P2JW312000-6-A01500-1--------NS CMYK Composite NY BP,CK Associated Press METRO MONEY A16 | BRUNCHBOX A16 | ARTS & ENTERTAINMENT A18 | HEARD & SCENE A19 SPORTS HOW THE GIANTS CAN FINALLY WIN A20 WSJ.com/NY PROPERTY SAVING A BROADWAY HANGOUT A18 THE WALL STREET JOURNAL. * * * * * * Saturday/Sunday, November 8 - 9, 2014 | A15 Staying in Underperforming Schools Few Students Request Transfers and Others Are Denied Their Choice; ‘It’s Not a Solution’ BY LESLIE BRODY More than 143,000 New York City students go to schools with such low test scores or graduation rates that they have the right to seek transfers to better ones. But only 6,662 families took advantage of the option this year, according to city data, and 1,815 didn’t get the transfer they wanted. Advocates for children’s rights say that this isn’t acceptable, that all students deserve good schools and can’t wait for the troubled ones they attend to turn around. Such transfers can be daunting, however. Students who get them often travel long distances across the city. Working parents who don’t want their children alone on buses or subways must patch together elaborate afterschool pickup plans. Emma Hulse, who helps families apply for such transfers at the New Settlement Parent Action Committee in the Bronx, called them a stopgap measure. “This is a safety valve and an important option for families willing to make a lot of sacrifices, but it’s not a solution,” she said. “The biggest issue is making sure there is a high-quality school in every neighborhood.” City and state officials are working on several initiatives to fix the most troubled schools. Mayor Bill de Blasio on Monday announced a $150 million plan that would add social services, teacher training and a daily additional hour of instructional time to 94 of them. On Friday, the city unveiled another plan to tackle two of the worst performers: Boys and Girls High School and Automotive High School, which had been failing for so long they were deemed “out of time.” The plan involves making all of the staffers reapply for their jobs. City schools chancellor Carmen Fariña said she was reviewing whether to change leadership at Automotive after replacing the Boys and Girls principal last month. She said she would create a committee, including United Federation of Teachers representatives, to decide which teachers would be released from the two Brooklyn schools at the end of the academic year. Getting new staff was a common practice of former Mayor Michael Bloomberg when he closed schools and opened new ones in their buildings. State Education Commissioner Please turn to the next page Transfer Denied Fewer than 5,000 students this year and last were able to transfer from struggling schools. Applied for transfers Received an offer 8,086 6,662 4,194 2013 4,847 2014 Source: NYC Department of Education The Wall Street Journal United To End Casino Flights Brooklyn, After Dark BY TED MANN sion for historic preservation and serves as a trustee on the nonprofit Newark Preservation and Landmarks Committee, or NPLC. Amer, 25, who runs marketing, is into art, online businesses and social media. The Haninis have deep ties in the city and New Jersey. Immi- grants from Jordan, the family settled in Jersey City in 1978. Unique among most Newark developers, according to some preservation experts, Samer and Amer also live in Newark. “It is a story we love to see happen,” said Liz Del Tufo, presiPlease turn to page A18 Ramsay de Give for The Wall Street Journal Others were less sure. Mr. Grimm said Mr. Schumer would lose a certain measure of influence, regardless of his deal-making skills. “When the bills are actually written, the minority party is not in the room,” Mr. Grimm said. “That’s just how it is.” Other Republicans said the worries about a GOP-controlled Congress’s effect on New York were unfounded. The party picked up three congressional seats in the state, giving it more clout in the House, they said. Rep. Peter King, a Long Island Republican, said it would now be easier for the delegation to deliver for its constituents on legislation like the James Zadroga 9/11 Health and Compensation Act, which gives benefits to people with an illness related to Please turn to page A17 United Airlines will halt its service to Atlantic City International Airport in December, pulling the plug on a seven-month experiment that surrogates of Gov. Chris Christie helped negotiate as part of administration efforts to revive the casino city’s sagging fortunes. The airline confirmed Friday it would end flights from Atlantic City to Chicago and Houston on Dec. 3, citing low demand that “didn’t meet our expectations.” Those two cities are the only destinations served by United from Atlantic City. The pullout will leave the small regional airport with a single, lowcost airline, Spirit Airlines. The move marks a reversal from roughly one year ago, when Mr. Christie announced a deal to bring United to Atlantic City by predicting that new commercialairline service would help the city “grow and prosper.” From the start, aviation industry experts questioned the move, since previous efforts to attract commercial carriers to the airport had foundered, thanks to a struggling local economy and competition from nearby Philadelphia International Airport. The South Jersey Transportation Authority, which owns the airport, and the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey expressed disappointment in the airline in a joint statement Friday afternoon, urging it to “reconsider its decision to give the service more time to develop.” “There will be ups and downs in the process of reinvigorating Atlantic City, but we hope to work with air carriers on new opportunities,” said Michael Drewniak, a spokesman for Mr. Christie. Joe