Learn NY launches a last-ditch ad campaign to sway Senators

One day before June 30, a lobbying group has launched an ad campaign to pressure the state Senate to renew mayoral control.

Learn NY, which is urging Senators to pass a version of the Assembly’s bill, is running advertisements, sending out robocalls, and planting its volunteers in the halls of the state capital today. The plan, according to spokeswoman Julie Wood, is to put enough pressure on state senators to force them to bring the issue to a vote.

“We’re in real jeopardy of having the school system be in chaos,” Wood said, echoing the mayor’s escalating warnings of anarchy.

The banner ads, which are running on three New York City politics websites — Politicker, Daily Politics, and NY1 — urge readers to call their state Senators and ask them to “pass the Assembly’s education reform bill now.”

There’s also a campaign to get people to sign the group’s online petition, as well as robocalls, which are going out to New Yorkers starting today. (If you’ve gotten one — please! — record and send it to tips@gothamschools.org.)

How long the campaign will last remains to be seen, Wood said. She said it’s possible that Learn NY would continue to operate after the school governance question has been settled. The nonprofit organization was created to champion mayoral control.