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Sheff
v. O'Neill AGREEMENT
REACHED...2008 version.
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Sheff Parties
Ask Legislators To Approve Settlement
By ARIELLE
LEVIN BECKER | Courant Staff Writer
April 16, 2008
Representatives
from both sides of the state's 19-year-old Sheff v. O'Neill school
desegregation lawsuit on Tuesday urged lawmakers to embrace the latest
proposed settlement, saying it stands the best chance yet of achieving
what earlier efforts have not: desegregating Hartford schools.
"We signed this
agreement because we believe it could be done," said Dennis Parker, an
attorney for the American Civil Liberties Union and one of the
plaintiffs' attorneys, testifying before the legislature's education
committee. "We recognize it involves hard work but we are willing to
put in that hard work."
The proposed
settlement, reached earlier this month, outlines measures that include
building magnet schools in Hartford-area suburbs and expanding the
number of slots for Hartford students in suburban public schools,
racially integrated preschools and technical and agricultural high
schools. It would also streamline the application process to magnet
schools, improve transportation and support for Hartford students
attending schools in other districts, and give the plaintiffs a role
overseeing the desegregation efforts.
If it's
successful, by the time the settlement expires in 2013, at least 80
percent of Hartford students who seek places in a racially integrated
school will have them.
The proposed
accord would replace a 2003 settlement, which expired last summer far
short of its goals. The new proposal doesn't spell out how to achieve
the new goals, but requires officials to create a comprehensive plan by
Nov. 30, and specifies many items that must be included.
"There is no
moment to be lost if we're to implement this by December," state
Education Commissioner Mark K. McQuillan said, urging approval of the
plan.
Lawmakers
offered a mixed reception.
Committee
co-chairman Rep. Andrew M. Fleischmann, D- West Hartford, noted that
Tuesday's hearing was far less contentious than ones held last summer
on an earlier settlement proposal, which legislators ultimately refused
to ratify. Fleischmann said he is optimistic about the new proposal.
State Sen.
Thomas P. Gaffey, D- Meriden, the committee co-chairman, said the
proposal had a more reasonable chance of success than previous efforts,
but said he was "chagrined" that officials have not yet offered
projections on the cost of the settlement.
Others
expressed skepticism.
State Sen. John
W. Fonfara, D-Hartford, said the settlement continued mistakes of a
decade ago, shortly after the state Supreme Court ordered Hartford's
schools to be desegregated.
Back then, he
said, the experts charged with developing the desegregation effort
split into two camps: one that wanted to focus on reducing racial
isolation, and one that sought to improve student performance. The camp
focused on racial isolation seemed to have won, Fonfara said. He
questioned whether it was worth continuing to spend money with the same
focus.
"This was about
the quality of the schools and what kids in Hartford, particularly
minority kids, receive, and I don't see those kids benefiting," he said.
Parker
disagreed "fundamentally," he said.
The proposed
settlement, like earlier efforts, is designed to improve education
while also reducing racial isolation, he said. "We have never and do
not now accept the proposition that it is an either-or," he said.
The exchange
brought to a head a theme raised by several legislators, who suggested
that the efforts to desegregate Hartford schools had not focused
sufficiently on raising student achievement or determining whether the
efforts were improving education or simply, in the words of state Rep.
Deborah W. Heinrich, D-Madison, "moving kids around."
Parker and
McQuillan disputed the notion, and argued the settlement was designed
to both reduce racial isolation and raise student achievement.

Reader's
note: Avon and Farmington flipped (correction to Courant map
published April 5, 2008)
Path To Integration
Hartford
Courant
April 5, 2008
- Build magnet schools in Hartford suburbs
- Improve existing magnet schools
- Expand openings for Hartford schoolchildren in suburban schools
- Common application for magnet schools
- Improve transportation
- By 2012, at least 80 percent of Hartford students seeking spots
in racially integrated schools must be accommodated
Deal Reached In
School Lawsuit; Desegregation Fight In Hartford Dragged On For 12
Years
By
Associated Press
Published on
4/5/2008
Hartford
(AP) — A tentative settlement was reached Friday in the
long-standing school desegregation lawsuit that for 12 years has sought
to remedy the racial isolation in Hartford schools.
The question of
whether the city's schools must be desegregated was
settled by the landmark state Supreme Court Sheff vs. O'Neill ruling in
the case in 1996, but the high court left it to the Sheff plaintiffs
and the state to figure out how to do it.
The latest deal
requires the state to develop a detailed plan to
address racial disparity, including more magnet schools in Hartford
suburbs and an increase in the number of spots available in suburban
schools for Hartford students.
The agreement
also requires that at least 80 percent of Hartford
students who want to attend integrated schools be accommodated by 2012.
The settlement
must be approved by a state judge and the General Assembly.
“This is a
watershed day in our ongoing efforts to ensure that all of
Hartford's children are afforded their constitutional right to a
quality integrated education,” said Dennis Parker, Director of the ACLU
Racial Justice Program and an attorney in the case.
Parker said
that for the first time in 12 years, the state must follow a detailed
framework to assure racial balance.
Others involved
in negotiating the agreement included lawyers with the
NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund, Inc. and Center for
Children's Advocacy.
The original
case was brought in 1989 on behalf of Milo Sheff, who was
then a 10-year-old student in Hartford's Annie Fisher School. Following
the 1996 Supreme Court ruling, the case landed back in lower courts
after plaintiffs complained over a lack of progress.
The two sides
reached an agreement on a four-year plan in 2003: It was
left largely to Hartford to implement the terms of the settlement by
building magnet schools and sending students to suburban schools
through the “Open Choice” program.
However, the
numerical goals of the 2003 agreement specifying levels of
integration were not met and after the accord expired last year, the
plaintiffs returned to court.
“Equal
opportunity to a quality, integrated education is a fundamental
right and for the first time there is a clear structure in place for
the state to follow to ensure that no child is denied that right,”
Parker said.
Schools Chief Makes A Pitch; Adamowski Seeks Regional District
By RACHEL GOTTLIEB FRANK | Courant Staff Writer
November 15, 2007
A regional school district that would craft and run interdistrict
schools could be an effective way to diminish the racial and economic
isolation of Hartford's schoolchildren, the city's superintendent of
schools, Steven Adamowski, testified Wednesday.
The existence of 166 local and regional school districts in 169 towns
has had the effect of segregating minority children, he said in the
final day of testimony at Superior Court in Hartford in the landmark
Sheff v. O'Neill desegregation case.
"All the poor students are bottled up in one place. It is essentially
the reason we have the Sheff case," said Adamowski, whose city is now
party to the case.
Adamowski testified that he has offered a series of suggestions to
state education officials, including the creation of a regional school
district for the 22 towns that are subject to the Sheff litigation.
Such a district would spend state funds to create and operate magnet
schools and interdistrict programs under its own school board. It would
not replace existing school boards and school districts, but function
alongside them.
"I'm very concerned we have no takers in the suburbs for magnet
schools," he said, speaking after his testimony. A regional district
should have enough authority to build new schools anywhere within the
22 towns, including Hartford, he said.
In 1996, the state Supreme Court held that the plaintiffs in the Sheff
case had proved their case that Hartford schoolchildren were being
denied an equal education because of racial and economic isolation. The
plaintiffs have now returned to Superior Court, after a settlement
before the Connecticut legislature broke down, to try to speed up
integration efforts. The city's schools today, the plaintiffs said, are
more segregated than they were when the case was first filed in 1989.
In his testimony, Adamowski endorsed some of the recommendations of the
plaintiffs' witnesses, saying it is critical that the state develop a
master plan to map out its integration efforts. The plaintiffs sought
to underscore the need for such a plan through their witnesses and in
cross-examination of state witnesses.
Adamowski's call for an independent regional district received a
lukewarm reception from state education officials.
State Education Commissioner Mark McQuillan said that the idea has
merit, but that it would take a long time for it to take shape and
begin working. "It would take a long time to develop the political will
in that many communities for a plan like that," he said.
McQuillan who says that making progress on desegregation is urgent said
he's concentrating now on the establishment of a joint office between
the state, the Hartford school district and the Capitol Region
Education Council, which runs several magnet schools.
But Adamowski testified that he had asked the state to assign a
full-time employee to work in the office, but in the end the state
decided to support a part-time position.
Tom Murphy, a spokesman for the state Department of Education, said
that the regional council serves a similar function to that of the
regional school district proposed by Adamowski because it can build
magnet schools in any of the towns that it serves.
One of the Sheff plaintiffs' expert witnesses suggested that the
council be assigned contracts to develop, manage and market all magnet
schools that are part of the desegregation effort. But Adamowski
opposes such a plan. Based on test-score data, he said, "there is no
superiority of CREC schools. I see no basis for CREC being the manager
for magnet schools," he said.
