McFarland v. Jefferson County Public Schools

• Decision Date: 29 June 2004
• Docket Number: No. CIV.A. 3:02CV-620-H.,CIV.A. 3:02CV-620-H.
• Citation: 330 F.Supp.2d 834
• Court: U.S. District Court — Western District of Kentucky
• Parties: David McFARLAND, Parent and Next Friend of Stephen and Daniel McFarland, et al. Plaintiffs v. JEFFERSON COUNTY PUBLIC SCHOOLS, et al. Defendants

330 F.Supp.2d 834

David McFARLAND, Parent and Next Friend of Stephen and Daniel McFarland, et al. Plaintiffs v. JEFFERSON COUNTY PUBLIC SCHOOLS, et al. Defendants

No. CIV.A. 3:02CV-620-H.

United States District Court, W.D. Kentucky, at Louisville.

June 29, 2004.

COPYRIGHT MATERIAL OMITTED

Teddy B. Gordon, Louisville, KY, for Plaintiff.

Byron E. Leet, Francis J. Mellen, Jr., Pamela J. Ledford, Wyatt, Tarrant & Combs, Louisville, KY, for Defendant.

Chinh Quang Le, New York, NY, for NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund, Inc.

David A. Friedman, Amanda G. Main, Amy D. Cubbage, Sheryl G. Snyder, Taylor Spalding Flanery, Frost Brown Todd LLC, Louisville, KY, for American Civil Liberties Union of Kentucky, Inc.

Jeffrey T. Metzmeier, Louisville, KY, for Kentucky Commission on Human Rights.

MEMORANDUM OPINION

HEYBURN, Chief Judge.

For twenty-five years, the Jefferson County Public Schools ("JCPS" or "the Board") maintained an integrated school system under a 1975 federal court decree. After release from that decree four years ago, the JCPS elected to continue its integrated schools through a managed choice plan that includes broad racial guidelines ("the 2001 Plan"). This case arises because some students and their parents say that the Board's student assignment plan violates their rights under the Equal Protection Clause of the United States Constitution.¹

The occasion of the fiftieth anniversary of Brown v. Board of Education² has generated much discussion regarding whether that ruling has fulfilled its original promise. To give all students the benefits of an education in a racially integrated school and to maintain community commitment to the entire school system precisely express the Board's own vision of Brown's promise. The benefits the JCPS hopes to achieve go to the heart of its educational mission: (1) a better academic education for all students; (2) better appreciation of our political and cultural heritage for all students; (3) more competitive and attractive public schools; and (4) broader community support for all JCPS schools.

One half a century of social change after Brown, the constitutional questions the federal courts confront are derivative of but dramatically different from those addressed in Brown. This case raises one of those questions: to what extent does the Equal Protection Clause limit JCPS's discretion to use race-conscious policies to maintain an integrated public school system. The Supreme Court has yet to consider this question directly.

I. SUMMARY

This case has required the Court to weigh individual rights under the Equal Protection Clause against the responsibility and right of an elected public school board to determine its own educational policies. For guidance, the Court has focused on the divided opinions of the Supreme Court in two recent cases: Grutter v. Bollinger, 539 U.S. 306, 123 S.Ct. 2325, 156 L.Ed.2d 304 (2003), and Gratz v. Bollinger, 539 U.S. 244, 123 S.Ct. 2411, 156 L.Ed.2d 257 (2003). The first of these opinions upheld race-conscious admissions policies at the University of Michigan Law School; the latter struck down different policies at the University of Michigan's College of Literature, Science and the Arts. These two cases set out the requirement that any use of race in a higher education admissions plan must further a compelling governmental interest and must be narrowly tailored to meet that interest. The Court considered these principles in the slightly different context of an elementary and secondary school student assignment plan.

JCPS meets the compelling interest requirement because it has articulated some of the same reasons for integrated public schools that the Supreme Court upheld in Grutter. Moreover, the Board has described other compelling interests and benefits of integrated schools, such as improved student education and community support for public schools, that were not relevant in the law school context but are relevant to public elementary and secondary schools.

In most respects, the JCPS student assignment plan also meets the narrow tailoring requirement. Its broad racial guidelines do not constitute a quota. The Board avoids the use of race in predominant and unnecessary ways that unduly harm members of a particular racial group. The Board also uses other race-neutral means, such as geographic boundaries, special programs and student choice, to achieve racial integration.