Sitt, chairman of the nonprofit Global Gateway Alliance, which champions improvements in the region’s airports, said it was “unfortunate” that United was getting out of Atlantic City. “But we do need to concentrate first on improving Newark, Please turn to page A17 AWASH IN COLOR: A crowd came out Thursday evening to see a laser show at the first New York Festival of Lights, under the Manhattan Bridge in Brooklyn’s Dumbo neighborhood. Besides lighting displays, the three-night celebration includes art installations, DJ performances and musical acts. The spectacle wraps up Saturday. Deal-Making Schumer Readies for New Senate 50° TODAY’S HIGH CHILLY Weather Real Feel 9 a.m. 42° 3 p.m. 50° Record High 76° (1975) Sunrise/Sunset 6:34 a.m./4:45 p.m. Sunday’s High 56° N.Y. Sports Lineup 1 p.m. Sunday Steelers @ Jets 4:25 p.m. Sunday Giants @ Seahawks For N.Y. sports coverage, see A20 U.S. Sen. Charles Schumer is known for brokering bipartisan agreements. one side has 60 votes. I’ve been able to pass some of the pieces of legislation I’m proudest of when we were in the minority,” Mr. Schumer said at an unrelated news conference Thursday. The senator then rattled off a short list of legislation he helped pass before Democrats took control of the Senate in 2007, such as tax credits for college tuition and prescription drug changes. “I’m going to keep working in a bipartisan way,” added Mr. Schumer, who declined to be in- In Newark, Making The Old New Again BY SHARON ADARLO Standing 12 stories high and facing the street with elegant marble columns, the First National Bank on Broad Street in Newark, built in 1912, had fallen into a state of neglect and sat vacant for many years. But later this month, the classical Beaux-Arts building will reopen as the stylish and modern Hotel Indigo, which is being billed as the first boutique hotel for Newark. It will have 108 rooms, a restaurant and rooftop lounge. The rehabilitation of the building to its former glory is a capstone for the Hanini Group, the Newark-based development and construction-management business, which has been working on the project since 2009. It has been a dizzying rise for the Hanini Group, made up of three brothers Thafer, Samer and Amer, who only started in the Newark real-estate world a decade ago. Since then, they have been singled out by preservation activists for their work at Hotel Indigo and their track record of preserving other historic Newark buildings. The Haninis are also investors in, and co-developers of, the historic Hahne & Co. department store on Broad Street, which is slated to have the city’s first Whole Foods in 2016. “I enjoy history. You can’t rebuild history. If you knock down a building, you erase a whole segment of time,” said Samer Hanini, 40 years old, who serves as the group’s head of design and construction. The Haninis are a close-knit family with avid interests in en- terviewed. “And I think that in the Senate I’m hopeful that the new Republican leadership will want to work in a bipartisan way.” Mr. Schumer, who was elected to the Senate in 1998, is known as a tough negotiator. The skills put the senator in a good position to serve as chief negotiator with Republicans holding only a small majority, said Ken Sherrill, a professor emeritus of political science at Hunter College CUNY. “He’s somebody who can sit down with John McCain and for that matter, McConnell,” Mr. Sherrill said, referring to Sen. Mitch McConnell, the Kentucky Republican expected to be the next majority leader. “He is an extraordinary deal maker who relishes the opportunity to put these things together.” Weekend Profile The Hanini Brothers Newark real-estate developers  Siblings Thafer, Samer and Amer started in Newark real estate only a decade ago.  Known for their work reviving and reusing the city’s historic buildings, including the Hahne & Co. department store John Taggart for The Wall Street Journal NEED TO KNOW Composite For the better part of a decade, Charles Schumer has occupied a powerful seat at the table with Democrats in control of the U.S. Senate. Now, with a new Republican majority taking over in January, New York’s senior senator—and the Democrats’ third-ranking member—will step into a more uncertain role: one where his ability to broker bipartisan agreements will be in demand more than ever. Mr. Schumer’s status as a member of the minority party has some elected officials and business leaders in the heavily Democratic New York City area worried about what a Republican Congress may mean for the region’s priorities, particularly infrastructure and transporta- tion—issues Mr. Schumer has often highlighted. Adding to the perceived decline in New York’s influence: the state’s junior senator, Kirsten Gillibrand, who has never served in the minority and is still in her first full term. In the House, the city has only one Republican member: Staten Island’s Michael Grimm, who has been stripped of his committee assignments because he has been indicted on federal charges. “It’s a problem. It’s a significant problem,” said Kathryn Wylde, president and chief executive of the Partnership for New York City, a nonprofit group representing business leaders. But Mr. Schumer said he doesn’t fear New York will lose clout next year. “In the Senate, you have to work in a bipartisan way unless  Redeveloped a historic bank building into Hotel Indigo, Newark’s first boutique hotel, scheduled to open Nov. 18 trepreneurship and real estate. Thafer, 42, a nonpracticing doctor who prefers staying in the background, heads daily operations, often scouting out future projects and properties. Samer, an avid bicyclist who studied architecture at the New Jersey Institute of Technology, has a pas- P2JW312000-6-A01500-1--------NS BY MARA GAY MAGENTA BLACK CYAN YELLOW