He testified, however, that there should be a centralized overseer of
integration efforts. "The appointment of a special master would be
absolutely necessary to carry out the original Sheff decision."
Wednesday's session completed the bulk of the hearing. Judge Marshall
K. Berger Jr. has told the attorneys that he will set a date for
closing arguments in the coming weeks.
Day 4 In Sheff Case Reveals Rift
By RACHEL GOTTLIEB FRANK | Courant Staff Writer
November 10, 2007
Testimony by the state's education commissioner on the fourth day of a
hearing on the Sheff vs. O'Neill desegregation lawsuit revealed a testy
relationship between Hartford's superintendent of schools and the state
Department of Education over state efforts to quicken the pace of
desegregation.
The Sheff lawsuit, filed in 1989, resulted in an order by the state
Supreme Court in 1996 to end the racial, ethnic and economic isolation
of Hartford's minority students. The court left it to the state and the
plaintiffs to decide how to do that. Now the plaintiffs say
desegregation efforts have fallen short, and they are in Superior Court
appealing for help.
State Education Commissioner Mark McQuillan on Friday summarized an
exchange of letters that began last summer between him and
Superintendent Steven Adamowski in which McQuillan asked Hartford to
submit documents showing why several of the city's magnet schools
didn't have enough white students and how the district intended to
remedy the problem.
"This was a repeated plea that went out," McQuillan testified, and the
state was threatening to withhold millions of dollars if those
documents weren't submitted by Oct. 1.
In letters back to McQuillan, the commissioner testified, Adamowski
challenged the state's authority to withhold funding.
"I wrote back to say we really do have the authority to withhold
funds," McQuillan said
In time, he said, Adamowski set conditions for the release of the
documents that the state was seeking. One condition was the reform of
the lottery system used to admit students to magnet schools. In
Adamowski's opinion, the lottery system for admission to interdistrict
magnet schools is illegal in the wake of recent U.S. Supreme Court
rulings on the use of race for the assignment of students to schools,
McQuillan said.
"He continued to come back to me to say it was the state's
responsibility to develop a new lottery system," McQuillan testified.
Finally, he said, Adamowski took the position that until he saw a new
lottery system he would not release enrollment plans sought by the
state.
McQuillan testified that he believes the lottery, which is run by the
Capitol Region Education Council (CREC), is fair.
The U.S. Supreme Court decision released in June forbids schools from
enrolling children strictly on the basis of race and threatened many
voluntary desegregation plans throughout the nation. But at the time of
the ruling,, experts said they believed it would have little effect on
school desegregation efforts in Hartford. The key difference, legal
experts said, is that the magnet schools and school choice plans that
are a central piece of the Sheff efforts do not single out students by
race. Rather, the plans attempt to achieve racial balance by selecting
students based on where they live.
In the dispute between McQuillan and Adamowski, the state ultimately
withheld $4.6 million from Hartford because the city did not submit the
enrollment plans that the state demanded.
Another point of tension between McQuillan and Adamowski is the
development of a joint office between the state, Hartford and the CREC
to implement desegregation programs.
Since he took office last January, McQuillan testified, he has
reorganized his office and created a special division to concentrate
exclusively on Sheff mandates. The joint office between the state,
Hartford and CREC is a separate office he is attempting to create. But
Adamowski made clear to McQuillan that he thought the state should take
the lead role in implementing integration efforts.
Throughout the hearing on the status of the desegregation projects
under the Sheff ruling, Hartford's lawyer has pushed the point that it
is the state - not Hartford - that is the defendant in the case, so the
state should be responsible for all costs and implementation.
Before McQuillan was called as a witness for the state, Robert
Genuario, secretary of the state Office of Policy and Management,
testified about some of the funding dedicated to desegregating
Hartford's schools, including $4.9 million in the state budget this
year and $9.9 million in next year's budget. The money is earmarked for
the development of new charter schools, expanding the Open Choice
program through which city students enroll in suburban schools, funding
interdistrict cooperative programs and operations of the joint office
between Hartford, the state and CREC.
John Rose, Hartford's lawyer, asked Genuario if there was money
dedicated to make up for lost taxes when the city buys private property
for use as a school and whether the state was paying for all the staff
in the magnet schools opened in Hartford as part of the integration
efforts.
Genuario said that the state assists with salaries for staff through
its main grant for education called the Education Cost Sharing Grant,
and he pointed out that schools never pay taxes.
Spotty Sheff Enforcement
By RACHEL GOTTLIEB FRANK | And MAGDALENE PEREZ Courant Staff
Writers
November 9, 2007
Over the years the state has helped develop a comprehensive plan to
desegregate Hartford's schools, spent hundreds of millions of dollars
on the efforts, appealed to suburban districts to open their schools to
city students and offered training to suburban districts to help city
students succeed, state witnesses testified Thursday in the Sheff vs.
O'Neill desegregation case.
But cross-examination of those witnesses in Superior Court in Hartford
revealed that shifts in management have resulted in spotty results and
murky accountability since 2003, when the plaintiffs in the Sheff
lawsuit reached a compromise agreement with the state on integration
goals.
During those years, changes in oversight included five state education
commissioners, multiple reorganizations of the state Department of
Education, four Hartford superintendents, a transition from state
control over Hartford schools to local control and the creation and
disbanding of a magnet school office in Hartford.
The lawsuit, filed in 1989, resulted in an order by the state Supreme
Court in 1996 to end the racial, ethnic and economic isolation of
Hartford's minority students. The court left it to the state and the
plaintiffs to decide how to do that, and sent the case back to Superior
Court for monitoring. Now, 11 years later, the plaintiffs say
desegregation efforts have fallen short, and they are in Superior Court
appealing for help.
Marcus Rivera, a consultant for the state education department,
testified that he helped Hartford create a plan for integration that
included developing magnet schools, improving all of Hartford's schools
and sending city students to suburban schools. After Hartford's school
board approved the plan, the state left it to the city to implement it,
he said.
But during his cross-examination of state witnesses Thursday, the
city's lawyer, John Rose, pointed out that Hartford is not a defendant
in the Sheff lawsuit and therefore not responsible for carrying out its
mandate.
After his testimony, Rivera said he isn't sure how much of the plan he
helped create was carried out, though he believes some of it was.
Some of the testimony suggested the state is not entirely to blame for
failure to reach Sheff goals to enroll specific numbers of Hartford
minority students in suburban schools through the Open Choice program.
Rivera said that Hartford hasn't always cooperated.
For example, Rivera said, when there were openings in suburban schools
for kindergartners and first-graders, then-Education Commissioner Betty
Sternberg asked then-Hartford Superintendent Robert Henry to include
information about the vacancies in a letter to Hartford parents that
the district was required to send anyway as part of the federal No
Child Left Behind law.
Henry refused to include information about the vacancies, Rivera said,
telling the state, "We really would not like to have these letters go
out because we want to keep all Hartford students in Hartford."
Under cross-examination by Sheff lawyer Martha Stone, Rivera said the
state did not take it upon itself to send the letter to parents.
"What we were not able to do is get information into the hands of all
parents that this was a choice open to them," Rivera said.
Stone pressed the point that the state had repeatedly made
participation in desegregation efforts voluntary by asking districts to
help, but never setting benchmarks for individual districts to meet.
When the state realized it would fall short of its requirement to place
1,600 Hartford minority students in suburban schools - last year 1,070
students were enrolled in the Open Choice program - Sternberg wrote a
letter to superintendents "strongly encouraging" them to open more
seats, Rivera said.
The July 2006 letter said that 469 new students must be added to the
Open Choice program - a total of 18 in each of the 27 school districts
governed by the Sheff compromise - to reach the state's ordered
obligation of placing 1,600 students in the program by 2007.
Each district has decided to heed or ignore that recommendation on its
own terms, Rivera said. While some districts have renewed seats for
Hartford students, others have not opened a single new seat in years.
Schools:
A Shift Of Views On Sheff; Case Returns To Court Amid New
Skepticism
By RACHEL GOTTLIEB FRANK | Courant Staff Writer
November 5, 2007
A decade after the state Supreme Court ordered the desegregation of
schools across Greater Hartford in the landmark Sheff v. O'Neill case,
the goal of integration remains elusive.
Magnet schools, the cornerstone of the state's plan to bring together
white children and children of color using voluntary incentives, have
fallen short. Hartford's schools still have a population that is
predominantly black, Hispanic and poor. Now, as the Sheff
plaintiffs head back to court Tuesday to demand the
state make good on its assurances, advocates of integration are facing
increasing skepticism on the part of both state lawmakers and city
officials over both the cost - and value - of continuing down the same
path.
