Cropp pledges to take over, revive schools

Linda W. Cropp says that, as D.C. mayor, she would seek to change the D.C. Charter to give her direct control of poor-performing schools.

“I really want us to develop standards that are very transparent and clear,” Mrs. Cropp said during an interview with editors and reporters at The Washington Times. “When those standards aren’t met, the underperforming schools that don’t meet them, I want those to come under the mayor. If the schools are working well, fine, but for those that aren’t working well, we need to do something about it.”

Mrs. Cropp, chairman of the D.C. Council, is seeking the Democratic nomination for mayor in the Sept. 12 primary.

To gain control of the city’s poor-performing schools, Mrs. Cropp said that she would work with the D.C. Board of Education and the school superintendent and effect a change of the home-rule charter. Currently, the school system operates independently of the mayor and the council.

She said that city schools “don’t need any more money” but do need to better manage their resources, noting that the school system boasts a $1 billion budget.

Her other plans for revitalizing city schools include focusing on early childhood education and vocational education and creating a “principals academy,” where principals would learn to manage their schools like businesses.

“We need to get a handle on helping our principals be better principals, better managers, and if they have that education pedagogy with them, that will help them be even better managers,” she said.

Giving examples of her proposed policies from her experience as a teacher and school board member, Mrs. Cropp said that education is linked to other important issues in the District, including crime and economic development.

“Education is just going to come up with everything that we’re going to try to do in the District,” Mrs. Cropp said. “With education, you can get an appropriate job, and with a job, you are less likely to commit crime.”

Mrs. Cropp said that adding more police officers to the force may not be the solution to curbing the city’s crime problem. She said D.C. officials should examine the police department’s focus while partnering with federal law-enforcement agencies.

“What we need is better deployment, what we need is police officers to be in the community, what we need is a different focus on what’s going on within the police force,” she said. “What we also need is a better partnership with the 54 protective service departments we have in the District of Columbia under the federal government.”

Mrs. Cropp said that emergency medical services (EMS) should continue to be a part of the fire department for budgetary and practical reasons, adding that fire department employees should be “cross-trained” to perform EMS functions.

“There’s no doubt that EMS gets more calls than the fire department. So what are we saying? [That] we’re going to double, triple, quadruple the cost of EMS? Or are we going to cut the fire department?” she said. “You can’t say you don’t need the fire department because EMS gets more calls.”

Efforts to cross-train firefighters in the past few years have “never really been implemented,” she said.

Mrs. Cropp said she also would focus on economic development.

She said that she would work to continue to give the city a balanced budget, while encouraging fiscal responsibility in the government.

Rebuilding rundown communities by providing affordable housing and creating more mixed-income neighborhoods also would be a high priority, she said, adding that her aim would be “connecting communities with government services.”

“When I revitalize Washington … it means rebuilding them with the ability to have a strong middle class,” she said.

Mrs. Cropp also said that she would work to secure the D.C. statehood by first getting the city a vote in the House.

Her extensive record as a public servant sets her apart from the other candidates, she said.

“My experience, my record, my sense of bringing people together, my accomplishments — all of those things are things that are truly different.”