Bilingual educators brought from the Dominican Republic to work for the city Department of Education were ordered by a middle school teacher to shut up about the steep cost of the rooms they were forced to rent — or be exiled from the program, they told The Post.
The Dominican recruits said Rosse Mary Savery, a teacher at MS 80 in the Bronx under Principal Emmanuel Polanco, warned them not to tell a soul about having to fork over a monthly $1,350 to $1,450 each for a single room in apartments where they share a kitchen and bathroom with colleagues.
“She told us that we cannot talk about the rent to anybody. That was the main thing that she said: ‘Don’t talk to anybody. Don’t tell anybody how much you’re paying,’” a teacher quoted Savery as saying.
Currently, 19 Dominican teachers are shacked up in the Bronx at three rooming houses run by the Association of Dominican American Supervisors and Administrators — a fraternal group of DOE principals and other employees.
As The Post has reported, ADASA housed 11 Dominican teachers in a two-family home it leased on Baychester Avenue, and three in a Marion Avenue co-op listed in city records as owned by Polanco’s mother, Juana Polanco-Abreu.
However, Polanco-Abreu died several years ago, according to a source who attended her funeral. City officials could not explain why she is still named as the property owner.
Polanco and his wife, Sterling Báez, 32, a DOE elementary school teacher in the Bronx, rake in $1,350 to $1,400 a month from each of the Marion Avenue tenants.
Another five teachers — and the husband of one — are housed in half of a duplex on Pilgrim Avenue in the Bronx.
Except for the married couple who share a room, each person pays $1,350 to $1,450 a month for individual rooms, while sharing a kitchen and bathroom. They use Zelle, a banking app, to pay their rent to ADASA treasurer and DOE administrator Daniel Calcaño, sources said.
”READ FULL ARTICLE: https://nypost.com/2022/11/26/doe-staffers-threatened-dominican-teachers-with-deportation/
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