Pennsylvania Human Relations Com'n v. School Dist. of Philadelphia

• Decision Date: 20 August 1996
• Parties: 112 Ed. Law Rep. 957 PENNSYLVANIA HUMAN RELATIONS COMMISSION, Petitioner, v. SCHOOL DISTRICT OF PHILADELPHIA, Respondent. Harry and Annemarie GWYNNE, Aspira of Pennsylvania, Intervenors, v. COMMONWEALTH of Pennsylvania, Thomas J. Ridge, Governor of the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, the City of Philadelphia and Edward Rendell, Mayor of the City of Philadelphia, Additional Respondents.
• Court: Pennsylvania Commonwealth Court

Page 1366

681 A.2d 1366

112 Ed. Law Rep. 957

PENNSYLVANIA HUMAN RELATIONS COMMISSION, Petitioner, v. SCHOOL DISTRICT OF PHILADELPHIA, Respondent.

Harry and Annemarie GWYNNE, Aspira of Pennsylvania, Intervenors, v. COMMONWEALTH of Pennsylvania, Thomas J. Ridge, Governor of

the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, the City of

Philadelphia and Edward Rendell, Mayor

of the City of Philadelphia,

Additional Respondents.

Commonwealth Court of Pennsylvania.

Decided Aug. 20, 1996.

Michael Hardiman, Assistant Chief Counsel, for Petitioner.

Mark J. Levin and Lynn Rosner Rauch, for Respondent, School District of Philadelphia.

Edward F. Mannino and William G. Frey, Philadelphia, for Respondent, Commonwealth of Pa.

Joseph A. Dworetzky and Richard Feder, Philadelphia, for Respondent, City of Philadelphia.

Michael Churchill, Philadelphia, for Intervenors, ASPIRA, et al.

Patricia Lowe, for Intervenors, Olney-Oak and Lane-Feltonville, et al.

SMITH, Judge.

Trial was conducted in this case on the issue of the liability, if any, of the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania and its Governor and the City of Philadelphia and its Mayor to pay any additional costs necessary for the School District of Philadelphia to comply with the Court's November 28, 1994 remedial order. The order directed the School District to remedy the racial disparities and unequal educational opportunities that exist in the Philadelphia public schools. Pennsylvania Human Relations Commission v. School Dist. of Philadelphia (HRC VII), 168 Pa.Cmwlth. 542, 651 A.2d 186 (1994).

The record in the liability phase of this case revealed the need for remedial measures that, if properly developed and implemented, would effectively deal with the pervasive discriminatory conditions in the School District. In devising the remedial order, the Court kept in mind that desegregation orders must respond to the facts of a particular case; that they are not limited or restricted solely to pupil reassignment plans; and that other independent or ancillary remedial relief may be warranted to cure the consequences of the racial segregation found to exist.

The current proceedings were held pursuant to the Court's November 4, 1995 order joining the Commonwealth and Governor and the City and Mayor in this action at the request of the School District and Intervenor ASPIRA. The November 1995 order provided that the School District and ASPIRA had the burden to establish the liability of the additional respondents to provide funding to pay costs associated with the Court's November 1994 remedial order. Pennsylvania Human Relations Commission v. School Dist. of Philadelphia (HRC XI), 667 A.2d 1173 (Pa.Cmwlth.1995). The order further provided that the joined parties would be given an opportunity to demonstrate that they lacked the ability to pay additional funds to the School District.

This is not a case that challenges the equity and/or adequacy of the Commonwealth's statewide education financing scheme. See Pennsylvania Association of Rural and Small Schools (PARSS) v. Ridge, No. 11 M.D.1991. It is about the adequacy of funding to the School District to allow it to comply with the remedial order. At the center of the current funding proceedings and all other proceedings conducted during the past twenty-five years of this litigation is the failure of the School District to provide to Black and Hispanic students in racially isolated schools the same educational opportunity afforded to their White counterparts.

After an extensive trial schedule associated with enforcement of the Pennsylvania Human Relations Commission's 1972 order requiring the School District to develop and to submit to the Commission a plan to correct the de facto segregation within the schools, the Court issued an opinion and order on February 4, 1994 granting the Commission's petition for enforcement of its final order and the April 15, 1983 order of Commonwealth Court. Pennsylvania Human Relations Commission v. School Dist. of Philadelphia (HRC VI), 161 Pa.Cmwlth. 658, 638 A.2d 304 (1994). The Court found that the School District failed to desegregate its public schools by all feasible means and concluded that the School District has continued to maintain a racially segregated school system that denies to Black and Hispanic students in racially isolated schools the right to an equal educational opportunity mandated by law.

