursday, fewer than 14,000 specimens had been tested since January, according to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. In South Korea, meanwhile, nearly 20,000 people are being tested every day.

The majority of Americans are still not allowed to be tested because of strict federal guidelines prioritizing elderly people and those with underlying medical conditions.

Ma’s foundation said the pandemic can no longer be resolved by any individual country.

“Rather, we need to combat the virus by working hand-in-hand,” the charity wrote. “At this moment. we can’t beat the virus unless we eliminate boundaries to resources and share our know-how and hard-earned lessons.”

Ma, whose nearly $40 billion net worth makes him the world’s 21st richest person, has recently donated supplies and money to several other countries affected by the fast-spreading coronavirus outbreak, including Iran, Italy, Japan and Spain.

In January, the business magnate donated 100 million yuan, or about $14.3 million, to support the development of a vaccine against the viral infection.

We need to thank Mr. Ma for helping our testing-challenged federal government for his generosity.

Tony

Dr. Anthony Fauci

Dear Commons Community,

Yesterday Dr. Anthony Fauci, the top infectious disease expert at the National Institutes of Health, gave an update on the coronavirus spread in the United States and stated:   “The system is not really geared to what we need right now,…It is a failing, let’s admit it.”  As reported by the Associated Press.

Seven weeks have passed since the first U.S. case of coronavirus was announced, and the government is failing to account for what could be thousands of additional infections because of ongoing problems with testing.

The effort initially was hobbled by delays in getting testing kits out to public health labs, but the stumbles have continued, leading scientists to conclude that the virus has taken root in more places than government officials say.

U.S. health officials, for example, promised nearly a month ago to tap into a national network of labs that monitor for flu. That system is only just getting started.

Donald Trump, on the otherhand, has sought to deflect blame over the testing, accusing the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention of being ill-prepared and repeating a debunked claim that his predecessor Barack Obama “made changes” to the agency’s testing system. He’s otherwise tried to stick to happy talk and falsehoods even after his Oval Office address this week contained mistakes about his European travel ban and how much virus treatment will cost.

“Frankly, the testing has been going very smooth. If you go to the right agency, if you go to the right area, you get the test,” Trump told reporters in the Oval Office.

During this pandemic, truth is critical.  I would suggest that Anthony Fauci be the face and spokesperson for the federal government on all matters related to coronavirus. President Trump should keep his mouth shut.  Someone should tell him that most of the American people are coming to ignore anything he says about coronavirus anyway.

Tony

Harvard students prepare to pack up and go home after the university said it would close campus housing this week.

Dear Commons Community,

All sectors of American society are facing serious challenges in dealing with the cororavirus.  The stock market is in free-fall, the airlines industry is tanking, sporting events are being suspended, and cultural institutions are shutting down.  Colleges and universities likewise are closing dorms, cancelling graduation ceremonies,  and moving classes online.  In the short run, all of us will survive. In the long run and if the virus threat continues or reemerges in the fall, the financial situation is much gloomier.  The Chronicle of Higher Education has a lead article this morning focusing on what coronavirus might mean in the longer term for colleges and universities especially those that are tuition-drive.  Here is an excerpt.

“The Covid-19 pandemic threatens the health of millions across the country, and it has pitched the remainder of the academic year into chaos and uncertainty. While students wait to learn how, or if, they can finish out their terms, college leaders are beginning to grapple with the longer-term financial ramifications.

But “there’s so much we don’t know about this,” says Kent J. Chabotar, president emeritus of Guilford College and an expert in higher-education finance. No one can say how serious the coronavirus’s effects will be or how long they will last, which makes it hard to predict outcomes.

Some key considerations, however, are emerging: Revenue from tuition may be in for a shock, budgeting has become unpredictable, and the length of time that campuses must remain closed will help determine the size of the financial challenge that awaits.

Veteran higher-ed leaders aren’t too worried about colleges’ ability to keep funding their operations in the short term. It’s the long-term picture that concerns them: If the pandemic locks down the country for an extended time, causing campuses to remain closed into the fall or beyond, or if the economy tanks, it could push colleges that are financially on the edge right over it.

