Fairchild v. Liberty Indep. Sch.
| Decision Date | 22 February 2010 |
| Docket Number | No. 08-40833.,08-40833. |
| Parties | Julie FAIRCHILD, Plaintiff-Appellant, v. LIBERTY INDEPENDENT SCHOOL DISTRICT; Mona Chadwick, individually and in her official capacity as Superintendent; Bruce Lacefield, Individually and in his official capacity as Principal; Tom Connelly, Individually Capacity; Jessica Barrier Lanier, Individual Capacity; Frank Davis, Individual Capacity; William Bednar, Individual Capacity; Karen Johnson, Individual Capacity; Matthew Harris, Official Capacity, Defendants-Appellees. |
| Court | U.S. Court of Appeals — Fifth Circuit |
597 F.3d 747
Julie FAIRCHILD, Plaintiff-Appellant, v. LIBERTY INDEPENDENT SCHOOL DISTRICT; Mona Chadwick, individually and in her official capacity as Superintendent; Bruce Lacefield, Individually and in his official capacity as Principal; Tom Connelly, Individually Capacity; Jessica Barrier Lanier, Individual Capacity; Frank Davis, Individual Capacity; William Bednar, Individual Capacity; Karen Johnson, Individual Capacity; Matthew Harris, Official Capacity, Defendants-Appellees.
No. 08-40833.
United States Court of Appeals,
Fifth Circuit.
Feb. 22, 2010.
[597 F.3d 748]
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[597 F.3d 751]Jeralynn L. Jackee Cox (argued), Fort Worth, TX, John Wesley Tunnell, Lufkin, TX, for Fairchild.
Richard Alan Morris (argued), Adam David Courtin, Feldman, Rogers, Morris & Grover, L.L.P., Houston, TX, Kristi Michelle Herring, Administaff, Kingwood, TX, for Liberty Ind. Sch. Dist, Chadwick, Lacefield, Connelly, Davis and Harris.
Kevin Wayne Cole, Cole Law Firm, Austin, TX, for Lanier.
Lawrence Louis Germer, Kelli Burris Smith, Germer Gertz, L.L.P., Beaumont, TX, for Bednar and Johnson.
Appeal from the United States District Court for the Eastern District of Texas.
Before HIGGINBOTHAM and STEWART, Circuit Judges, and FELDMAN*, District Judge.
PATRICK E. HIGGINBOTHAM, Circuit Judge:
Julie Fairchild—asserting that the Liberty Independent School District had infringed her constitutionally protected speech—sued the District and several of its officials. She claimed the District— after firing her—did not allow her at a school board meeting to present her side of her troubles with a teacher for whom she had been an aide, issues then on an alternative-track review before consideration by the Board. The district court granted the defendants summary judgment on all claims, and Fairchild appealed. We affirm the judgment but travel a some-
[597 F.3d 752]what different path than did the district court.
Fairchild worked for the District as a teacher's aide for special needs children in Jessica Barrier Lanier's classroom.1 The two did not get along, and the District eventually fired Fairchild in May of 2005. The next day, Fairchild submitted a posttermination grievance. She alleged that the District had terminated her in retaliation for accusing Barrier Lanier of such things as overdosing children with prescription medicine, lifting a severely handicapped student by her hair and belt loops, and shopping for her wedding during school time.2
Two District policies, DGBA (Local) and BEC (Legal), govern employee concerns and grievances.3 DGBA (Local) requires employees to follow a three-tiered administrative process in which the school board for the first time directly hears and deliberates on the matter at Level III. Per BEC (Legal), the Board will hear the employee concern in closed session, unless the target of the concern demands a public hearing.
At Level I Fairchild alleged that the District had terminated her for trying to blow the whistle on Barrier Lanier; that she posed a danger to the children and should be fired. The District denied Fairchild's Level I grievance. Fairchild then progressed on two parallel tracks—one within the District and one outside of it. She filed for a Level II hearing, and, afterfailing to reach an agreement, she requested a Level III (and final) hearing. In the meantime, Fair-child reported Barrier Lanier to Child Protective Services, and began a parents' petition asking the District to be more forthcoming with information regarding special needs children—and demanding that the District not retaliate against any employee who shares information about an endangered child.
