DOE ‘charter zones’ provoke legal response
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The expansion of charter schools into zoned school buildings took a legal turn yesterday as the United Federation of Teachers and the New York Civil Liberties Union jointly filed suit to block the DOE from emptying school zones of their schools without public process or approval from Community District Education Councils.
DOE has long been pushing the limits of parent tolerance of its authoritarian use of power. When they closed PS241 and proposed only one school, a charter, to take over its building, we realized that for the first time in our district a zone would be empty of any zoned school. This seemed like a zoning change, but according to the law that outlines mayoral control, only CECs have the authority to approve zoning changes. To members of CEC3, DOE’s unilateral action seemed illegal. But we are not lawyers, so we reached out to lawyers we knew, and organizations with lawyers on staff, and asked how it looked to them.
The responses came one after another: the DOE’s action did seem illegal. We also discovered that some citywide organizations were hearing the same story from CECs in other districts. Parents in those districts had the same experience of zones being emptied of their neighborhood schools without CEC approval, and had come to the same conclusion as we had: a legal response seemed warranted. It took citywide organizations with legal resources, like the United Federation of Teachers (UFT) and New York Civil Liberties Union, to organize the legal response. In pushing the envelope, DOE was testing the limits of its authority until someone came along willing to provide a firm response.
Fortunately, the sunset of the mayoral control laws this June provides a good opportunity to ask the hard questions, and demand the discipline that the DOE so clearly needs. I am a named plaintiff in the lawsuit because the CECs were the ones legally mandated to approve zoning changes. In the announcement, I am quoted as saying ““This is about the rule of law and community participation. The law requires local involvement in zoning changes through the approval of Community Education Councils. By closing these schools, the DOE is not only breaking the law, it is subverting the democratic process.”
If DOE’s plans have a sound basis, they should be able to withstand the “withering scrutiny” of honest public hearings and the CEC approval process — which is grounded in the very same “power to the parents” DOE says it is encouraging, in the upcoming CEC elections.
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Congratulations to Jennifer and the other plaintiffs, and thanks to the UFT and the NYCLU for standing up for the rule of law and the rights of parents to be involved in decisionmaking.
It is about time someone made it clear that the DOE and Chancellor Klein, no matter how arrogant and self-righteous they may be, should be subject to the law, like every one else.
Comment by Leonie Haimson — March 25, 2009 @ 9:57 pm