Evelyn R. Ellis, a Minor v. The Board of Public Instruction of Orange County, Florida

423 F.2d 203, 1970 U.S. App. LEXIS 10657
CourtCourt of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit
DecidedFebruary 17, 1970
Docket29124_1
StatusPublished
Cited by88 cases

This text of 423 F.2d 203 (Evelyn R. Ellis, a Minor v. The Board of Public Instruction of Orange County, Florida) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Evelyn R. Ellis, a Minor v. The Board of Public Instruction of Orange County, Florida, 423 F.2d 203, 1970 U.S. App. LEXIS 10657 (5th Cir. 1970).

Opinion

BELL, Circuit Judge:

The issue presented in this case is whether the Orange County Florida public school system is now unitary. The answer depends on a review of the posture of the system in light of two controlling decisions of the Supreme Court. 1 In Green v. County School Board of New Kent County, 1968, 391 U.S. 430, 88 S.Ct. 1689, 20 L.Ed.2d 716, the mechanics of what must be done to bring about a unitary system were outlined. They were stated in terms of eliminating the racial identification of the schools in a dual system in six particulars: composition of student bodies, faculty, staff, transportation, extracurricular activities, and facilities. 391 U.S. at 435, 88 S.Ct. It was such dual systems, organized and operated by the states acting .through local school boards and school officials, which were held unconstitutional in Brown v. Board of Education, 1954, 347 U.S. 483, 74 S.Ct. 686, 98 L.Ed. 873 (Brown I), and which were ordered abolished in Brown v. Board of Education, 1955, 349 U.S. 294, 75 S.Ct. 753, 99 L.Ed. 1083 (Brown II).

In Green the court spoke in terms of the whole system — of converting to a unitary, nonracial school system from a dual system. Then, in Alexander v. Holmes County Board of Education, 1969, 396 U.S. 19, 90 S.Ct. 29, 24 L.Ed.2d 19, the court pointed to the end to be achieved. The result, if a constitutionally acceptable system may be said to exist, must be that the school system no longer operates as a dual system based on race or color but as a “unitary school * * * [system] within which no person is to be effectively excluded from any school because of race or color.” 396 U.S. at p. 20, 90 S.Ct. at p. 30, 24 L.Ed.2d at p. 21.

Tested in this frame of reference, we conclude that the Orange County school system falls short of being a unitary system only in one respect: A part of the student desegregation plan. It follows that the motion for injunction pending appeal will be denied so as to afford the district court, along with the school board, an opportunity to complete the conversion from a dual to a unitary system. We take the case for final de *205 cisión on the merits. 2 The judgment of the district court will be affirmed in part, reversed in part, and the case remanded to the district court with direction.

I.

THE ORANGE COUNTY SCHOOL SYSTEM

This system covers the whole of Orange County including the urban areas of Orlanda, Winter Park, Winter Garden and Apopka, as well as rural areas embraced in a county having a land area of 910 square miles, or almost the size of Rhode Island (1,049 square miles). The system is comprised of 26 secondary schools, 66 elementary schools, 3 vocational schools and 3 special education schools, or a total of 98 separate schools. There are 68,012 white and 14,856 Negro students in the system, or a total of 82,-868 students as of the present time (February 2, 1970). The racial ratio of students is approximately 82 per cent white -18 per cent Negro. There are a total of 3,563 teachers in the system, 2,913 white and 650 Negro, or much the same racial ratio as students.

On February 1, teachers were transferred so as to establish a substantial racial ratio in each school. 3 As an example, Jones High School which has a student population of 1,136 Negro students and 121 white students, now has a faculty composed of 66 white teachers and 14 Negro teachers, 82.5 per cent white and 17.5 per cent Negro. The greatest percentage departure in the system (Orange Center Elementary School) from the system-wide faculty ratio would involve the change of three faculty positions to be exact. Attached as Appendix I is the present faculty population by school and race.

In our recent decision in Singleton v. Jackson Municipal Separate School District, 5 Cir., 1969, 419 F.2d 1211 (consolidated cases en banc) [Nos. 26285 et al., dated December 1, 1969], in order to mandate compliance with the Green and Alexander v. Holmes County decisions, we required, not later than February 1, 1970, that the faculty and staff be desegregated on the following basis:

“Effective not later than February 1, 1970, the principals, teachers, teacher-aides and other staff who work directly with children at a school shall be so assigned that in no case will the racial composition of a staff indicate that a school is intended for Negro students or white students. For the remainder of the 1969-70 school year the district shall assign the staff described above so that the ratio of Negro to white teachers in each school, and the ratio of other staff in each, are substantially the same as each such ratio is to the teachers and other staff, respectively, in the entire school system.”

The Orange County system has complied with this directive as to faculty and staff. It has also agreed ,to comply in full with the Singleton provision as to continuing non-discriminatory practices in maintaining and replacing faculty and staff.

We also required that transportation systems, in those school districts having transportation systems, be designed to insure the transportation of all eligible pupils on a non-segregated and otherwise non-discriminatory basis. Orange County has been in compliance with this di *206 rective since 1964. In addition, a bi-racial committee will review the transportation system from time to time to insure non-discriminatory operation. 4

It also appears that all extracurricular activities, including sports, are being operated on a non-segregated basis and this is likewise true as to facilities.

The requirement of Singleton that all school construction, school consolidation and site selection (including the location of any temporary classroom) in the system be done in a manner which will prevent the recurrence of the dual school structure by taking into consideration residential housing patterns has also been adopted by Orange County. The bi-racial committee will consider and review matters falling into this category. Fn. 4, supra.

These facts demonstrate full compliance with five of the six criteria of Green: Faculty, staff, transportation, extracurricular activities and facilities, leaving only the question of student body composition.

In order to facilitate the integration of student bodies, we required a majority to minority transfer policy in Singleton as follows:

‘The school district shall permit a student attending a school in which his race is in the majority to choose to attend another school, where space is available, and where his race is in the minority.”

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423 F.2d 203, 1970 U.S. App. LEXIS 10657, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/evelyn-r-ellis-a-minor-v-the-board-of-public-instruction-of-orange-ca5-1970.