Incantalupo v. Lawrence Union Free School District Number 15

652 F. Supp. 2d 314, 2009 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 75516
CourtDistrict Court, E.D. New York
DecidedAugust 24, 2009
DocketNo. 09-CV-3342 (JS)(AKT)
StatusPublished
Cited by13 cases

This text of 652 F. Supp. 2d 314 (Incantalupo v. Lawrence Union Free School District Number 15) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering District Court, E.D. New York primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Incantalupo v. Lawrence Union Free School District Number 15, 652 F. Supp. 2d 314, 2009 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 75516 (E.D.N.Y. 2009).

Opinion

MEMORANDUM AND DECISION

SEYBERT, District Judge.

Plaintiffs Tara Incantalupo, Stephen Jackson, Andrew Levey, Stacey Sullivan and Fu-Yun Tag (“Plaintiffs”) have filed suit against Murray Forman, David Suss-man, Uri Kaufman, Asher Mansdorf, Michael Hatten, Solomon Blisko and Nahum Marcus (collectively, “the Individual Defendants”) and the Lawrence Union Free School District Number 15 and the Board of Education of the Lawrence Union Free School District Number 15 (collectively, “Lawrence Defendants”), alleging violations of their First and Fourteenth Amendment Rights. Plaintiffs have also moved for a preliminary injunction to enjoin a “Consolidation Plan” that Defendants seek to implement this September.

Defendants oppose Plaintiffs’ preliminary injunction motion and, instead, demand that the case be dismissed.

For the foregoing reasons, Plaintiffs’ motion for a preliminary injunction is DENIED and Plaintiffs’ Complaint is DISMISSED.

BACKGROUND1

Plaintiffs are residents of the Lawrence Union Free School District and the parents of children who attend the district’s public schools. Compl. ¶¶ 4-13. The Individual Defendants are current and former members of Lawrence’s Board of Education (“the School Board”) who support the Consolidation Plan that Plaintiffs oppose. Id. ¶¶ 16-21.

The Lawrence Union Free School District (“Lawrence”) is a school district within Nassau County, New York, serving the Village of Lawrence and much of the surrounding “Five Towns” area. Id. ¶ 22. At one time, Lawrence had a demographically diverse population, and was known for its superior public schools. Id. ¶¶ 23-24.

Beginning in the 1980s, Lawrence’s demographic balance began to shift due to a substantial influx of Orthodox Jews. Compl. ¶¶ 24-25. Orthodox Judaism is a form of Judaism that demands adherence to the Hebrew Bible’s commandments. Id. ¶ 28.2 Orthodox Jews’ religious beliefs [318]*318manifest themselves in their adherents’ diets, wardrobes, grooming habits, and their large nuclear families. Id. ¶ 29.3 As a result, Orthodox Judaism “oftentimes represents more than just a religion ... it is a culture and lifestyle as well.” Id. ¶ 30. Thus, Orthodox Jewish communities constitute “separate cultural, ethnic, political, and socio-economic groups” from society-at-large, and “possess their own shared values, beliefs, interests, and political agendas, which are taught onto future generations.” Id. ¶ 30.4

Because Orthodox Jews want to pass their religious heritage onto their children, they primarily tend to educate their children in private seminaries, known as “yeshivas.” Id. ¶ 31. The yeshiva system replaces the public education “to which Orthodox children, like all children, are otherwise entitled.” Id. ¶ 31. Orthodox Jews “who possess the requisite financial means are expected to send their children to yeshivas,” where they study both secular (e.g., math, English) and parochial subjects. Id. ¶ 32.

In Lawrence, the yeshiva system “has helped to create a community that is insular and isolated from its surrounding communities.” Id. ¶ 33. Indeed, due to the Orthodox Jewish community’s size and preference for yeshiva education, the majority of Lawrence’s children currently attend private schools, mostly yeshivas. Id. ¶ 35.

Orthodox Jewish values sometimes “manifest in the form of political ideologies (and corresponding political agendas).” Id. ¶ 34. Through bloc-voting, Orthodox Jewish communities mobilize “to support public policies that favor Orthodox interests.” Id. ¶ 34. Thus, in Lawrence, Orthodox Judaism operates as a “de facto political affiliation.” Id. ¶ 34.

Around 2000 or 2001, Lawrence’s Orthodox community began to assert itself politically. Id. ¶ 38. At this time, the Lawrence School District Superintendent announced that Lawrence had spent all its cash reserves, and that the school system needed a tax increase to sustain its operating budget. Id. 40. Because the Ortho[319]*319dox community pays taxes to support public schools while receiving little benefit from them (as they principally educate their children in yeshivas), the Orthodox community mobilized to limit their taxes and defeat the school district’s operating budget. Id. ¶¶ 38-40. This campaign succeeded, and Lawrence was forced to adopt a contingency budget that limited school spending. Id. ¶ 42. Every year following, until 2006, Lawrence proposed increasing school spending, and each time the Orthodox community mobilized to defeat it. Id. ¶¶ 46-47. Voting statistics show that Lawrence’s heavily Orthodox areas opposed the larger school budgets, while secular neighborhoods favored them. Id. ¶ 47.

Although operating on a smaller budget, New York State law required Lawrence to provide busing to students who went to parochial schools. Id. ¶ 49. The need to bus approximately 4,000 students to private schools, sometimes located far away from Lawrence, caused Lawrence’s transportation budget to balloon to over $7,000,000. Id. ¶ 50.

Due to smaller school budgets, Lawrence’s public schools declined in quality. Id. ¶¶ 48, 51. Test scores fell, Lawrence’s reputation diminished, and Lawrence was placed on New York’s educational watch-list for underperforming school districts. Id. ¶ 51. Despite these falling scores, the Orthodox community continued to oppose giving Lawrence “free reign” to spend. Id. ¶ 55. Plaintiffs plead that the Orthodox did so because they feared “depleting the funding available for Orthodox interests, especially yeshiva tuition payments.” Id. ¶ 55. This particular conclusory allegation is not accepted as true. Plaintiffs nowhere allege that any public money went to “Orthodox interests,” much less “yeshiva tuition payments” specifically. Rather, what Plaintiffs appear to actually mean by “depleting the funding available for Orthodox interests” is that Orthodox Jews opposed higher taxes, in part because they believed that higher taxes would impair their ability to afford yeshiva tuition.

In 2006, Defendants Kaufman, Hatten, Mansdorf, and Blisko won election to Lawrence’s School Board. Id. ¶¶41, 46, 58. Each of these defendants are Orthodox Jews who educate their children in yeshivas, not public schools. Id. Their election thus created an “Orthodox Majority” on Lawrence’s School Board. Id. ¶ 63. The Orthodox community heavily supported Kaufman and Hatten’s campaigns, particularly after they campaigned on a platform of enhancing services to private schools while lowering taxes. Id. ¶ 59. During the campaign, Kaufman, Hatten, Mansdorf, and Blisko all supported providing free transportation services to prekindergarten private school students while having the “temerity” to support a “0% tax increase.” Id. ¶ 60.

Plaintiffs allege that this platform “was designed to convert [Lawrence’s Board of Education] ... into a proxy for the Orthodox shuls in the Five Towns area.” Id. ¶ 62. Similarly, Plaintiffs allege that the “Orthodox Majority,” in general, has sought to “convert the public [School Board] into an Orthodox ruling committee, and to establish Orthodox Judaism as the official religion” of Lawrence. Again, these conclusory allegations are not accepted as true.

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652 F. Supp. 2d 314, 2009 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 75516, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/incantalupo-v-lawrence-union-free-school-district-number-15-nyed-2009.