Tensions that have long remain hidden are now erupting, opening up a
new and potentially contentious chapter in the effort to desegregate
schools in and around Hartford.
"It's breaking out in the open now," said John Brittain, a former Sheff
lawyer. "The current spat with the Hartford school system exposes the
fragility of the infrastructure of the Sheff v. O'Neill process."
Lawyers for the Sheff plaintiffs declined to say what they will seek in
court. The latest effort at compromise between the state and the
plaintiffs - which failed to win legislative approval - called for the
state to spend $112 million over the next five years to expand the
array of magnet, charter and vocational-technical schools. But
one attorney said now that the issue is heading back to court, the
plaintiffs won't be constrained by the compromises that they have
agreed to in the past.
"There's new thinking we'll be presenting at the trial," said Matthew
Colangelo, an attorney with the NAACP Legal Defense Fund who is
representing the plaintiffs in the Sheff v. O'Neill lawsuit.
"We're saying it's been 11 years and not enough progress has been made
and we think it's time for the court to get involved."
Forced Integration?
The question of whether the city's schools must be desegregated was
settled by a state Supreme Court order in 1996, though the court left
it to the Sheff plaintiffs and the state to figure out how to do
it. The state and the plaintiffs finally reached an agreement on
a plan in
2003, and it was left largely to Hartford to implement its terms by
building magnet schools and sending students to suburban schools
through the state's "Open Choice" program.
The guiding principle of those efforts has been to make desegregation
voluntary - sidestepping the politically explosive prospect of forcibly
moving children from one school to another. But the effectiveness
of this approach is now being questioned.
"The notion that we're going to get a better result by voluntary
programs is ridiculous," said state Sen. Thomas Gaffey, D-Meriden,
co-chairman of the legislature's education committee. "We need to shift
away from the model of remedy that the state has been pursuing for
years. The district is as racially isolated today as it was 10 years
ago. It suggests you need to do something different."
Gaffey advocates giving the education commissioner more statutory
authority to enforce broad participation by area towns. The best
way to satisfy the court order, he said, probably would be to
expand the Open Choice program, through which Hartford students enroll
in suburban schools. This would give the commissioner power to order
reluctant towns to open their doors to more students from Hartford.
"How open Open Choice is, is really debatable," Gaffey said, conceding
that towns won't like being strong-armed into admitting more Hartford
kids and that getting any major changes through the General Assembly
would be difficult.
Hartford School Superintendent Steven Adamowski bluntly told the State
Board of Education recently that it isn't fair Hartford has borne the
brunt of making integration happen, while suburban participation
remains optional. As it stands, the state is withholding $4.6
million from the city-run
magnet schools for failing to enroll enough white students, and won't
release that money until the city submits a plan outlining its plan for
a remedy. If the state doesn't release the money, Adamowski said, the
district will have to begin laying off staff at the four magnet schools
that don't meet the quota.
Adamowski told the State Board of Education and
the education commissioner that a regional approach is needed. He
strongly encouraged them to create a system of rewards and punishments
to get the region's many "fiefdoms" to work with Hartford in developing
models for integrated schools that are different from the traditional
magnet school model.
But while there are growing questions about the effectiveness of
voluntary solutions, the state will likely argue in court against
involuntary participation, said Education Commissioner Mark K.
McQuillan. "This state has historically and fervently relied on local
control," he said.
That devotion aside, he said, programs that are entered into
voluntarily are more likely to work.
"People will invest more of their energy and time to carry it out,"
McQuillan said. "Let's try voluntary measures now. If that fails then
we may have to take more drastic measures that people may not want."
McQuillan said he wants to expand the Open Choice program and to press
for the development of magnet schools in the suburbs. He conceded
that the assumption that suburban youngsters would be drawn
to magnet schools run by Hartford was mistaken. By locating schools in
the suburbs, officials said, the state could address the perception of
some parents that Hartford schools are not safe.
"Suburban parents have some trepidation about sending their children
into the inner city. Whether it's perceived or accurate, we are aware
of it," said Tom Murphy, spokesman for the state Department of
Education. "Having several schools in suburban communities as a choice
will give an opportunity to allay those concerns."
McQuillan said he thinks that six or seven magnet schools run by
suburban towns could work, focusing on young children in grades pre-K
through 3. Parents who would otherwise pay to send their preschool-aged
children to day care would find the offer of an all-day public
preschool school program particularly enticing, McQuillan said.
Hartford Pulls Back
Beyond the question of how to make desegregation happen is a broader
problem: Officials are growing more vocal about the burden Sheff
presents - and even questioning the value of its goals. In a
presentation to the State Board of Education on ways Hartford is
working to close the achievement gap between urban and suburban
children, Adamowski questioned the very premise of the Sheff lawsuit.
"There is no research to suggest that minority students will do better
by sitting next to a white student," he said.
The original lawsuit, filed in 1989, asserted that the racial
segregation of Hartford schools violates the state's constitution.
Adamowski's comment resonated with some, including Hartford school
board member Andrea Comer, who believes it is demeaning to assume that
children of color need to share a classroom with white students in
order to learn well. But it drew a sharp response from some
advocates of desegregation.
"We're disappointed that it's 2007 and the superintendent wants to
debate whether it is a bad thing for Hartford's minority children to be
taught in racially segregated schools," Colangelo said.
"As a social science matter, the answer has been clear for decades,"
Colangelo said. As a legal matter, he said, the case was settled years
ago.
In his presentation to the state board, Adamowski outlined a strategy
for improving the city's schools that does not specifically address the
court's order, although the Hartford school board's new policy for
redesigning failing schools directs the superintendent to "give
consideration" to the Sheff goals of reducing racial and economic
isolation.
"This is high stakes for the state," Murphy said. "The superintendent's
reform package has not connected Sheff with the strategies for
improvement. We've got to find some common ground."
In the past, Hartford's superintendents have publicly embraced the lead
position in fulfilling the requirements of the Sheff lawsuit, even if
they grumbled behind the scenes about cost. Adamowski's public
arm's-length posture from both the state and the tenets of the court
order represent a dramatic shift in the landscape. Lawmakers are
also asking questions about the direction of desegregation efforts.
Legislative leaders this summer didn't put the $112 million plan to
expand magnets up for a vote in part because they questioned the
effectiveness of the approach, and in part because Hartford's mayor and
superintendent urged rejection until the state develops a more
comprehensive plan to integrate schools.
On the eve of the case's return to court, Mayor Eddie A. Perez,
chairman of the school board, lobbed his pitch into the arena, saying
that while the city remains committed to the Sheff goals, the state
shouldn't dump the burden on Hartford.
"The state wants to monitor us and have us implement Sheff. We want
them to implement Sheff and we will assist them," Perez said. "It can't
just be Hartford's burden."
Sheff Case Returns To
Court
School
Desegregation Issue Had Been Stuck In The State Legislature
By ROBERT A.
FRAHM | Courant Staff Writer
July 6, 2007
The struggle to
desegregate Hartford's public schools is back in court.
Plaintiffs in
the Sheff v. O'Neill case filed a legal motion Thursday,
saying they will wait no longer for the legislature to approve a
tentative agreement that would require the state to take aggressive new
measures to reduce racial isolation in Hartford's public schools.
A 4-year-old
settlement in the long-running case failed to reach its
goals and expired last week. The state and the Sheff plaintiffs reached
a tentative agreement in late May that would establish new goals and
extend the settlement, but the legislature so far has not approved the
extension.
The proposed
extension calls on the state to spend millions of dollars
more over the next five years to subsidize magnet schools, charter
schools and other programs designed to bolster integration.
The
legislature, which received the settlement as its regular spring
session was coming to a close, is expected to take up the issue in a
special session later this month.
"Time is
wasting, and kids are not being properly educated," Wesley W.
Horton, a lawyer for the plaintiffs, said after filing a motion asking
the courts to enforce a 1996 state Supreme Court ruling ordering the
state to reduce racial isolation in Hartford's mostly black and
Hispanic schools.
The motion,
filed before Superior Court Judge Marshall K. Berger Jr.,
is the latest step in a legal case that began 18 years ago and led to a
2003 court-approved settlement designed to expand opportunities for
Hartford students to enroll in racially integrated magnet schools and
predominantly white suburban schools.
That settlement
set a target calling for 30 percent of Hartford
students to be enrolled in racially integrated schools by this year,
but the effort has fallen short.
A recent study
by Trinity College researchers reported that only 9
percent of the city's students attend schools that have enough white
students to qualify as racially integrated under the Sheff agreement.
At the same time, enrollments at many of Hartford's schools, including
some magnets, remain almost entirely black and Hispanic.
