Schools file lawsuit over funding for education

JEFFERSON CITY, Mo. -- Claiming the Missouri Legislature has failed to fulfill its constitutional obligation to adequately fund public education and fairly distribute the money, 243 Missouri school systems are turning to the courts for relief.

The Committee for Educational Equality, which includes 48 Southeast Missouri school districts, filed a lawsuit in Cole County Circuit Court on Tuesday that seeks to have the state's current funding system declared unconstitutional.

The action was prompted by two straight years of education spending cuts and the growing financial disparity between Missouri's wealthiest and poorest school districts.

Several area school superintendents who were on hand for the filing of the lawsuit said the action was taken reluctantly but is necessary to spur lawmakers to make changes.

Blane Keel, superintendent of the Clearwater School District, said his financially strapped Wayne County district is being forced to choose between staffing classrooms and repairing crumbling buildings.

"It's a tremendously sad day when the legislature has decided not to do what's right by our kids in Missouri, but I believe that's where we're at," Keel said.

The state's education funding formula was last overhauled in 1993 after a circuit judge declared the previous system unfair.

Alex Bartlett, the Jefferson City lawyer handling the current lawsuit, also represented the 89 plaintiff districts that launched the earlier case. He said the situation is even more dire than it was a decade ago, as evidenced by the participation of nearly half of the state's 524 school districts. The plaintiff districts serve more than 340,000 students.

Since the previous court case ended with passage of landmark education legislation that drastically increased funding, the Missouri Supreme Court never had the chance to definitively interpret the constitutional provisions that govern education funding. The districts are pursuing such a ruling this time around.

"We do not know what eventually will come of this lawsuit except that we hope there will be a decree by the court saying the present system is unconstitutional," Bartlett said.

That decision could be a long time coming because the first case took more than two years just to clear the trial-court level.

While the Missouri Constitution places the duty of funding public schools on the legislature, school districts also receive revenue from local sources. However, the ability to raise local money varies widely and contributed to the wide gap in per-pupil spending. In the 2002-2003 school year, the state's wealthiest district spent nearly $14,000 per pupil while the poorest spent around $4,500.

Van Buren schools superintendent Jeff Lindsey said many small communities like his have low property values and little industry, which translates into a weak local revenue stream.

Gov. Bob Holden, a Democrat, blamed the Republican-led legislature for ignoring his efforts last year to bolster education spending. Holden's plan called for a variety of tax increases.

"I do not want the courts running our schools, but when the legislature fails to satisfy its constitutional duties, the school districts are left with no alternative," Holden said.

Senate President Pro Tem Peter Kinder, R-Cape Girardeau, noted that while various executive branch officials are named as defendants in the lawsuit, no lawmakers are.

"Attempts by Governor Holden to make a political issue over funding for our schools does not help our students -- and helping students must be our first priority," Kinder said.

The case is Committee for Educational Equality, et al., v. State of Missouri, et al.

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