In a move that could cost the city about $5.2 million, the schools chancellor, Joel Klein, said yesterday that he would place 44 assistant principals into unneeded office jobs rather than force schools to hire them.

“I believe that leaders need the power to choose their own management teams,” Mr. Klein said in a letter sent to the city’s 1,400 principals.

If the Department of Education cannot place the 44 “excessed” assistant principals — those whose posts may have been cut due to budget or school restructuring — by next week, Mr. Klein said that he would be required under the current contract to “force them upon” schools.

He said that it could “tear up the teams” that principals have built over the months and years. Instead, Mr. Klein said he had no choice but to create new jobs that the city didn’t want or need.

“This is tax-payer money that should be paying for the high-quality educators,” Mr. Klein said. He said the money could be used to hire 80 more teachers.

Currently, there are 22 vacancies for assistant principals at schools across the city.

The president of the union representing city principals, Jill Levy, struck back, saying that Mr. Klein was just trying to find an excuse for not signing a new contract.

“I think it is a horrible thing to defame people to make it appear that these people were put into these positions because they were not capable of doing their job,” Ms. Levy said. “Most of them are in this position because schools downsized or closed.”

The union, the Council of School Supervisors and Administrators, is entering its third year without a contract. It recently declared an impasse in negotiations with the city and called on a state mediator to end the dispute.

Mr. Klein used the letter yesterday to call for contract reform and said he hoped that the education department could soon come to an agreement with the union.