The Trinity
report found that magnet schools, instead of drawing white
suburban children into the city, have been more popular among black and
Hispanic suburban families. It also found that previous gains under a
program allowing city children to enroll in suburban schools have
stagnated.
Thursday's
legal motion would have little effect if the legislature
approves the tentative settlement, but lawmakers said they will need
more time to review the proposed settlement before voting later this
month.
"We received
this settlement ... less than 48 hours before the
adjournment of the regular session" in June, said state Sen. Thomas
Gaffey, co-chairman of the legislature's Education Committee. "To
expect the General Assembly to take this up when we're grappling with
the state budget in that short a time frame is absolutely unreasonable."
Among the
lawmakers' concerns, according to Gaffey, is the poor track
record of the original settlement. "There has been very little progress
at reducing racial isolation in Hartford's schools," he said. "What is
the evidence we're going to be any better off?"
Gaffey,
D-Meriden, said he plans to schedule a hearing to review
questions about the Sheff proposal, including whether it complies with
last week's U.S. Supreme Court ruling prohibiting schools from
assigning students to schools on the basis of race.
Although the
goal of the Sheff settlement is to reduce racial
isolation, officials have said the Sheff programs are not affected by
the Supreme Court's ruling because students are selected for schools
based on where they live, and are not singled out by race.
Gaffey also
said lawmakers want to know why Hartford officials did not
sign on to the latest tentative agreement.
Although
Hartford plans to comply with the terms of the Sheff
agreement, officials decided not to sign because of the cost of busing
students and building new magnet schools under the original agreement,
Hartford Corporation Counsel John Rose said. Under the original
settlement, the state paid the bulk of the cost, but Hartford also
spent millions of dollars, he said.
If the city had
received guarantees that those costs would be covered
completely by the state under the new tentative settlement, "we would
have signed off," he said. "That's really what it's about."
Although the
court allowed city officials to take part in settlement
negotiations, the settlement was between the plaintiffs and the state.
The city could have signed on, but its approval was not required.
A
Losing Battle, So Far; Report: Reality Spoils Racial Balancing Act
By ROBERT
A. FRAHM, Courant Staff Writer
June 13, 2007
An agreement
hailed four years ago as a way to end the overwhelming
racial isolation in Hartford's public schools has failed, a new
independent review of the landmark Sheff v. O'Neill school
desegregation case says.
Trinity College
researchers will issue a report today showing in stark
numbers how little progress has been made toward creating magnet
schools that draw a mix of white and non-white students, or toward
getting the city's mostly black and Hispanic student population into
mostly white suburban schools.
The report
shows that magnet schools, instead of drawing white suburban
children into the city, have been more popular among black and Hispanic
suburban families. It also found that gains under a program allowing
city children to enroll in suburban schools have ground to a halt.
"This is sad
news," said Jack Dougherty, a Trinity professor who, along
with two students, compiled a report showing that the key Sheff
strategies to reduce racial isolation in Hartford's schools have come
up short.
Shifting
population patterns also have complicated efforts to balance
schools by race. The report documents dramatic changes in many of
Hartford's suburbs, including substantial growth in the number of
non-white students since the Sheff case was filed in 1989. Several
towns - Windsor, Manchester and East Hartford among them - have seen
dramatic increases in their non-white student populations over the past
two decades.
"When the Sheff
case was filed ... it was clear that people thought of
Hartford as a minority city and the suburbs as predominantly white,"
said Dougherty, director of Trinity's educational studies program.
"That model
from 1989 doesn't fit nearly as well now as it did then."
The report says
a 2003 court-approved settlement in the Sheff case will
fall far short of its goals when it expires this month.
State officials
last week announced a tentative agreement with the
Sheff plaintiffs to take aggressive new measures to speed the pace of
integration. A proposed extension of the 2003 agreement calls on the
state to spend millions of dollars more over the next five years to
subsidize magnet schools, charter schools and other programs designed
to bolster integration.
That tentative
agreement, which also sets new racial quotas, requires
approval by the legislature and the courts.
A crucial piece
of the earlier agreement revolved around magnet
schools, where officials hoped that specialty themes, such as arts or
technology, would attract white suburban children into the city,
joining black and Hispanic children from Hartford.
Instead, the
magnets have been especially popular among families from
towns such as Bloomfield, Windsor and East Hartford, where non-white
students now make up a substantial majority of the school-age
population.
White families
have been less enthusiastic about the magnets, with
parents complaining about delays in the construction of new buildings,
problems with busing and even a lack of sports programs. The city's
struggles with crime, including a spate of shootings last summer, along
with Hartford's troubled history of sub-par public schools, also have
undermined recruiting.
Although a few
magnets, including several older, well-established
regional schools run by the Capitol Region Education Council, have
attracted racially mixed student bodies, many others remain mostly
black and Hispanic, the report shows.
Sheff
plaintiffs won a state Supreme Court ruling in 1996 and reached a
settlement with the state in 2003 establishing a court-approved goal:
enrolling 30 percent of Hartford's schoolchildren in racially
integrated schools by this year.
But Dougherty,
along with Trinity students Jesse Wanzer and Christina
Ramsay, reported that only 9 percent of the city's schoolchildren
attend schools that have enough white students to qualify as racially
integrated under the Sheff agreement.
Even under a
rule allowing the state to include children who attend
recently created magnet schools that have not yet reached the minimum
quota of white children, only 17 percent of Hartford children count
toward the Sheff goal, the report said.
The report also
found that a long-running school choice program that
allows Hartford parents to send their children to mostly white suburban
schools is well short of its goal of 1,600 children.
Enrollment in
the program flattened out at 1,070 children this year,
the report said. That is only one more than the program had a year ago
and below the 1,175 students enrolled in 1979 in Project Concern, the
predecessor of the current choice program.
In some
suburbs, enrollment in the choice program has declined over the
past decade. Farmington, for example, enrolled 94 Hartford children
this year, down from 108 a decade ago, the report said. The decline
occurred mainly because the town's overall growth during the 1990s left
limited space in its schools, said Superintendent Robert M. Villanova.
As space problems ease, the town expects to take in more children in
the program, he said.
Sheff
supporters lament the slow rate of progress in both the magnet
school and the choice programs, contending that state officials have
not provided sufficient support. In addition, they cite problems with
busing and long delays in plans for building new magnets.
"It has taken
too long for [magnet] schools to be constructed," said
city Councilwoman Elizabeth Horton Sheff, whose son, Milo, was the lead
plaintiff in the landmark desegregation case.
"You can't
blame parents for being nervous, not having a permanent
place for their schools," she said.
A not unrelated
matter...
How fair is the state's tax system? It's the rich against the poor
By: Keith M.
Phaneuf, Journal Inquirer
Analysis
04/14/2007
HARTFORD - When
majority Democrats in the state legislature unveiled their new budget
Thursday, they reopened a debate that hasn't been joined at this level
in 16 years.
The issue: Is
Connecticut's income tax fair, and should wealthier households pay
higher rates?
Democrats, who
won potentially veto-proof, two-thirds majorities in the House and
Senate this year gave their answer Thursday, unveiling a sweeping plan
to shift more than $1 billion in tax burdens onto households earning
more than $190,000. At the same time, they want to provide hundreds of
millions of dollars in new tax breaks to those earning less than
$190,000.
Republican Gov.
M. Jodi Rell, whose own budget plan maintains a relatively flat income
tax and seeks an across-the-board hike, didn't say this week whether
she would support asking the wealthy to pay a higher rate. She said she
would wait until legislative fiscal analysts report on the proposed tax
hikes next week.
But Democratic
lawmakers, sensing an advantage, pressed hard for an answer Friday.
"I'm really
shocked that the governor's idea of 'unconscionable' is a middle-class
tax break," said House Speaker James A. Amann, D-Milford. "We're asking
those who make more to pay a bit more. There's fairness in that. ...
Why wouldn't the governor want to have that."
Rell did call
it "unacceptable" and "unconscionable" for Democrats to propose a $37
billion budget for the next two fiscal years that adds almost $650
million to her proposal.
Democrats say
their tax plan would raise about $790 million in new revenue, but the
governor said she fears it would require closer to $1 billion. Rell's
budget plan seeks $660 million more from residents next year.
House Majority
Leader Christopher G. Donovan, D-Meriden, said neither Rell nor anyone
else should be surprised by the Democrats' plan. It mirrors concepts
they have been talking about for years but lacked the votes to
implement - until this year.
Democrats
'stronger, ready'
"We've run into
governors who have been in the way," Donovan said, referring to Rell
and her predecessor and fellow Republican, John G. Rowland. "This year
we're stronger and ready to take on the challenge."
The "challenge"
Donovan refers to is the current state income tax, which treats most
residents largely the same, regardless of income.