All of this came to a head on August 16, 2005. That night, the District held a school board meeting. At the beginning of its meetings, the Board allows public comment on Board business. It resolves no disputes at this opening comment session and decides no questions. Rather, issues requiring resolution must proceed through alternative channels. When commentary moves to issues with named teachers or individual employees, the Board notes it as matter-beyond the scope of the opening session, and the speaker must first proceed through an alternative process. This decision steers away personal grievances or examinations of individual performance, both of which would necessitate reply and a frustration of the Board's agenda. It also avoids a frustration of the policy of not hearing personnel (including employeeon-employee) grievances in public absent the consent of the employee whose performance is questioned. After the opening
[597 F.3d 753]comment session, the Board moves to the remainder of its meeting agenda—sometimes in open and sometimes in executive sessions.
The Board scheduled Fairchild to speak during the comment session of the August 16 meeting to allow her to present her petition. Fairchild had to sign a statement acknowledging that: "[A]ny issues pertaining to... specific... district personnel... may necessitate a closed session." She had to further acknowledge, "This comment period is not intended for the presentation of complaints. The Board will only consider complaints that remain unresolved after they have been addressed through proper administrative channels and when they have been placed on the agenda." Additionally, the District has in place an enforcement rule which governs all public meetings; it states in part:
The Board shall not tolerate disruption of the meeting by members of the audience. If, after at least one warning from the presiding officer, any person continues to disrupt the meeting by his or her words or actions, the presiding officer may request assistance from law enforcement officials to have the person removed from the meeting.
At the same meeting, the Board decided to hold Fairchild's Level III grievance hearing, which would commence after the open session. As required by BEC (Legal), the Level III grievance would close, this because Fairchild sought to level charges against Barrier Lanier.
But Fairchild requested a different procedure—a hearing and decision on her Level III appeal in the open session of the meeting. She cited the Texas Open Meetings Act: "This chapter does not require a governmental body to conduct an open meeting to deliberate the appointment, employment, evaluation, reassignment, duties, discipline, or dismissal of a public... employee... [unless] the... employee who is the subject of the deliberation or hearing requests a public hearing."4 Even though she sought with her grievance to attack Barrier Lanier, Fairchild contended that her hearing bore on her own firing. That is, she was the "subject" of a negative employment "deliberation"—and she demanded an open session. The District compromised—telling Fairchild that she could have her public hearing but that, if it moved to employee-on-employee concerns, the session would close pursuant to BEC (Legal).
Ultimately, during the August 16 meeting Fairchild presented her petition in the comment session without interruption—not mentioning school employees by name. She also had her Level III grievance in the closed session, as scheduled. There, Fairchild made her complaints against Barrier Lanier and sought to "clear" her own name. In the end, the District denied the relief sought in the post-termination grievance hearing.
Fairchild brought this action in federal district court to contest the procedures used at the August 16 Board meeting. She alleged that: (1) the District had misinterpreted the Texas Open Meetings Act, because the Act requires a public grievance hearing; (2) in the alternative, the Act is unconstitutional as applied to her in that it closed her Level III grievance hearing; (3) the District had retaliated against her for trying to blow the whistle on Barrier Lanier; (4) the District's public comment rules, collectively called BED (Local), which she claims do not allow parents in the opening comment session to com-
[597 F.3d 754]plain against teachers, are facially unconstitutional; (5) the District's policies DGBA (Local) and BEC (Legal) violate the First Amendment, both on their face and as applied to Fairchild's post-termination grievance hearing; and (6) the individual District administrators and teachers had deprived her of constitutional (First Amendment) rights and should be held liable under § 1983.
Through the course of multiple voluminous motions, the district court granted summary judgment to all defendants on all claims. On appeal, there remains only a facial challenge to the rules concerning the comment session of the Board meeting and both a facial and as-applied challenge to the closing of Fairchild's grievance hearing.5
Our review is de novo, and we may affirm a grant of summary judgment on any grounds supported by the record— including grounds different than those relied upon by the district court.6
We begin with Fairchild's facial attack on the comment session rules, BED (Local).7 The district court granted summary judgment to the defendants, persuaded Fairchild had not shown the injury essential to Article III standing. We hold that Fairchild has standing to bring her First Amendment facial challenge to the comment portion of the Board meeting and affirm the summary judgment on the merits.
A plaintiff must meet both the constitutional demands of Article III standing as well as instrumental prudential concerns.8 Prudential considerations are judicially-imposed and are seen as jurisdictional in reach.9 Article III "standing has three elements: (1) an 'injury in fact' that is (a) concrete and particularized and (b) actual or imminent; (2) a causal connection between the injury and the conduct complained of; and (3) the likelihood that a favorable decision will redress the injury."10
In First Amendment facial challenges, federal courts relax the prudential limitations and allow yet-unharmed...
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