Manhattan’s Community Education Council District 2 rescinds anti-trans resolution

A Manhattan-based Community Education Council voted on Sept. 10 to rescind a widely-criticized anti-trans sports resolution, drawing praise from advocates who regularly protested the resolution at meetings in the aftermath of the vote. Members of Community Education Council District 2, encompassing Chinatown, Tribeca, West Village, Chelsea, Kips Bay, and the Upper East Side, voted 7-3 to nix the resolution, which called for the formation of a new committee that could review and potentially oppose trans inclusion in school sports. Known as Resolution 248, the vote was non-binding and Community Education Councils are independent from the city’s Department of Education, but they are often viewed as New York City's version of school boards and serve as liaisons between the people and the government. Notably, the city squashed any notion that the resolution would prompt policy changes when the Education Department clarified that “every student can participate in sports and competitive athletics in accordance with their gender identity, and we prohibit any exclusion of students based on their gender identity or expression." Multiple members who sponsored and supported that resolution last year — including Maud Maron, Sabena Serinese, and Len Silverman — are no longer on the council. Moreover, the 7-3 vote notably reflected the new-look makeup of Community Education Council District 2 after recent elections led to significant turnover within the council's ranks. Parent Leaders for Accelerated Curriculum and Education (PLACE), a conservative-leaning education advocacy group whose members were among those who supported Resolution 248, saw four of its seven candidates lose their bids for Community Education Council District 2 in recent elections. The president of the community education council, Craig Slutzkin, who also supported the resolution, is again serving as president for the new 2025-27 term. In the aftermath of the resolution's initial passage, Manhattan Borough President Mark Levine opted against reappointing Slutzkin to a post on Community Board 5. In yet another sign of the public's outrage over the resolution, alums of Townsend Harris High School in Queens — where Slutzkin serves as the Townsend Harris Alumni Association co-president — wrote an open letter featuring hundreds of signatures condemning what they described as his “unacceptable support for transphobia” as a member of CEC2 and labeling him as a transphobe who “should not hold leadership positions within the school’s alumni association. Maron, who also sponsored of the resolution, once sent chat messages asserting that “there is no such thing as trans kids [because] there is no such thing as transition i.e. changing your sex,” according to a report by The 74. Maron confirmed to Gay City News last year that she is affiliated with the anti-LGBTQ political group Moms for Liberty. “Anti-inclusion politics have no place on any council, least of all in the district covering the birthplace of the modern queer liberation movement,” said Dr. Megan Pamela Ruth Madison, who is a founder member of the group known as Aunties & Friends for Liberation and serves on the board of Trans formative Schools, which is a free after-school program focused on serving the needs of trans, queer, non-binary, and gender-expansive youth. “Unfortunately it’s not just anti-trans policy that’s made it onto our school boards; it’s anti-Black, anti-immigrant, Islamophobic, often under the guise of ‘standards’ or ‘accelerated curriculum.’ We won this fight, but organizations like PLACE NYC won’t stop here." The latest vote comes five months after more than a dozen elected officials in Manhattan signed a letter asking New York City Education Chancellor Melissa Aviles-Ramos to step in amid allegations that members of the council were manipulating quorum to prevent votes on resolutions pertaining to transgender issues.