State
government, which enacted an income tax in 1991, employs just two
rates. The first $10,000 on income from most individuals, and the first
$20,000 from most couples is taxed at 3 percent. All income above that
is taxed at 5 percent, regardless of how wealthy a household is.
The new plan
retains the initial 3 percent increment and sets five more tiers. The
income parameters for individuals were unavailable Thursday but
generally are about 53 percent of those for couples.
The new rates
for couples under the Democratic proposal are:
* 4.75 percent
for income between $20,001 and $100,000.
* 5 percent for
income between $100,001 and $150,000.
* 5.5 percent
for income between $150,001 and $200,000.
* 6.25 percent
of income between $200,001 and $250,000.
* 6.95 percent
for income above $250,000.
A preliminary
analysis shows that couples earning $190,000 or less would see their
state income taxes go down.
Another
middle-class break
These changes
alone would bring an estimated $900 million net bonus into the state's
coffers. Democrats then would devote $300 million of that to increase
the property-tax credit within the income-tax system from $500 to
$1,000, giving middle-class households another break. Families earning
more than $190,000 per year are ineligible to claim the property tax
credit.
Democrats have
tried to revise the income tax before. They tried to add third tax
bracket repeatedly between 2001 and 2003, but Rowland vetoed all of
those attempts.
Those proposals
were far less sweeping than the plan unveiled this week. They generally
targeted only households earning more than $1 million and were
nicknamed the "millionaires' tax." They imposed only a modest rate hike
and devoted all the dollars to new spending without providing any tax
cuts for middle-income families.
Some Democrats
say a progressive system always was the vision they had for the state
income tax when it was enacted in 1991 under then-Gov. Lowell P.
Weicker Jr. After a nearly
nine-month battle, a tax was approved. But liberal Democrats, who
wanted the progressive income tax, had to compromise with the
more-conservative Weicker, who would support only a flat tax.
If this year's
Democratic plan is adopted, it wouldn't be the first time the state
ordered an income-related tax change aimed primarily at the wealthy.
Another part of
the 1991 compromise was the end of separate state taxes on capital
gains and on dividends and interest - levies that were designed
primarily to tap wealthy households with large amounts of investment
income. The capital gains tax was 7 percent, and the levy on dividends
and interest reached as high as 14 percent. Once the income tax was
enacted, investment income was rolled into new system and taxed at the
flat rate, which was 4.5 percent in 1991.
Liberal
'Holy Grail'
"A progressive
income tax has been the Holy Grail of the liberal movement since time
began," said former state Rep. Jonathan Pelto, a Mansfield Democrat who
backed the income tax. Liberal Democrats grudgingly accepted the
compromise of a flat income tax because the alternative was to continue
to rely too heavily on a state sales tax that didn't provide enough
revenue.
"Any income tax
was better than a sales tax," Pelto said. "But I think many legislators
always wanted to revisit it."
Weicker was
replaced in 1995 by Rowland, who left office in July 2004 and was
succeeded by Rell. More than a decade of Republican governors has meant
that backers of a progressive income tax have had to bide their time -
until now. Having won 107 of
151 seats in the House and 24 of 36 in the Senate, Democrats now feel
they have the muscle to force a new debate on the income tax.
Pelto said Rell
won't long be able to avoid telling the public which tax philosophy she
favors.
"She has
already said we are going to need to raise taxes, and she wants to
raise it for everyone," he said. "The Democrats have responded that we
agree taxes need to be raised, but we are going to protect" the middle
class.
"This
isn't a debate over whether to raise taxes," Pelto said. "It's about
who should pay more."
Downside:
volatility
One downside to
a progressive income tax is that it makes state revenues more
volatile. A tax that relies
more heavily on investment income from wealthy households is subject to
the economic highs and lows of the stock market.
Even with the
current, largely flat income tax, state government lost more than $1
billion in tax revenue tied to investments when the recession hit in
2002-03. The result was more than 2,500 state employee layoffs and an
income tax increase on everyone.
Sen. Louis C.
DeLuca of Woodbury, the leader of the Senate's Republican minority,
said he fears Democratic lawmakers would use big revenues from boom
times to launch new programs that couldn't be sustained when the
inevitable economic crash hits.
"When you base
your budget on high-income earners, the people who invest, you're
setting yourself up for a problem down the line because you know you're
going to have those dips in the market," DeLuca said, predicting that a
progressive tax would prompt more wealthy families to leave the state.
Democrats
"don't want to believe that money is mobile," the Republican leader
said.
©Journal
Inquirer 2007
A
review of Sheff, 2006..click here to see the full story - or read an
excerpted version below.
A
DECADE OF HALF MEASURES: 10 years after a
Hartford mother and son forced city schools to integrate, progress has
dragged
Stan Simpson, The Hartford Courant
July
23, 2006
Eugene
Leach couldn't help himself. He's a historian after all.
Our conversation was about Sheff vs.
O'Neill - the landmark Hartford school desegregation court ruling that
is 10 years old this month. The
Trinity College history and American studies professor took me back to
1848 and the writings of abolitionist Frederick Douglass, one of his
favorite 19th century authors and orators. Douglass
had been lamenting the construction of a new school in Bath, N.Y., with
taxpayers' dollars. It was going to be for whites only. He believed
segregated schools were unbecoming and shortsighted.
"It will be an important point
gained if we secure this right," Douglass wrote. "Let colored children
be educated and grow up side by side with white children, come up
friends from unsophisticated and generous childhoods together and it
will require a powerful agent to convert them into enemies and leave
them to prey upon each others rights and liberties."
Those thoughts 158 years ago are as
profound today - and as difficult to attain. The Sheff plaintiffs are
once again haggling with the state, urging more progress in the
desegregation of Hartford schools. A
decade after the court's decision that Hartford's schools would be
integrated voluntarily, the 24,000-student school district remains 95
percent black and Latino, and most of the students are poor. While some
city students now have better opportunities to be educated, most
continue to languish in substandard public schools.
The problem is that these students'
futures are subject to the luck of the draw - or the school lottery, in
this case. And, as the kids might say, that sucks.
"I'm where Douglass was in 1848,"
said Leach, who is white and a parent-plaintiff in the Sheff suit. "I
haven't changed my fundamental belief that what the country professes
is equality. And equality means open doors for integrated education and
open opportunity for integrated education."
The state Supreme Court ruling on
Sheff was national news. That the state was deemed responsible for de
facto segregation, even thought it didn't cause it, was a largely
contrarian notion. The verdict came seven years after the suit was
filed in 1989 and one year after Superior Court Judge Harry Hammer had
ruled in the state's favor. Still,
even with the trumping Supreme Court edict - which suggested no remedy
- the plaintiffs had to return to court three times in arguing that the
state was not complying.
A settlement was finally hatched in
2003, in which both sides agreed that the state would build eight new
magnet schools over four years at a cost of about $45 million per year.
A separate program, called Open Choice, was established to increase the
number of suburban-school slots available to city students from 1,000
to 1,600. The goal was to have 30 percent of the Hartford students in
integrated schools by 2007.
The state has fallen way short on
all of these goals. Its administrators have blamed construction delays
and problems finding suitable building sites. Only two magnet schools
are in new buildings, with others in various stages of planning. Of the
1,600 suburban-school seats available to Hartford students, only 1,062
have been filled. Educators say increases in suburban populations have
made fewer of those seats available. Other observers suggest that
political will is also a factor.
With the 2007 deadline approaching
on the settlement, my assessment of the 1996 verdict is that it is one
fraught with frustration and anticipation. After all these years,
Sheff, much to the plaintiffs' chagrin, gets a grade of "Incomplete" -
just a notch above an F.
"If you go back to the overall goal
of reducing racial isolation and economic isolation, not much has
changed in that regard," said Eddie Davis, the recently retired Danbury
schools chief. He was the Hartford school superintendent in 1996.
"It's great to see the theme schools
that are beginning to spring up around the Hartford area, and yet they
have attracted a very small number of white students," he said. "If you
had not been here 10 years ago and didn't know about the Sheff lawsuit,
you'd see very little evidence that there was a lawsuit and that the
plaintiffs prevailed..."
Frustration over the implementing
integration is equally high. It reached a point where John Brittain - the attorney who
helped the plaintiffs win their case and became one of the most
prominent faces of the Sheff case - started having second thoughts.
If meaningful change couldn't happen even with a state Supreme Court
ruling, Brittain fumed, maybe he should have agitated more for quality
neighborhood schools instead of integrated ones. Though still an
advocate for integration, Brittain says generations of young urban
children have been sacrificed while integration efforts lag.
"I don't think integration is dead, but certainly it's in the intensive
care unit," said Brittain, now the chief counsel and senior deputy
director of the Washington, D.C.-based Lawyers Committee for Civil
Rights Under Law. "And it's certainly losing its enthusiasm among the
intended beneficiaries of communities of color. ... The Sheff vs.