The student assignment process for the traditional schools is distinct from that employed at all other programs and schools. In that process, JCPS separates students into racial categories in a manner that appears completely unnecessary to accomplish its objectives. To the extent the 2001 Plan incorporates these procedures, the Court concludes that it violates the Equal Protection Clause. The Board may continue to administer the 2001 Plan in every respect in all of its schools, with the exception of its use of racial categories in the traditional school assignment process.

II. FACTUAL BACKGROUND

Plaintiffs all have children who attend or have attended Jefferson County public schools and have participated in the student assignment process. Each, in different ways, is dissatisfied with the procedure or result of his or her child's assignment to a Jefferson County public school.³ Plaintiffs seek to enjoin the use of racial guidelines under the 2001 Plan, including the use of racial categories in the traditional school assignment process. This Court has stated that, because the student assignment plan applies at all grade levels in all school settings in the Jefferson County schools, any ruling would necessarily apply to the entire school system.

The JCPS Board is composed of seven members elected by district for terms of four years. The Board manages and controls JCPS. The Board is a corporate body which is organized and exists pursuant to KRS § 160.160. It has the powers and duties stated in KRS § 160.290 and other applicable statutes. The Board selects a superintendent, who acts as the chief administrative officer of JCPS. Defendant Stephen Daeschner is the Superintendent of JCPS.

This Court conducted a five-day hearing in December 2003. Prior to this hearing, the parties entered into a 135-paragraph stipulation that included 75 exhibits. At the hearing, several Plaintiffs testified about their experiences with the JCPS student assignment plan.⁴ Defendants called the superintendent, several board members, numerous administrative staff members, principals and educational experts, who provided testimony about all aspects of the JCPS student assignment plan, the traditional program, the student population and the importance of a racially integrated education.⁵

A.

JCPS is the 28th largest public school system in the United States. Its district boundaries mirror those of the new Metropolitan Louisville which is now the 16th largest city in the nation. In 2003-2004, about 97,000 students were enrolled in JCPS: approximately 5,000 in preschool programs; 42,500 in elementary schools; 21,650 in middle schools; 24,750 in high schools; 2,100 in alternative schools; and about 1,000 in special schools and special education centers. The racial profile of students subject to the 2001 Plan is about 34% Black and 66% White.⁶

JCPS offers a full array of comprehensive, specialized and advanced programs throughout its schools.⁷ It operates pre-school and grades Primary 1 ("kindergarten") through grade five in its 87 elementary schools, sixth grade through the eighth grade in its 23 middle schools, and ninth grade through twelfth grade in its 20 high schools. It also operates the Brown School, which contains all grade levels in one building, as well as several alternative schools and special education centers. Each school building has a program capacity, which is the number of students that the building can accommodate, consistent with the programs offered there. JCPS allocates operating funds to each school using the same formula that is uniformly applied to all JCPS schools.

The Kentucky Education Reform Act of 1990 ("KERA") sets out many requirements for curriculum development, educational goals and assessment requirements for all Kentucky schools, including JCPS. KERA requires each school to form a School-Based Decision Making Council ("SBDM council" or "Council") composed of parents, teachers and the school's principal or administrator. Each Council determines which textbooks, instructional materials and student support services will be used at its school. It also adopts policies for various aspects of school life.

KERA requires a statewide assessment program known as the Commonwealth Accountability Testing System ("CATS"). This test measures core academic content, basic skills, and higher-order thinking skills and their application. KERA requires that JCPS and SBDM councils identify achievement gaps between various groups of students, including between Black and White students, and between Free and Reduced Lunch ("FRL") students and non-FRL students. JCPS sets biennial targets for eliminating those achievement gaps.

B.

This case and its legal predecessors⁸ are inseparable from JCPS's ongoing commitment to racial integration within its individual schools. One can find the complete legal and historical background of this case in Hampton I, 72 F.Supp.2d 753, 754-67 (W.D.Ky.1999). A brief description follows.

In 1973, parents and students filed two federal lawsuits against the Board and the former Louisville Board of Education, alleging that each maintained a segregated school system and demanding desegregation of those schools (collectively, the "Haycraft" case). In December 1973, on appeal from dismissal of both lawsuits, the Sixth Circuit directed Judge James Gordon to devise a student assignment plan that eliminated all vestiges of state-imposed segregation in the two school systems. Newburg Area Council, Inc. v. Bd. of Educ. of Jefferson County, 489 F.2d...