Four school districts in Crawford and Sebastian counties filed an official motion Wednesday requesting to be intervenors in a school finance lawsuit between the Deer/Mount Judea School District and the state.
“We’re not suing anybody,” said David Woolly, superintendent of the AlmaSchool District in Crawford County. “We’re just trying to have the opportunity to have our say.”
School boards in Alma, Fort Smith, Greenwood and Van Buren in late January authorized their superintendents to decide whether they wanted to intervene in the ongoing lawsuit. Mitch Llewellyn notif ied thePulaski County Circuit Court of the districts’ interest with a motion and a complaint.
The judge in the case is Chris Piazza.
Deer/Mount Judea sued the state in December 2010, alleging that the funding system for education is unconstitutional, especially what is provided for isolated schools and transportation, said Clay Fendley, an attorney representing the district. The district has an enrollment of about 360 students who live in a geographic area spanning 400 square miles in Newton County.
A judge in Pulaski County Circuit Court had dismissed the case, saying the issues raised were decided in a previous school finance case. Although the Arkansas Supreme Court agreed on some points with the lower court, the high court found some errors and in October sent the case back to the Circuit Court.
Attorney General Dustin McDaniel has asked Piazza to dismiss the case.
The case has not yet been scheduled for trial. A request for a scheduling order filed by Deer/Mount Judea’s attorneys asked for a two-week trial and set a deadline for the Deer/Mount Judea School District to file an amended complaint within days of the end of this year’s Arkansas legislative fiscal session, which began Monday.
The request to intervene by the Alma, Fort Smith, Greenwood and Van Buren districts states that the four districts ask that they be allowed to participate in all trial and pre-trial proceedings.
Woolly said he does not know what to expect from the case or how much involvement the districts will have. The four districts differ in enrollment and property wealth from each other and from Deer/Mount Judea.
But any decision on the school funding system would affect all school districts, Woolly said.
“Our four districts just have a history and a tradition of speaking up on these matters,” Woolly said. “We’re wanting to speak for all the children in Arkansas.”
State law says that the state will study the adequacy of funding for schools, Woolly said.
The motion states that the districts agree with Deer/ Mount Judea that the state has not complied with the law in evaluating whether a “substantially equal opportunity for an adequate educationis being afforded to Arkansas students.”
However, the districts have characteristics that are different from Deer/Mount Judea. Deer/Mount Judea is a district of small, remote schools in a mountainous and sparsely populated area, while the other four districts are larger schools with populations ranging from 3,280 students in Alma to 14,700 students in Fort Smith.
The Arkansas Supreme Court dismissed some of Deer/Mount Judea’s claims because they could have been brought in previous school funding cases to which Deer/ Mount Judea was a party, the motion states. The districts seeking to intervene worry that they could face the same situation if they are not allowed to intervene in the case.
The motion filed on behalf of the four districts states that their hope is to aid the court in reaching a more balanced resolution to any adjustments made in the school funding system as a result of the case.
School funding is an ongoing concern for superintendents across the state, said Richard Abernathy, executive director of the Arkansas Association of Educational Administrators. The association is not involved in the case. Abernathy notified membersof his organization about the case being sent back to the Circuit Court. Any changes in the school funding system could affect their districts, he said.
“The costs are constantly going up. The demands placed on schools are constantly going up,” Abernathy said. “School funding is supposed to be based on need and not on available revenue. That’s not the way it works.”
Northwest Arkansas, Pages 9 on 02/13/2014