O'Neill decision largely has met the same fate as its fore-parent,
Brown v. the Board of Education, in the long delay and difficulty in
implementation."
Fifty-two years after the landmark Brown decision ruled segregated
schools were illegal, America's public schools are re-segregating at a
pace comparable to the 1950s.
Stanley Battle, a former administrator at Eastern Connecticut State
University, now is president of Coppin State University, a historically
black university in Baltimore. Coppin also oversees a largely minority
K-12 public school system, which is beginning to show academic strides
because of the schools-university partnership.
Battle said he's long past pining for integration to improve urban
education, though he sees the value of diverse classrooms.
"We talk about integration, but we practice segregation. Let's be
honest,"' Battle said. "So, if we're so hell-bent on saying one thing
and doing another, let's at least be honest about making sure that the
schools are at the highest quality, that we have certified and
top-notch teachers, that we have good equipment, partnerships and
relationships with universities, the private sector and businesses to
encourage children to stay in school."
African-Americans and Latinos represent 22 percent of Connecticut's
total population but 75 percent of its prison population. Of the states
18,000 prison inmates, 75 percent don't have high school diplomas. In
many states, including Connecticut, there are more black men in prison
than in universities. And while Connecticut has some of the finest
public schools in the country, it has the nation's widest
academic-achievement gap between African-American and Latino students
and their white peers.
"We have to find different paradigms to make sure that we don't have a
legacy of children who are totally ignorant," said Battle.
"The state has not met the goal of the settlement and has not
honored the ruling from the Supreme Court," said Hartford City
Councilwoman Elizabeth Horton Sheff.
Her son, Milo, now a rapper, is the plaintiff for whom the case is
named. "While minimal progress has been made, the state is not fully
committed to the desegregation of our schools."
The state is asking for patience, saying
that building eight new schools in four years is an ambitious
undertaking.
"What's complicated is trying to find sites that are available
for school buildings in a city like Hartford, where the city is fairly
justified in being reluctant to give up land that could be taxable,"
said Jack Hasegawa, the state
Department of Education's bureau chief for educational equity. "And the
city's school-building stock is pretty well used up..."
Better accountability to measure progress needs to be agreed upon.
Hundreds of millions of dollars have been pumped into these
desegregation initiatives, including money for pre-school and literacy
education. Martha Stone, a
lead-plaintiff attorney, said a mechanism to measure progress will be
among the items the Sheff team will be seeking in its next round of
talks.
That lack of measurement has raised the eyebrows of some third-party
observers.
"It's surprising to me in all the talk of school accountability lately
that there's no legal mechanism to make sure that the quality of the
academic achievement is under consideration," said Jack Dougherty,
associate professor of education at Trinity College. Dougherty, along
with other local professors, has been researching Sheff's impact. He
said his research indicates that the state is overstating the
percentage of Hartford students who qualify to be counted toward
compliance with the Sheff settlement. The state's estimate is 23.5
percent; Dougherty's research shows it's 14 percent.
The negotiations should also talk about significantly increasing the
percentage of city students to be integrated. The current 30 percent
goal means more than two-thirds of the Hartford kids are left behind.
More incentives are also needed for suburban schools to open slots for
city kids. If the Sheff goal is to be achieved, Open Choice can't be
offered in name only.
House votes
to OK settlement 87-60. Next stop, Senate (not necessary for
confirmation).
Legislators
Approve Sheff Settlement; House Votes 87-60 For Integration Plan
February 26,
2003
By ROBERT A.
FRAHM, Courant Staff Writer
The landmark
settlement in a school desegregation case against Connecticut survived
challenges to its cost and its educational merit as it won final
approval
in the state
legislature
Tuesday.
The House of
Representatives voted 87-60 to approve the out-of-court settlement in
the
Sheff vs. O'Neill case, an agreement that includes plans for eight new
integrated
magnet schools
in Hartford over the next four years. Some legislators objected
to
the estimated $135 million price for the plan, which also calls for
expansion
of a
suburban school
choice program for Hartford children, but the House could not muster
enough
votes to block the agreement.
"It was a good
day," said Philip Tegeler, one of the lawyers for plaintiffs in the
14-year-old
case, which sought to reduce racial segregation in Hartford's mostly
black
and
Hispanic public
schools. Attorney General Richard Blumenthal called the vote "a
historic
victory for Connecticut's children," saying it would help the state
make
"significant, solid steps toward diversity and perhaps become a
national
model."
The Senate could
still debate the agreement today, but a vote would be no more than
symbolic.
Under state law, the settlement automatically takes effect unless both
houses of the
legislature reject it by a three-fifths margin no later than today, the
final deadline for a vote. In the House, the most vehement
objections
came from
lawmakers representing
towns outside of Hartford. Their opposition to spending millions on
renovating
or building new schools in the capital city came against the backdrop
of a deepening
state budget crisis.
The legislature
is trying to close a $650 million budget gap this year and a projected
$1.5 billion gap next year - a crisis that threatens every area of
state
supported
programs, including
public schools. An analysis done for the legislature estimates the
settlement
would cost $45 million in operating funds and $90 million for
construction
over four years.
"The settlement does little but renovate buildings at the expense of
every
other town in the state," said state Rep. Toni Boucher, R-Wilton.
The agreement
calls for at least 30 percent of Hartford's schoolchildren to be
integrated
into magnet schools or suburban schools by 2007, up from about 10
percent
now. Tuesday's vote fell largely along partisan lines, with most
Democrats
supporting the settlement and most Republicans opposing it. "We
will
leave behind 70 percent of the children," said state Rep. Robert W.
Heagney,
R-Simsbury. "This isn't a solution. It's simply a patch."
State Rep. Lawrence
F. Cafero Jr., R-Norwalk, said the money would be better spent trying
to
close an academic achievement gap that finds black and Hispanic students
trailing whites
in towns such as Norwalk. "Not one nickel of that money is going
to help kids read better or write better or compute better," Cafero
said.
He added that the Sheff case could be the first of many coming from
other
communities where schools are heavily populated by black and Hispanic
schoolchildren.
"What's to stop ... parents in towns like Bridgeport or New Haven from
bringing the same kind of lawsuit, hoping to achieve the same kind of
result?"
he said.
The Sheff plaintiffs
had gone back to court a year ago, accusing the state of dragging its
feet
in complying with a 1996 state Supreme Court ruling ordering the state
to
desegregate
Hartford's schools. Superior Court Judge Julia L. Aurigemma had been
scheduled
to make a ruling until the two sides reached a settlement last month.
"I think it's
a good first step," state Rep. Kenneth P. Green, D-Hartford, said after
Tuesday's vote. He said the settlement marks the first time that a plan
includes specific provisions for measuring progress toward racial
integration.
As for the cost, Green said, "Education is an expensive endeavor. ...
If
we don't educate our children, what is the cost in prisons? What is the
cost in mental health services? In not having a workforce?"
Sheff Deadline:
2007
SETTLEMENT:
A Four-Year Effort Begins To Help Undo Hartford's School Segregation
January 23, 2003 by ROBERT
A. FRAHM, Courant Staff Writer
After
14 years of court battles, political
maneuvering and heated public debate, the two sides in Connecticut's
historic
Sheff vs. O'Neill school desegregation case signed a four-year truce
Wednesday.
Now comes the hard part.
The
agreement between the plaintiffs
and the state already is being hailed as a national model for voluntary
school integration, but its success or failure will hinge largely on
whether
Hartford can attract hundreds more white suburban children into the
city
to attend proposed new magnet schools. A key provision of the
agreement
is the creation of eight new magnet schools in or near Hartford over
the
next four years - something both sides see as essential to changing a
stubborn,
longstanding pattern of racial segregation in schools in Connecticut's
capital city.
Hartford
public schools, where more
than 90 percent of students are black or Hispanic, remain as segregated
today as they were when the Sheff lawsuit was filed in 1989.
Under the proposed settlement, the
state for the first time would establish specific goals for increasing
the number of Hartford children attending integrated magnet schools
or enrolling in suburban schools
under a voluntary transfer program.
The
inclusion of specific goals and
timetables was a key objective for plaintiffs, but the plan - which
depends
upon parents making voluntary choices - falls short of the
original vision of the plaintiffs,
which included the possible redrawing of boundary lines between city
and
suburban school districts. Even if the goals are met, 70 percent
of the city's children would remain in mostly segregated schools.
"Is
it the vision we started with
14 years ago? No. Is it a giant step forward? Yes," said Elizabeth
Horton
Sheff, the mother of lead plaintiff Milo Sheff. "It's a good thing.
