In Stunner, Miami School Head Snubs New York

MIAMI — It was supposed to be a triumphant moment for Mayor Bill de Blasio and the New York City school system. The mayor had lured away one of the nation’s most successful educators to become the city’s new schools chancellor.

Then, in less than 24 hours, triumph turned to embarrassment when the official, Alberto M. Carvalho, abruptly — even impulsively, in his own telling — changed his mind and renounced the job during a dramatic spectacle broadcast live on television Thursday.

Carvalho, superintendent of Miami-Dade County Public Schools, made his announcement before his school board in Miami, leading to cheers in the packed meeting room and fury and confusion in New York City.

“I am breaking an agreement,” Carvalho said. “I shall remain in Miami-Dade as your superintendent.” His words came during a special board meeting that turned into a 3 1/2-hour exhibition of supporters begging him to stay.

Carvalho began with a speech tantalizing the crowd with hints he might leave, then interrupted his remarks to speak privately by telephone with de Blasio before coming back and delivering the news.

It was an embarrassing turn of events for the de Blasio administration, which appeared to be caught off guard and at first reacted with anger.

“Who would ever hire this guy again?” Eric Phillips, the mayor’s press secretary, said on Twitter. “Who would ever vote for him?”

De Blasio, not 24 hours earlier, had called the superintendent “the best person to lead the nation’s largest school system into the future.”

The pick seemed almost too good to be true — and, apparently, it was. Carvalho came to the United States from Portugal at 17 and overstayed his visa. He said he was homeless for a time and had slept in a friend’s U-Haul. He became a physics teacher, then rose up the ranks in Miami-Dade education. A charismatic presence, he speaks at least four languages: Portuguese, English, Spanish and French. He seemed well poised to hone de Blasio’s education agenda and pitch it to the public.

It did not work out that way.

Bafflement over what prompted his sudden about-face lingered throughout the day. New Yorkers — including de Blasio — grappled with how Carvalho could have so abruptly changed his mind, turning down one of the most prestigious and high-profile jobs in education more than a week after accepting it.

“My first response was just profound surprise,” the mayor said at a news conference Thursday. As late as an 8 p.m. call Wednesday, he said, “All systems were go.”

De Blasio added, “He told me repeatedly this was his dream job.”

Carvalho gave little explanation except to describe an emotional decision driven in part by phone conversations with two students who were unauthorized immigrants. They told him, “I don’t know what my future will look like if you leave,” he said. “If I were to leave those two, I’m probably leaving everything I believe in.”

In Miami, where he has flirted with running for Congress, he was an influential figure with broad appeal. The day’s love fest was a clear reminder of that, and in Miami-Dade County the school chief has greater prominence than in New York. People in Miami who have followed his career wondered whether being thrust into the glare of the New York media, and the prospect of close scrutiny, had dampened his enthusiasm.

Ten years ago, Carvalho was involved in a scandal in which leaked emails led to speculation he was having an affair with a reporter who covered education. Carvalho’s spokeswoman in Miami said that had no bearing on his decision.

New York City is the largest school system in the country, with 1.1 million students and a budget of $30 billion, larger than the gross domestic product of some countries. Nonetheless, many educators and observers warned that de Blasio might have a difficult time attracting top talent to continue the work of Carmen Fariña, who plans to retire as chancellor, rather than someone with the freedom to cut a bold new vision. She was expected to stay through March. Thursday’s spectacle is likely to make replacing her that much more difficult.

“How embarrassing!” said George Arzt, a veteran political consultant who was a press secretary to Mayor Ed Koch. “In the past there are people who have pulled out of jobs they’ve been appointed to, but I don’t remember any job as prominent as schools chancellor. But it’s certainly shocking, and they have to renew their search and find someone very quickly.”

Arzt added, “The problem is that the new person will be viewed as the second choice.”

The courtship of Carvalho went on for more than a month. Phillips said Carvalho met with the mayor twice at Gracie Mansion, once in January and once in February. De Blasio’s wife, Chirlane McCray, who routinely participates in City Hall hiring decisions, was deeply involved in the interview process as well.

