{"id":149587,"date":"2026-03-02T12:20:10","date_gmt":"2026-03-02T12:20:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/149587\/"},"modified":"2026-03-02T12:20:10","modified_gmt":"2026-03-02T12:20:10","slug":"nyc-never-opened-25-planned-preschools-despite-demand-surge-records","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/149587\/","title":{"rendered":"NYC never opened 25 planned preschools despite demand surge: records"},"content":{"rendered":"

Roughly 20 planned early childhood education centers in the Big Apple mysteriously sit idle as demand surges for universal pre-K and 3K<\/a> seats close to home, The Post has learned.<\/p>\n

More than 25 of 47 3K \u201cinitiative projects\u201d at sites first earmarked under former Mayor Bill de Blasio are still unlisted on the official NYC MySchools directory \u2014 despite costly construction contracts, rent payments to private owners and official Department of Education signage posted outside some \u201cphantom\u201d schools.<\/p>\n

The list of leased shell sites includes a converted Brooklyn warehouse on the Columbia Street waterfront \u2014 where nearby young families face waitlists of more than 100 students for a nearby seat, parents told The Post.<\/p>\n

The planned 3K site at 129 Van Brunt St. in Brooklyn has sat idle for years without students, parents say.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere\u2019s not a lot of seats to go around,\u201d fumed Brooklyn parent Zach Hetrick, who lived on the same block as the Columbia Street waterfront site when his daughter would\u2019ve been eligible.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Without the center, the father-daughter duo must trek to another city-run site over a mile away on foot, or a 15-minute bus ride \u201cif it comes on time.\u201d<\/p>\n

Though the 3K location was first slated for completion in 2023 \u2014 and later underwent more than $1 million in construction work in 2024 for a \u201cproposed\u201d 3K center, with a total estimated cost of $18 million \u2014 the site is still being \u201cevaluated for potential use,\u201d the DOE told The Post in a statement.<\/p>\n

\u201cIf we\u2019re paying for the school to be built and it already exists, it\u2019d be great to be using that school,\u201d Hetrick said. <\/p>\n

\u201cUltimately, I think we should be using the resources we\u2019re already paying for.\u201d<\/p>\n

The news comes after a Post investigation revealed<\/a> a city-run site on the Upper East Side set to open in 2024 had been sitting empty, angering parents \u2014 and prompted Mayor Zohran Mamdani to open the site just three weeks later.<\/a><\/p>\n

The news comes after a Post investigation revealed a city-run site on the Upper East Side set to open in 2024 had been sitting empty for years. Matthew McDermott for NY Post<\/p>\n

City Council Speaker Julie Menin, a longtime Upper East Side rep, said the opening of the center had been a \u201clong time coming.\u201d She noted a staggering 853 early child care centers closed in recent years, while demand for free programs has skyrocketed \u2014 which can otherwise cost parents tens of thousands of dollars a year through private providers.<\/p>\n

\u201cI can\u2019t tell you the number of parents that have said to us, \u2018if we do not get affordable child care, we\u2019re going to leave the city,\u2019\u201d Menin said last month during the opening of the new preschool on the Upper East Side.<\/p>\n

\u201cAt the end of the day, this is what we need to do citywide \u2014 to open up more child-care facilities, to make sure that every single parent that needs a slot for 3-K and pre-K has it.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

A \u201cPre-K for All\u201d sign outside the unopened Van Brunt Street preschool. NYPost<\/p>\n

The city spent $787 million from FY2020 to FY2024 on early education initiatives, including for the creation of classrooms in existing buildings and new locations, according to the DOE\u2019s five-year capital plan report released last August.<\/p>\n

Still, nearly two dozen of the 3K expansion sites were built but left sitting empty for years after they were set to be finished, DOE reps said at a City Council education committee hearing last year<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\u201cI believe there\u2019s about 21 of those sitting vacant,\u201d DOE early childhood education rep Jeff Klein said at the time, adding the city was working with the Department of Buildings and health department to \u201censure that these can be still viable, because if time has passed and they\u2019re sitting vacant, they need to be up to all appropriate codes.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cWe have a need for seats in our community, and we look at a mothballed site in a private building that we put a bunch of money into the capital repairs, and then we\u2019re paying rent,\u201d North Brooklyn councilman Lincoln Restler said at the meeting.<\/p>\n