The good news is that years of financial shocks and risk-management preparation have bred caution and contingency plans. After the Great Recession temporarily cut off access to short-term credit, many institutions started keeping more cash on hand than they had previously.

Most colleges can cover three to five months of operating expenses, says Dean O. Smith, a former university administrator and an expert on higher-education finances: “They’re basically rainy-day funds, and this is certainly a rainy day.”

Many institutions have already prepared for closures and remote operations due to natural disasters, and those plans may come in handy now.

The longer the pandemic disrupts everyday life, the greater the chance that its effects will disrupt business as usual. The regular progression of enrollment events will be derailed, and ordinary fall enrollment itself may be in jeopardy.

Given how dependent many institutions are on tuition revenue, and how many of them struggle to bring in that revenue in an increasingly competitive environment, that could cause serious financial problems for the coming academic year. If the pandemic hobbles the economy in the long term, that could affect family finances, state support for public colleges, and endowment performance.

Covid-19 might prove less of a challenge if the sector weren’t already so stressed, says Chabotar.

“We’ve run into a crisis, and our flexibility is shot, because we’ve already given away the store” with high tuition-discount rates and other desperate measures. If the pandemic continues into next year, he says, “the damage is significant but not necessarily fatal” for most institutions.

The longer the disruption continues, especially if the economy suffers, the more that the most vulnerable colleges will feel increased pressure to merge or close.

..

The uncertainty over what will happen over the coming weeks and months has put college leaders in the toughest budgeting position of all, which, he says, “is a small probability of a colossally bad outcome.”

…

While tuition-dependent private institutions may feel the biggest pinch from lingering disruption, public colleges could be affected financially, too. They may face uncertain enrollment in the fall, and if the larger economy suffers, that may lead to reduced state support.

…

Conventional wisdom holds that a bad economy is good for college enrollment, but that may not help all institutions. Over all, the wisdom holds true: The recession saw 2.4 million additional students enroll in college from 2007 to 2011. But much of that economically driven enrollment goes to community colleges.

Small private colleges “attract a different type of student,” Smith says. “Those that are caught in spiraling discounts and tuition and so forth, they are vulnerable.”

How many students return after a crisis — or whether they return at all — can be unpredictable, says Scott S. Cowen, president emeritus of Tulane University. Cowen was president when Hurricane Katrina flooded New Orleans, in August 2005. The university was open again by January, and many students returned. But only about half the expected entering class enrolled the following fall.

“It took about six years to rebuild the population,” Cowen says.

New students, especially, may be most unpredictable. “Will they sit out a year to see what happens? Will they go more locally? Will they go to less-expensive institutions?” Cowen asks. “These are all the kinds of scenarios that the schools have to begin to prepare themselves for.”

The pandemic’s effects on the broader economy could have sweeping effects on colleges. If financial markets suffer, “you assume it affects financial giving and people’s capacity,” Marcy says.

At Tulane after Katrina, Cowen found many alumni and foundations ready to help the university get back on its feet. But some potential donors hesitated, uncertain about putting their money into a shaken institution and its city. If colleges endure prolonged closures and the economy suffers, Cowen says, “I’m guessing people will sit on the sidelines for a while.”

If the stock market continues to sink, as it’s been doing, it could also harm endowments. That could be especially fateful for colleges where “there’s not fat to trim into anymore,” says Lawrence. Institutions would be loath to dip into endowment funds to prop up shaky finances at a time when the size of their endowment could be shrinking. Some institutions will not even have that luxury.

Colleges may be able to find some savings, and possibly even some financial silver linings. Cutting back on travel and public events will save money, and the turn to online teaching as a temporary solution may allow for some savings on facilities costs as well.

….

Right now, college leaders must feel their way forward, hoping for the best and trying to plan for the worst.”

Tony

The Met

Dear Commons Community,

Today many of New York City’s cultural treasures announced closings out of  concern for the spread of the coronavirus.  Governor Andrew Cuomo made an emergency declaration prohibiting gatherings of 500 or more people.  As a result, performances at all Broadway theaters, the Metropolitan Opera, Carnegie Hall, and even the St. Patrick’s Day Parade scheduled for Tuesday have been cancelled or postponed for at least two weeks and probably more.

The word in Manhattan is out – “stay home.”

Tony