This
isn't the end of it. We'll come back and we'll see where we are in four
years."
About
10 percent of Hartford's schoolchildren
currently attend integrated magnet schools or enroll in suburban
schools
under a voluntary choice program, but the new
agreement calls for raising that
figure to 30 percent - or about 7,000 students - by 2007, a challenging
target.
"Implementing
this [settlement] ...
is probably harder than agreeing to it," state Education Commissioner
Theodore
S. Sergi said moments before he and other officials
signed the agreement in a room packed
with TV cameras, reporters and plaintiffs. The plan calls for the
state to spend an additional $45 million over the next four years to
help
operate the new magnet schools, and to expand a program, called Open
Choice,
allowing Hartford parents to enroll their children in predominantly
white
suburban schools.
The
state now spends about $65 million
a year on magnet schools and other programs to promote racial
integration.
If it wins the approval of the state legislature, the
settlement would resolve at least
for four years a case that led to a state Supreme Court ruling in 1996
saying that racial isolation in Hartford schools violated the rights of
schoolchildren to an adequate education.
Following
that ruling, the state spent
hundreds of millions of dollars on magnet schools and other programs to
promote integration, but the Sheff plaintiffs returned to
court last spring, saying those programs
were making only minimal progress. The issue has been before
Superior
Court Judge Julia L. Aurigemma, who also will have to approve the
settlement.
Wednesday's
agreement also includes
state funding for additional after-school and summer exchange programs
for city and suburban schoolchildren.
Gov.
John G. Rowland, who announced
the agreement Wednesday, predicted the legislature would approve it. "I
think there will be almost unanimous support for it," he
said. The plan could involve
the use of existing buildings, renovation of some classrooms or the
construction
of new school buildings - something Rowland estimated could
cost as much as $200 million in state
bond funds over several years. He called it a good decision,
saying
the state did not want to leave the matter to the courts.
In
addition to doubling the number
of city children voluntarily enrolling in suburban schools, the
settlement
calls for roughly tripling the number in integrated magnet schools by
2007.
"We have a lot of work to do," Sergi, the education commissioner, said.
"We have a very good chance of meeting that target, but it will be
difficult."
In
Hartford, where public schools
have struggled to overcome a reputation as being among the worst in the
state, skeptics believe magnet schools will be a difficult sell to
suburban
parents. Nevertheless, educators point to the popularity of
magnet
schools such as the Breakthrough Magnet School and Montessori School in
Hartford and the Metropolitan Learning Center in Bloomfield.
At
the University of Hartford Magnet
School, more than 1,000 Hartford children and about 900 suburban
children
are on waiting lists, said Bruce Douglas, executive director of the
Capitol
Region Education Council, which runs that school and eight other magnet
programs in greater Hartford. "There is definitely a great
demand"
for magnet programs, he said. State officials also cite the
success
of magnet programs in New Haven, a mostly black and Hispanic school
system
that draws hundreds of suburban students to city schools.
"There
is every reason to believe
Hartford can replicate our success," said Edward Linehan, supervisor of
New Haven's magnet programs. Parents have choices to enroll in more
than
20 of New Haven's 48 public schools. Among those are eight magnet
schools
and one regional vocational agriculture school drawing about 1,100
students
from the suburbs. To attract parents, "there has to be no
question
about the quality of instruction in reading, writing, arithmetic,"
Linehan
said. "If it's a high school, you have to have strong electives."
The agreement
comes as schools in many states are becoming increasingly segregated. A
Harvard University study released this week says that a growing number
of black and Latino students nationwide are attending schools
consisting
mainly of minority groups while white students are increasingly likely
to attend schools that have few minorities.
Gary
Orfield, a Harvard professor
who led the study, said the Sheff agreement is a compromise that
"really
expands opportunity for some of the kids in Hartford, but leaves
most of them behind."
"It's
not the final solution," he
said. "The issue will come back."
As
officials signed the agreement
Wednesday, state Attorney General Richard Blumenthal said, "At a time
when
many are doing less to reduce racial isolation, we will do more."
State
Rep. William Dyson, D-New Haven,
called the agreement "a noble undertaking" but said many questions
remain.
The agreement may resolve the Hartford case but does not directly
address
problems of racial isolation and poverty elsewhere, he said.
"How
do you deal with it in the context
of all the other towns that have the same problems?" he said. "What do
you say to Bridgeport? What about Waterbury?"
In
Hartford, however, the families
who filed the case in 1989 were clearly pleased even though the matter
took more than a decade to reach Wednesday's resolution. One of
the
plaintiffs, Neiima Best, was 11 years old when the case was filed. She
is 25 now, a college graduate and the mother of three children.
"I
knew when I got involved, she probably would not benefit personally,"
said
Denise Best, her mother. Now Denise Best has a granddaughter who is on
waiting lists at two different magnet schools in Hartford but has not
been
selected so far.
"Hopefully,
this plan will benefit
her," she said.
Now the
New
York Times is on the case!
Poverty in a Land of Plenty:
Can Hartford Ever Recover?
By PAUL ZIELBAUER (Monday, August
26, 2002 front page with picture of Colt Building)
"Hartford's descent reflects the
conundrum of Connecticut, which has a split economy of affluent suburbs
and floundering cities..."
Monday, December
09, 2002 - 3:41:54 AM MST
Diversity in
schools muddled; Big cities can't match gains made in suburbs
By LINDA CONNER LAMBECK lclambeck@ctpost.com
HARTFORD - Five years after the state
launched efforts to comply with a state Supreme Court order to reduce
racial
isolation in public schools, most suburban districts are
more diverse, but urban districts
remain as segregated as ever.
In
2001-02, 133 out of 166 school
districts showed increases in the percent of minority students over the
1996-97 school year, according to the strategic school profiles each
district
submitted to the state. Another 30 districts showed declines in
their
minority population. Three stayed the same.
But
in city school systems, where
high concentrations of minorities prompted the filing of the landmark
Sheff
vs. O'Neill desegregation lawsuit 13 years ago, the situation has not
improved.
In both Bridgeport and New Haven schools, the minority percentages are
higherin 2001-02 than they were five years earlier. Both have
populations
of racial minorities bordering 90 percent. In Hartford, the
target
of the Sheff case, the population of racial minorities has declined
marginally,
from 95.2 to 94.2 percent.
State
education officials are in the
process of compiling a report on efforts to reduce racial, ethnic and
economic
segregation. It is due in January. Information already provided
by
districts on strategic profiles, however, suggest an abundance of
voluntary
interdistrict programs and schools, diversity training and student
swapping
is going on both in the cities and the suburbs. But some say the
increasing suburban diversity has as much if not more to do with
immigration
and pursuit of the American dream than efforts taken by the school
systems.
"It's
a little of both," said Thomas
Murphy, a state Department of Education spokesman. "We're seeing more
participation
in magnet schools as well as housing patterns that reflect some
migration
of middle class minority families out to the suburbs." Others
caution
that a diverse district doesn't ensure diverse schools.
"Students
don't attend districts,
they attend schools. It's not uncommon to see a rapid increase in
suburban
segregation if districts aren't careful," said Gary Orfield, a Harvard
University professor and desegregation expert who has testified on
behalf
of the Sheff plaintiffs. According to Orfield, the whole
population
of Connecticut, and much of the nation, is being driven by immigration
and a growing diversity.
The
net result is a swelling minority
population in formerly all-white suburbs, while the cities remain
segregated
because middle-class black and Hispanics leaving the cities are being
replaced
by poor immigrants or no one at all.
Statewide,
school diversity has increased
to about 30 percent. Numbers on the strategic profiles show towns
adjacent
to big cities are seeing the biggest increases in minority students.
Stratford's
minority student population grew from 25.5 to a reported 32.4 percent
in
five years. Supt. of Schools Ray O'Connell thinks it's even higher than
that this year.
He
also challenged Orfield's contention
that suburban minorities might be kept segregated.
On
the contrary, Stratford has several
magnet programs that O'Connell said have helped increase diversity at
all
schools. Also, the graduates of some elementary schools have been
redirected
to make sure there is diversity at the middle and high school level in
the north end of town. Where Bunnell High School used to have a 4
percent minority population, more than a quarter of the student body
are
now minorities.
"Any
school that will serve as a microcosm
of the broader society is preparing kids for the real world," said
O'Connell.
It was a lack of diversity coupled with appalling conditions in
Hartford
Public Schools that led the state Supreme Court in 1996 to rule that
the
racial segregation that existed between urban and suburban districts
was
unconstitutional.
The
court ruled segregation was denying
urban and suburban students the kind of education to which they were
entitled.