\u201cThat is infuriating.\u201d<\/p>\n

Planned 3K center at 1972 Broadway on the Upper West Side sat empty without the DOE knowing about the site, council member Gale Brewer told The Post. NYPost<\/p>\n

One planned 3K site at 18-31 131 St. in College Point, Queens, a former warehouse set to seat 165 students, underwent a full renovation and brand-new outdoor play area after the city entered into a five-year lease for the building in 2021. But it sits empty, despite an anticipated 2022 opening.<\/a><\/p>\n

The DOE also shelled out roughly $200,000 for lighting work alone at a three-floor site at 1010 Third Ave. on the Upper East Side, city permits show. Despite the permits on Third Avenue showing work for \u201c3K lighting,\u201d the DOE told The Post the site\u2019s future has not yet been determined.<\/p>\n

Other planned 3K and Pre-K sites included in last year\u2019s DOE report appear to have become something else entirely \u2013 including a DOE Family Welcome Center on Staten Island, and charter elementary schools for Success Academy Ridgewood and Zeta Charter Schools in Jamaica, Queens.<\/p>\n

A proposed 3K center at 11-11 40th Ave. in Long Island City, Queens, is now listed as the address of the \u201ctemporary\u201d site of a new elementary school, the Academy of Cultural Excellence PS 439Q. It\u2019s supposed to open this September before it moves to a permanent location.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt was the de Blasio administration that planned all of these child care centers,\u201d Brewer said, \u201cbut I [was the one who] told the Adams administration.\u201d Luiz C. Ribeiro for NY Post<\/p>\n

Council Member Gale Brewer even told The Post the city has shelled out a whopping $24,000 a month in rent \u2014 and an estimated total cost of about $22 million \u2014 on one site in her district that sat vacant for years.<\/p>\n

The planned three-floor 3K center at 1972 Broadway on the Upper West Side was allegedly unknown to the DOE before she notified the agency, the councilwoman said \u2014 as the School Construction Authority never told the DOE about all of these centers.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt was the de Blasio administration that planned all of these child care centers,\u201d she added, \u201cbut I [was the one who] told the Adams administration.\u201d<\/p>\n

Though the 3K was initially set to be completed in September 2023, per planning documents, one floor of the building finally opened to special needs preschool students in 2025.<\/p>\n

The local district is finally \u201cworking to fill the other floors with 4 Pre-K classes and 4 3-K classes as an annex for PS 452,\u201d a rep for Brewer confirmed.<\/p>\n

When asked about the mystery sites, City Hall rep Jenna Lyle told The Post the new administration is working to evaluate the longstanding phantom sites \u2014 and some may finally see the light.<\/p>\n

\u201cFor years, early childhood programs were slashed and sidelined by the prior administration, despite community need, leaving many of these buildings to sit empty,\u201d Lyle said.<\/p>\n

\u201cThat is changing under this administration. We are taking a close look at the areas around all vacant buildings and assessing early childhood seat need.\u201d<\/p>\n

Additional reporting by Peter Senzamici<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Roughly 20 planned early childhood education centers in the Big Apple mysteriously sit idle as demand surges for…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":149588,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[6602,302,4337,68,57,9,197,56,63,65,64,51259,209,5271,58],"class_list":{"0":"post-149587","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-new-york-city","8":"tag-charter-schools","9":"tag-city-hall","10":"tag-department-of-education","11":"tag-exclusive","12":"tag-metro","13":"tag-new-york","14":"tag-new-york-city-life","15":"tag-ny","16":"tag-nyc","17":"tag-nyc-headlines","18":"tag-nyc-news","19":"tag-preschools","20":"tag-public-schools","21":"tag-schools","22":"tag-us-news"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/149587","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=149587"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/149587\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/149588"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=149587"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=149587"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=149587"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}