Judge OKs district's breakup

3-way split occurs July 1; Stephens’ enrollment too small

U.S. District Judge Susan O. Hickey on Wednesday approved the breakup of the tiny Stephens School District, which will be split among three other school districts on July 1.

Camden-Fairview, Magnolia and Nevada County school districts will take parts of the Stephens School District starting with the coming 2014-15 school year.

In April, the Arkansas Board of Education ordered the breakup of the Stephens district because the district's enrollment fell below the 350-student minimum required by state law for a school district.

The Education Board sought federal court approval of the dissolution of the Stephens district because the Stephens district is a party in an old school desegregation lawsuit that has never been dismissed. Stephens became a party in the case when it absorbed the McNeil School District in 2004. The McNeil district was the original defendant in a desegregation case that resulted in a 1970 consent decree.

Stephens district representatives, who were unsuccessful in their effort to convince the state Education Board to consolidate Stephens only with the Nevada County district, asked Hickey to issue a temporary restraining order and preliminary injunction to stop the split-up of the district.

The Stephens district leaders argued that the Stephens students would be subject to bus rides of up to four hours a day if the district was split among three other districts.

Stephens, represented by Clay Fendley of Little Rock, asked the court to set a 45-minute maximum limit on bus rides.

In an eight-page order, Hickey said she had "serious concerns about the continued applicability of a very specific consent decree directed toward a school district that has been dissolved." However, she also said that to bring some needed finality to the matter, she would assume that the consent decree is still in effect and that the Stephens' consolidation requires court action.

The judge said that the 1970 consent decree addressed the issue of busing students for desegregation but "says nothing regarding actual transportation times. That raises the question of this Court's authority to impose a maximum transportation time or even consider Stephens's concerns regarding transportation time.

"The job of this Court is to enforce the terms of the settlement agreement reached by the parties in 1970. The fact that a settlement agreement has been entered does not make the school district a 'ward of the Court' -- it does not give the Court general jurisdiction over every alleged injustice committed by a school district.

"Simply put, if the settlement is silent on the subject of transportation time, the Court's authority does not extend to that issue. Stephens's motion could be denied on this ground alone," she wrote.

The Stephens territory and students in Ouachita County will go to Camden-Fairview schools. Stephens' territory and students in Columbia County will go to the Magnolia School District schools and Stephens territory in Nevada County will go to the Nevada County School District. There are no Stephens' students who actually reside in the Nevada County.

In her order Hickey said there was no evidence or testimony submitted to support arguments that the Stephens' students would be on buses for up to four hours.

She cited testimony from Robert Davis, the superintendent of the Camden-Fairview School District, who said the Stephens students assigned to his district would be picked up on three different buses and travel about 50 minutes one way, counting pick ups and drop-offs at bus stops and at the district's five schools.

Stephens' students assigned to the Magnolia School District could anticipate having shorter drives to school than their drives to the Stephens' campus, the judge said.

"Accordingly, the Court sees no reason to take the extraordinary step of mandating a maximum transportation time when there is no evidence to indicate that the travel time will be excessive," Hickey wrote, adding that the Stephens students can ask for court intervention later if they feel their travel times are not in line with Davis' testimony.

Hickey also noted that Stephens students going to Camden-Fairview and Magnolia will be going to schools with greater racial diversity than existed in the Stephens district, which was 81 percent black this past year. Camden-Fairview's enrollment was 60 percent black and Magnolia's 53 percent black.

Jeremy Lasiter, counsel for the Arkansas Department of Education, represented the state Education Board in the case. Allen Roberts, a Camden attorney, represented the Camden-Fairview, Magnolia and Nevada County district intervenors in the lawsuit.

Hickey said in her decision that the court will retain jurisdiction in the case, which is titled Ronald Runyan v. Stephens School District, for reasons that include hearing arguments on the appropriate future application of the 1970 consent decree.

Metro on 06/26/2014

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