O'Malley Knocks Ehrlich Ads, State's Role in Baltimore Schools

Baltimore Mayor Martin O'Malley lashed out at Gov. Robert L. Ehrlich Jr. yesterday, accusing the Republican incumbent of trying to stereotype Baltimore's schools with his campaign commercials and suggesting that the state has hindered progress in Maryland's lowest-performing district.

"I would like to see the state get out of the way," said O'Malley, a Democrat running against Ehrlich for governor. "They're all about finding ways to try to belittle us. . . . The state's shown itself to be pretty incapable of showing the kind of oversight that's needed."

O'Malley told reporters he would welcome the end of a governing "partnership" created by the General Assembly nearly a decade ago that gave the governor and mayor joint control over appointments to Baltimore's school board. Before 1997, the system had been under direct control of City Hall.

The subsequent years have been marked by financial difficulties and repeated power struggles between city and state officials. Student performance has improved in lower grades in recent years, but older students continue to lag far behind their counterparts in other jurisdictions.

Ehrlich campaign spokeswoman Shareese DeLeaver dismissed O'Malley's contention that the campaign ads "stereotype" the Baltimore system, calling it "as unfounded as it is ridiculous."

"The governor's ads are not dismissive of the minimal progress that has been made in the Baltimore City school system, but he is of the profound belief that they can do better under better leadership," she said.

The governor has sought in recent weeks to make the performance of Baltimore's schools a focal point of the governor's race and pin blame on O'Malley for their shortcomings. Ehrlich's two most recent TV ads highlight a battle he waged this year with O'Malley and the General Assembly over whether the state should seize control of 11 of Baltimore's lowest-performing middle schools and high schools. One ad, which Ehrlich narrates, includes bleak footage of Baltimore schools and a newspaper headline saying city schools are "in chaos."

"The governor likes to point to lower-performing schools and hold them up as if they were typical of what kids in the city are doing," O'Malley said yesterday, noting that Baltimore is also home to three of the state's 10 best-performing high schools.

O'Malley made his comments during an event designed to highlight a volunteer effort led by the mayor's office to paint and make other repairs at city schools during the summer. During much of the time the mayor spoke to reporters, he used a roller brush to spread cream-colored paint on a classroom wall.

DeLeaver said yesterday that O'Malley was "trying to defend the indefensible and deflect his failures in the Baltimore City schools system."

She said that on the campaign trail, O'Malley has been "touting the Baltimore City school system like a badge of honor rather than a badge of shame. Only now, in an election year, is he embracing the very school system that he is trying to abandon."

O'Malley said the Ehrlich campaign "will say what they say, whether it's true, whether it's false, if it serves their end. . . . Unlike the governor, I take responsibility for doing all that I can."

In recent years, O'Malley has sought to assert greater control over the management of school finances and facilities.

Ehrlich has played down the state's role in the system in recent interviews. During a luncheon last week with Washington Post editors and reporters, the governor said he felt no personal accountability for the Baltimore schools, aside from his joint appointments to the board with O'Malley. "That's the only state control over that school system," Ehrlich said.

Ehrlich spokesman Henry Fawell said yesterday that the governor is "philosophically receptive" to giving local jurisdictions more control over their school systems. But he said he was not aware of a specific proposal for changing governance in Baltimore.

O'Malley said he would like to see Baltimore officials given control over appointment of the school board members as well as the system's chief executive. That position is now filled by the board.

O'Malley said Ehrlich's TV ads probably "make people who are for the governor feel good about being for the governor." But he said they are not likely to persuade voters to change allegiances.