Baltimore City Councilman Mark Conway is gathering private funding for a study on student absenteeism, after his $100,000 funding request was not included in the city budget this year, due to what he has described as “political retaliation” against him by Mayor Brandon Scott.
Conway secured $50,000 for the study from a philanthropic partner, and he’s currently working on finding another $50,000, the councilman’s spokesperson Luca Amayo told The Baltimore Sun. Conway was the lead sponsor on a bill to study the causes of student absenteeism, which was co-sponsored by almost all other council members and signed by the mayor in May.
Council President Zeke Cohen’s office declined to comment on Monday about the private funding. Cohen also didn’t provide an explanation when asked why the necessary funding for the absenteeism bill he co-sponsored wasn’t included in the city budget.
“I remain in conversation with the sponsor about how he can find funding to support the study,” Cohen told The Baltimore Sun in a text message on Monday, adding that the Council “has been aggressively advocating” for the implementation of the Maryland Transit Administration’s $1.1 billion BMore Bus plan, which “would meaningfully reduce commute times for kids.”
Conway had informed Cohen’s staff in February that the absenteeism study would cost $100,000, according to an email record reviewed by The Sun. But the funds were not included in the city budget this year.
Conway told The Sun in September that Cohen had promised to make the absenteeism bill a priority in his budget discussions with Scott. Asked on Monday if this was true, Cohen referred The Sun to his communications director, Emily Sullivan, who referred The Sun back to Cohen’s initial Monday comments.
Conway previously claimed in an interview with The Sun that Scott had refused to fund his absenteeism bill as an act of “political retaliation,” following Conway’s opposition to the budget due to concerns about Scott’s relationship with the nonprofit Baltimore Children and Youth Fund. In particular, Conway noted that BCYF sends much of its funding to the mayor’s office instead of directly spending the money on youth programs.
In response to Conway’s claims of retaliation, the mayor’s office previously told The Sun in September that it “did not receive correspondence from Councilman Conway outlining a request for this funding. The Councilman should have simply asked the Mayor in person. The Councilman’s indirect and manufactured complaints are not an effective use of the Mayor’s time.”
Regarding BCYF, the mayor’s office has told Spotlight on Maryland it spent the funds from BCYF on three different categories of youth programs. BCYF said it has no documentation of the money transfer.
City Schools previously told The Sun it can not complete the absenteeism study without funding from the city.
Absent students have long been a concern Baltimore, and especially in recent years during the COVID-19 pandemic, when more than half of students missed at least one-tenth of their total enrolled school days, and thousands missed at least one-third of the entire school year.
Have a news tip? Contact Brooke Conrad at bconrad@baltsun.com or 443-682-2356.