The court ordered the imbalance corrected but suggested neither a
timetable
nor blueprint for correcting the situation. The state has
wrestled
with the issue ever since, but not as earnestly as the Sheff plaintiffs
would
like. Twice plaintiffs have gone
back to court to ask the state be pressured to move faster. This time,
the two sides have also been meeting privately to negotiate a
settlement
without benefit of the judge.
This
week, Commissioner of Education
Theodore S. Sergi said the two sides are still close and still meeting.
"I'm still optimistic and hopeful. Other than that, I can't say
anything
more," he said. Every year, the state mandates that districts
report
what they are doing to promote diversity. It requires them to increase
their efforts annually.
Some districts are increasing their
diversity by accepting city students through the Project Choice open
enrollment
program. Four of Easton's 55 minority students, for instance, are from
Bridgeport.
Many
districts list their contribution
of students to state-funded charter schools as promoting diversity.
However,
statistics show some charter schools are as segregated as their host
community.
Racial minorities make up 96.6 percent of Bridge Academy in Bridgeport.
At Amistad Academy in New Haven, 96.4 percent of the students are
racial
minorities. Ansonia, which has seen a steady increase in its
minority
population, said its biggest contribution to diversity thus far has
been
to open new schools.
"Before
this, many students attended
schools that lacked libraries, gyms, cafeteria, and technology and were
not racially balanced," Ansonia officials point out. Now they
are.
Other districts admit diversification remains a challenge.
"There
are relatively few minority
children who attend the Seymour Public Schools, which prevents
intradistrict
activities," officials there wrote. The district reports more
inter-district
activities than ever, but says increases in enrollment have hindered
efforts
to participate in Project Choice. Of 2,874, students, 262, or 9.1
percent of Seymour students were racial minorities in 2001-02. A third
of those were Asian.
Asians
also account for a large percentage
of minority students in Darien, Easton, Orange, and Trumbull. By the
state's
definition, minority students include black, Hispanic, Asian American
and
American Indian students. Orfield, the Harvard professor, said
Asians
should be excluded from minority counts.
"Asians
are not segregated. They're
the most integrated population in the country. Putting Asians in there
is really very misleading, I think," Orfield said. Census
figures,
however, suggest Asians are one of the fastest growing minorities in
the
state.
Settlement
Possible In School Desegregation Suit
2:38 PM EDT,October 9, 2002
By ROBERT A. FRAHM, The Hartford
Courant
The
two sides in Connecticut's landmark
school desegregation lawsuit could be closing in on a settlement as
negotiations
reach a critical stage, officials said today.
Parties
in the Sheff vs. O'Neill case
will meet again next week to try to reach a deal that could lead to a
significant
expansion of magnet schools and urban-suburban
student transfer programs in the
Hartford region.
“We're
at a make-or-break point,”
Mark Stapleton, the state Department of Education's chief legal
officer,
said as the state Board of Education held a brief closed meeting
Wednesday
morning to get an update on negotiations. “We're getting close to a
decision
on whether a deal is feasible.”
The
settlement talks, which began
earlier this year, are the first serious out-of-court discussions aimed
at resolving the dispute since the case was filed 13 years ago.
Six
years ago, the state Supreme Court
ruled in favor of the Sheff plaintiffs and ordered the state to reduce
racial imbalance in Hartford's mostly black and Hispanic public
schools.
However, the plaintiffs returned to court two years ago and again
earlier
this year to contend that the state legislature has not done enough to
comply with that
ruling.
The
state has spent millions of dollars
in recent years building new racially integrated magnet schools in the
Hartford region and throughout Connecticut, but black and Hispanic
children
continue to make up the overwhelming majority of students in Hartford
and
other major cities.
Superior
Court Judge Julia L. Aurigemma
was expected to rule on the case as early as this fall, but the two
sides
are expected to ask her for another extension of a deadline to file
legal
briefs while settlement talks continue. Although neither side
will
discuss details of the talks publicly, the negotiations are centered
around
a proposal by plaintiffs to create new integrated magnet schools in
Hartford
and open additional spots in suburban schools for city children over
the
next four years.
Aside
from the potential cost of building
new schools, the two sides are believed to be discussing matters such
as
deadlines, enrollment goals and transportation arrangements.
“We
went into this with a 50-50 shot”
of reaching an agreement, state Education Commissioner Theodore S.
Sergi
said after briefing the state Board of Education on the talks. “I still
think there is [an even chance], and we're close.”
While
officials remain hopeful, there
is no guarantee that the matter will not wind up back in Aurigemma's
courtroom.
“If
something is going to happen,
it's going to happen soon,” said Dennis D. Parker of the NAACP Legal
Defense
and Educational Fund, a lawyer for the Sheff plaintiffs. “I'd like to
think
we can come up with something. We've exchanged a couple of proposals.
I'm
not going to say there isn't some distance between us because there is.”
The
Sheff case surfaced two weeks
ago as an issue in the governor’s race when gubernatorial challenger
Bill
Curry said the dispute could be resolved easily over lunch. Gov. John
G.
Rowland shot back that Curry’s remark “shows the lack of depth and
understanding
of the significant problems we're facing in . . .urban education.”
Decision
expected in the Fall,
according to the Greenwich TIME June 28, 2002.
The Sheff v. O'Neill case went back
to court on April 16th. Although there is a State position, and
have
been active at times in the past, the State League currently does not
have
a specialist in this area. Help is needed to mobilize the
community
around this issue.
The
CCLU has taken the lead in pulling
together like-minded groups. The next planning date for Sheff v.
O'Neill had been set for March 20th, at 6:00 p.m. at the CCLU
Offices,
32 Oak Street. It is reported on the LWVCT WEBsite that in all
likelihood
there will be a town hall meeting on Sheff v. O'Neill on April 3rd or
4th
and a candlelight vigil on April 15th at the State Capitol the day
before
Sheff v. O'Neill goes back to court.
The
LWVCT WEBsite advises for "...more
info you can call Teresa Younger at 247-9823, ext. 219 (Executive
Director,
CCLU)."
Sides
Seek
Sheff Pact; Serious Talks In School Desegregation Case
July 13, 2002 - By RACHEL GOTTLIEB,
Courant Staff Writer
For
the first time in the 13-year
history of the Sheff vs. O'Neill school desegregation case, lawyers for
both sides are holding serious negotiations aimed at settling the
landmark
case.
The
state and the plaintiffs announced
Friday that they are seeking an extension of the deadline to file legal
briefs until after Labor Day to give them time to negotiate for a
settlement. They said they expect
Superior Court Judge Julia L. Aurigemma to grant the extension.
While
there is no guarantee the state and the plaintiffs will be able to
agree
on a way to end the case and the segregation that the state Supreme
Court
in 1996 ruled is unconstitutional, the announcement said they will take
July and August to try to craft a resolution. This twist in the case,
now
in its third round of hearings, was startling because both sides have
been
far apart for more than a decade.
Aurigemma,
reached at her home Friday,
said she had not yet received a motion requesting an extension. "They
said
it might be coming."
Aurigemma,
who ruled three years ago
that the state was proceeding as it should and granted more time for it
to comply with the state Supreme Court's desegregation
order, had asked both sides for suggestions
on how she should rule. She indicated in court that she may not simply
go with one side or the other, saying "It may well be
the court doesn't believe the [Sheff]
plan is the way to go or adopting the state's plan of leaving things
the
way they are is the way to go."
The
question itself, she said, could
be seen as gentle prodding for the two sides to work out a
compromise.
"Have I encouraged them?" she said, repeating a question put to her. "I
probably did." Rather, she later clarified, "I didn't encourage
them
to settle. I just asked for suggestions." Then she laid out what
both sides were facing. "If I
decided I wanted to take a middle
ground, I might be out on my own and that wouldn't be a good idea. If
the
plaintiffs and the state can find a way to live with a resolution, that
would be excellent," Aurigemma said. "It would be a good thing for
everyone."
There
were talks about a settlement
before the lawsuit was filed in 1989, said John C. Brittain, who was a
principal lawyer for the plaintiffs in the first round of the case but
who has shifted to being more of an informed observer since moving to
Texas
to teach law. The difference now, Brittain said, is both sides
have
shown their stamina and fully aired their legal theories, and judges
have
ruled on those theories. "The parties have once again seen each
other
naked, so to speak," Brittain said from Texas.
"The
plaintiffs realistically know
that the state is not going to do as much as they want no matter how
hard
they push. But the state knows the plaintiffs won't go away no
matter
how slowly they proceed," said Brittain, explaining that settlement
discussions
began around two weeks ago. Neither side will say precisely what
is being negotiated.
But in the latest hearings on the
long-running case, hearings that began in April, the plaintiffs
outlined
for the first time a remedy to end racial isolation of Hartford
schoolchildren that they could accept.
By
this September, six years after
th