Arthur v. Nyquist

680 F. Supp. 536, 1988 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 1462, 1988 WL 14326
CourtDistrict Court, W.D. New York
DecidedFebruary 23, 1988
DocketNo. CIV-1972-325C
StatusPublished

This text of 680 F. Supp. 536 (Arthur v. Nyquist) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering District Court, W.D. New York primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Arthur v. Nyquist, 680 F. Supp. 536, 1988 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 1462, 1988 WL 14326 (W.D.N.Y. 1988).

Opinion

CURTIN, Chief Judge.

The Buffalo, New York, Board of Education [the Board] and the Buffalo Teachers Federation [BTF] have jointly moved for interim modification of my order of August 8, 1980, commonly known as the one-for-one hiring order.

On September 10, 1987, the Board and the BTF submitted an interim order, to which other parties in the action filed specific written objections on September 17, 1987.1 All parties met with the court to discuss the proposed order and the objections thereto on September 22 and 23,1987. On October 9, 1987, the court directed the Board to submit further affidavits providing a statistical breakdown of minority hiring since August 8, 1980, and information on the Board’s minority recruitment program. The Board submitted this information on October 29, 1987, and December 10, 1987.

I now approve the proposed interim order submitted by the Board and the BTF, with certain changes which respond to objections raised by other parties and to concerns of this court. In general, I note that at the time of my March 27, 1979, order, which first set forth the general hiring goals later addressed by the one-for-one order, minorities represented only 12.2 percent of the teaching staff in the Buffalo Public Schools. Order of March 27, 1979, p. 10. At present, minorities represent over 21 percent of the teaching staff in a number of tenure areas, and 20.3 percent of the total staff. Appendices, A, B, and C. While minority hiring has not yet attained the minimum requirement of 21 percent representation in each of the tenure areas specified by my August 8, 1980, order, it is clear that significant progress has been made in this direction. The Board must, as the order which follows emphasizes, continue to direct its most vigorous efforts to minority recruitment efforts in order to [538]*538satisfy the minority hiring requirements. However, I believe that some interim modification of the August 8,1980, order is now appropriate in order to partially remedy the plight of those majority teachers who have waited many years to attain permanent status. The agreement reached by the Board and the BTF, with some alteration, provides an acceptable partial remedy for this situation which does not adversely affect attainment of the minority hiring goals.

The order of the court follows; departures from the proposed order of the Board and BTF are underscored. The necessity for these changes is discussed in footnotes to the underscored sections.

Order Modifying this Court’s August 8, 1980, Order

1. The Hiring Order

Both the Board and the BTF urge the use of paragraph 11(b) of the August 8, 1980, one-for-one hiring order to permit the granting of probationary appointments to a substantial number of non-minority teachers in selected tenure areas. The intervenors for the handicapped also support the concept.2

The plaintiffs and the Community Advisory Board for Bilingual Education of Buffalo [CAB] oppose the use of paragraph 11(b) for such purpose.

By way of pertinent background, the August 8, 1980, order established “the goal of hiring one minority for one majority for all positions, until the goal of twenty one percent (21%) minority employees has been reached ...” (Appendix to order, p. 3 ¶ 4). The “instructional staff” of the Buffalo Public Schools which the plan covers is composed of six classifications of employees: 1) central office and school building staff; 2) supportive school staff; 3) elementary teachers; 4) special area teachers; 5) remedial area staff; and 6) secondary teachers (Appendix to order, pp. 3-4 ¶ 6). New hirees in the instructional services of the defendant Board were to be appointed to probationary (tenure track) positions in the ratio of one majority for every minority so hired. In the event there were no qualified minorities available for probationary appointment to a given position, only a temporary appointment could be made to that position (as well as to its counterpart, the corresponding majority position).

Paragraph 11(b) reads as follows:

In those extreme situations where the Board can factually demonstrate unavailability of qualified candidates to fill open positions, the Court may permit the Board to make probationary appointments.

Since the inception of the August 8,1980, order, the number of temporary appointments required thereunder has continued to grow. It has become apparent that over the life of the order a sufficient number of qualified minority candidates to fill certain probationary positions within these categories has been and continues to remain unavailable. The Board has maintained a recruitment program which predates the August 8, 1980, order. Recently, that program was greatly expanded. The results of its implementation have been a partial, but not total, success. Whether the Board’s increasing emphasis on recruitment will net further gain is unpredictable at this time. Accordingly, some interim relief is warranted, and paragraph 11(b) can be used for such purpose.

It is the intended nature of this interim relief that a) the relief be temporary — accordingly, the matter shall be brought back for review by the parties and the court no later than July 1, 1988; and b) the adaptations permitted preserve the opportunity for minority race placements in permanent positions sufficient to attain the 21 percent goal of the original order.

[539]*539Accordingly, to the extent that staffing of any of the six areas is less than 21 percent minority, the number of positions necessary to reach 21 percent in that given area will be reserved for qualified minority applicants. Each such reserved position will be filled by a qualified candidate under a temporary appointment until such time as a qualified minority candidate can be hired on a probationary appointment for that position.

By Appendix [A] (attached hereto), the Board has specified by name each of the tenure areas within each of the six instructional services categories. As to each of those tenure areas, the Board provides, inter alia, the following: 1) the total number of permanent tenure positions available for the 1987-88 school year within that tenure area; 2) the total number of minority employees occupying probationary and tenure positions within that tenure area; 3) the total number of majority candidates occupying probationary and tenure positions within that tenure area. The Board has calculated the number of minority positions required to equal 21 percent of the total available positions. For each category, the number of minority positions required to equal 21 percent of the total available positions shall be reserved for qualified minority probationary appointments. As to the remainder, hiring of probationary teachers can proceed without regard to the one-for-one hiring requirement.

The parties should also review each of the tenure areas included in each of the six categories in order to determine whether any of the positions falling therein are of a kind for which it is unlikely qualified minority candidates will be available within a reasonable time. The same analysis should be performed with respect to majority candidates. The parties should then consider whether those positions would be offsetting one to another or whether there should be some additional adjustments to take into account the realistic expectation of finding majority/minority candidates for those certain tenure positions while still preserving the overall 21 percent employment goal.

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680 F. Supp. 536, 1988 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 1462, 1988 WL 14326, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/arthur-v-nyquist-nywd-1988.