The record developed during trial on the enforcement action graphically demonstrated that equal educational opportunity is denied to Black and Hispanic children in racially isolated schools. The Court thereafter appointed a team of educational experts who, on September 28, 1994, submitted a report to the Court containing various recommendations for curing the racial discrimination within the school system. It was after the submission of that report and subsequent hearings that the Court issued the November 1994 remedial order requiring the School District, among other things, to develop and submit an educational reform plan designed to cure the racial disparities that exist in the School District. The School District submitted its initial reform plan to the Court on February 15, 1995, later modified at the direction of the Court.

Additional proceedings before the Court generated the orders dated April 27, 1995 and June 13, 1995, ¹ and resulted from further attempts by the Court to facilitate compliance with the remedial order. Ultimately, the Court determined that most of the components of the School District's reform plan were either in compliance or substantial compliance with the remedial order. These components included, but are not limited to, the development of high academic standards; professional development of staff; full-day kindergarten for all eligible children in racially isolated schools by September 1995 and all remaining schools by September 1996; reduction in class sizes beginning with grades K-3; expansion of pre-school and early childhood opportunities; class leveling by the end of the second week of school in September; provision of books, computers and instructional materials; development and expansion of the community school concept; creation of alternative schools for chronically disruptive students and in-house accommodation and suspension rooms; and school-to-work and school-to-higher-education programs. Developing specific details of the remedial programs ordered by the Court was left to the discretion of the School District.

Trial in the final phase of this long-running litigation began on May 30, 1996, and the evidence was concluded on July 11, 1996 after nineteen days of trial. The record was closed as of July 29, 1996 after the submission of a stipulation by Counsel for the School District and the Commonwealth and Governor itemizing the expenditure of an additional $13.2 million in state funding for the 1996-1997 fiscal year, the submission of an audit report of the 1995-1996 School District consultant services contracts and the submission by Counsel of proposed findings of fact and conclusions of law and briefs. ² The record extends over 4000 pages, 18 witnesses were presented and more than 100 exhibits were admitted. Upon a review of the record and the proposed findings of fact and conclusions of law submitted by Counsel for the School District, ASPIRA, the Commonwealth and Governor and the City and Mayor, the Court makes the following necessary findings of fact and conclusions of law. ³

I.

FINDINGS OF FACT

School District Demographics/Finances

1. The School District is the fifth largest school district in the country and is the largest school district within the Commonwealth. Current student enrollment is approximately 211,000 students, and enrollment for 1996-1997 is projected at 215,500 students. At the close of the 1995-1996 school year, there were 130,228 Black students who accounted for 63 percent of the enrollment; 23,133 Hispanic students who accounted for 11 percent; and 42,101 White students who accounted for 20 percent of the enrollment. There are 257 schools in the School District and approximately 11,650 teachers.

2. Approximately 101,000 of the 211,000 students in the School District come from families receiving Aid to Families With Dependent Children (AFDC), and that number is expected to increase for the 1996-1997 school year. Approximately 73 percent of the student population is eligible for free lunch, and this extraordinary level of poverty increases the educational challenges and costs to the School District.

3. The School District's AFDC student population increased by 13.64 percent from 1992 to 1996, compared to a decrease of 5.89 percent in AFDC student population for all other Commonwealth school districts. During the 1994-1995 school year, the School District had 42.3 percent of the Commonwealth's AFDC student population. In 1993-1994, 45.8 percent of the students in the School District were from families receiving AFDC benefits. The following year, 47.7 percent of the students in the School District were from families receiving AFDC benefits. By contrast, the median for students from AFDC families in school districts in the five-county metropolitan area was 2.7 percent.

4. The 1995 school-by-school test results show that Philadelphia had 128 elementary schools where in excess of 50 percent of the fifth grade students scored in the lowest quartile in reading. In 94 elementary schools more than 64 percent of the fifth grade students scored in the lowest quartile in reading. At least 144 schools had fewer than 10 percent of the students scoring in the highest quartile in reading. The average SAT score for School District minority students is approximately 690 compared to a national average of 950.

5. The School District receives revenue from the Commonwealth designated as basic education subsidy, formerly ESBE, and other revenue for specific purposes. Since 1991-1992, the Commonwealth's basic education subsidy to the School District...