STATE FUNDING EQUITY

Summer 01 (v5#1)
Pataki Stalls CFE Victory
Governor's Appeal Delays Implementation of Campaign for Fiscal Equity Ruling

"What do we need: Fair funding!
When do we need it? Now!"

On April 26, this chant rose loudly from a rally in front of Governor Pataki’s Manhattan office building, where parents, children, advocates, educators, and politicians protested the governor’s appeal of the decision in the Campaign for Fiscal Equity (CFE) school-funding lawsuit.

The noisy rally denounced Pataki’s decision to send the CFE ruling into at least a year of appeals (New York has two levels of appeals courts). The group of over 100 protesters included mayoral candidates Mark Green and Fernando Ferrer, Manhattan Borough President C. Virginia Fields, rally organizer NYS Assemblywoman Barbara Clark of Queens, CFE lead plaintiff Robert Jackson, and other city leaders.

Pataki’s choice to appeal puts an automatic hold on the remedy process. Pending further consideration by the appeals court, the appeal suspends the order from New York State Supreme Court Justice Leland DeGrasse. Justice DeGrasse’s ruled in favor of CFE earlier this year, ordering the state to create a new school funding system to guarantee sufficient resources for each school district to provide every student the opportunity for a sound basic education by September 15, 2001.

The governor’s notice to appeal DeGrasse’s historic ruling was quietly filed on February 28, just days before the deadline. CFE immediately brought a new motion to expedite the case and avert further delay. Up until then, Attorney General Eliot Spitzer had given both public and private assurances that he would cooperate to move the appeals process ahead as quickly as possible. Following CFE’s motion to expedite, however, Spitzer told the appellate court that the state would need every day of the entire nine months allotted for the process. Dragging out the appeals for a couple of years would take the resolution of the case safely beyond the next gubernatorial election, as CFE and others quickly pointed out, accusing the governor and attorney general of putting their own political interests above the interests of the state’s public school students.

CFE Fights Back: Appeal Put on the Fast Track

In response to Spitzer’s reply papers, CFE filed its own papers in the New York State Supreme Court reproaching the state for unnecessarily delaying its appeal in CFE v. State. Every day the appeals process is held up denies New York public school students their constitutionally protected opportunity to a sound basic education, CFE argued. According to the motion, "The cumulative nature of education means that each day of delay (never mind each year) results in further harm to more than one million children who still continue to receive a constitutionally deficient education."

On April 6, CFE won another important court victory. The appellate court did not buy the state’s argument for getting maximum time to prepare their case and, instead, granted CFE’s motion to accelerate the normal schedule for briefing and arguing the appeal. A five-judge panel put the case on the fast track: the state must submit their papers by August and oral arguments are set for October.

Ever since the announcement of the appeal, CFE has called on the Legislature to do the right thing and, appeal notwithstanding, move forward to implement Justice DeGrasse’s remedy. CFE is urging the state to act immediately to create an independent panel to begin an assessment of the actual costs of a sound basic education for all districts statewide the first task set out by Justice DeGrasse. If the Legislature does not move forward, CFE will consider asking the appeals court to lift the stay on the remedy process.

Until Pataki’s team files its brief, no one will know which part or parts of Justice DeGrasse’s decision will be under scrutiny. The 180-page ruling, issued after a seven-month trial and long deliberation period, declares New York State’s current system for funding education unconstitutional. Specifically, it finds that the current system violates New York City students’ right to a sound basic education guaranteed them by the state constitution and that it also violates the rights of New York City minority students to equal education opportunity.

Urgent Need for Reform

The CFE decision creates a new constitutional standard for a sound basic education, which Justice DeGrasse defines as the "foundational skills that students need to become productive citizens capable of civic engagement and sustaining competitive employment." This means, as Justice DeGrasse elaborated, being able to understand complex ballot issues and sophisticated scientific evidence in criminal cases that could come before a jury; it means being prepared not just to get a job but to pursue a career.

To ensure a sound basic education, Justice DeGrasse held that the state must provide at least the following resources:

• sufficient numbers of qualified teachers, principals, and other personnel;
• appropriate class sizes;
• adequate and accessible school buildings with sufficient space to ensure appropriate class size and implementation of a sound curriculum;
• sufficient and up-to-date books, supplies, libraries, educational technology and laboratories;
• suitable curricula, including an expanded platform of programs to help at-risk students by giving them "more time on task";
• adequate resources for students with extraordinary needs;
• and, a safe orderly environment.

The court-ordered September 15 deadline for a new funding system that remedies the constitutional wrongs created by the current one expresses the urgency of the need for reform. The new funding system must: ensure that every school district has the resources necessary for providing the opportunity for a sound basic education, based on a costing-out process; take into account local-cost variations; provide sustained and stable funding for long-term planning by schools and school districts; provide transparency so the public understands how the state distributes school aid; and ensure a system of accountability to measure whether the reforms implemented by the Legislature actually provide the opportunity for a sound basic education and remedy the disparate impact of the current system.

Justice DeGrasse’s decision carefully analyzes in great detail the lack of qualified teachers, excessive class sizes, inadequate facilities, and other factors that deny students in New York City the opportunity for a sound basic education, and catalogues the deficiencies of the current state aid system. It also directly answers the question, "Does money matter?"–answering yes on the basis of solid evidence, cutting-edge research, and an in-depth understanding of the educational and legal issues involved.

Waiting for Action

Thanks to the CFE decision, education funding has become the issue of the year in Albany, where legislators are now embroiled in the state’s annual budget negotiations. Both the Republican-controlled Senate and the Democratic-majority Assembly are offering education budget increases that reflect the influence of Justice DeGrasse’s ruling, reflecting the growing recognition that money matters to student outcomes and that public schools around the state are underfunded to the detriment of student achievement.

In the meantime, while the budget and appeals processes play themselves out, public school students and their families throughout the state wait and hope that the CFE lawsuit will soon yield enough additional education resources to level the educational playing field.