Carvalho told de Blasio that he would take the job last week, Phillips said, and it seemed that the matchmaking had ended. But an announcement was postponed at least once when Carvalho said that he could not leave his district because of gun scares and jitters in the aftermath of the school shooting at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School, which is in a neighboring district. Phillips said an announcement was scheduled for Monday and then scratched, and the same for Thursday.

On Wednesday, the news media in New York were told that Carvalho would be the new chancellor. De Blasio said that Carvalho agreed that City Hall could give word of the announcement to the news site Politico. But officials in Miami warned caution, saying that he had not made a public statement yet, so perhaps it was not final.

A measure of panic began to set in at New York’s City Hall on Wednesday night, after the initial news reports and indications that Carvalho appeared to be getting cold feet, according to someone familiar with the matter. The person spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to discuss private conversations in City Hall.

Late into the evening, phone calls went back and forth between New York and Miami. At one point, at least one senior administration official spoke by phone with Carvalho, who reiterated the promise he had made about taking the job, according to the person. Carvalho did not suggest he was backing out of the job Wednesday, the person said, but instead offered logistical and other reasons for remaining in Florida that day.

At Thursday’s board meeting in Miami, speaker after speaker lavished praise on Carvalho for preventing budget cuts to the arts, advocating on behalf of immigrants and stabilizing a school district that before his tenure had been notorious for political upheaval.

After bathing in more than two hours of praise, Carvalho spoke, and then he asked for several breaks. As he disappeared off the stage for a few moments, the crowd in the room, which had been resigned to his leaving, started to wonder whether he might stay. Those breaks turned out to be attempts to speak to de Blasio. He eventually reached him.

The conversation, Carvalho said, was not easy.

“This is probably the second most difficult thing I’ve ever done in my life. The very first one was to leave my country,” he said. “I am breaking an agreement between adults to honor an agreement and a pact I have with the children of Miami.”

In Florida, the audience roared. In New York City, mouths dropped.

Carvalho left the dais to a mob of well-wishers who offered him hugs, handshakes and kisses on the cheek. As theatrical it was, this was not Carvalho’s first public flirtation with professional indecision. In 2008, he was offered two superintendent jobs nearly simultaneously, in Miami-Dade and Pinellas County. The Pinellas County school board offered him the job first, but the same day, the Miami-Dade board ousted its superintendent, Rudy Crew. They asked Carvalho if he would take the superintendent job on an interim basis, but, with an offer in hand, he said no. In a chaotic meeting, the board voted to offer him the job permanently.

Carvalho then took two days to decide, saying that he was “soul-searching” and that he wanted to “honor the process” by speaking with the chairs of each board. In the end, he took the job in Miami-Dade, where he was offered a higher salary, though he said that was not a factor.

New York City officials said they would match his $352,874 Miami salary, going much higher than the salary of the current New York City chancellor, who earns $234,569.

A savvy operator with years of experience in the school district’s communications and governmental affairs office, Carvalho is known to speak in perfectly quotable sound bites. But he has also proven to be prickly when asked about personal shortcomings, including the possible affair with the former reporter. A media frenzy over his personal life would have been unavoidable as chancellor.

Carvalho has long held higher aspirations, including becoming U.S. secretary of education, and being chancellor in New York might have gotten him closer to that dream. He said Thursday he knew staying in Miami-Dade was perhaps not his best career move. “I hope I don’t come to regret” the decision, he said. Remaining appears likely to give him more control over the nine-member school board, which had recently started to question him more than in years past. His local stature will only grow if he is perceived as having sacrificed personal gain to remain superintendent.

Carvalho acknowledged telling de Blasio that he had accepted the job. His close friends had advised him to leave “on top, when things are good,” in Miami-Dade.

“When I walked into the room today, I was going to New York City,” Carvalho said.

He changed his mind in a “real-time decision,” he said. “I understand how unorthodox this is.”

When he finally reached de Blasio by phone, Carvalho said the mayor told him he’d been watching the Miami-Dade meeting, which was streaming online. Carvalho called the conversation “difficult and a little sad,” but also professional.

Asked about the tweet by de Blasio’s press secretary questioning who would want to hire — or vote — for him after reneging on his word to New York, Carvalho said, “I accept that.”