United States v. School Dist. of Ferndale, Mich.

460 F. Supp. 352, 1978 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 15562
CourtDistrict Court, E.D. Michigan
DecidedSeptember 13, 1978
DocketCiv. 75-70958, 76-70871
StatusPublished
Cited by3 cases

This text of 460 F. Supp. 352 (United States v. School Dist. of Ferndale, Mich.) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering District Court, E.D. Michigan primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
United States v. School Dist. of Ferndale, Mich., 460 F. Supp. 352, 1978 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 15562 (E.D. Mich. 1978).

Opinion

OPINION OF THE COURT INCORPORATING FINDINGS OF FACT AND CONCLUSIONS OF LAW

CORNELIA G. KENNEDY, Chief Judge.

These actions are brought by the Attorney General of the United States under two separate statutes, Action No. 75-70958 under the Equal Educational Opportunities Act of 1974 (EEOA), 20 U.S.C. §§ 1701-1758, and Action No. 76-70871 under Title IV of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, 42 U.S.C. § 2000c-6. Named as defendants are the School District of the City of Ferndale, Michigan, a school district of the third class (hereinafter referred to as School District or District); its Superintendent William G. Coyne; The State of Michigan; The Michigan State Board of Education, a constitutional body corporate; John W. Porter, Superintendent of Public Instruction, Department of Education; and William G. Milliken, Governor of the State of Michigan, an ex officio member of the State Board of Education (hereinafter referred to as State defendants).

The complaints in each case allege School District built, operated and maintained the Ulysses S. Grant Elementary School in the school district for the purpose and with the effect of segregating black elementary students in the school system and have discriminatorily assigned or permitted the assignment of black faculty to the Grant School on the basis of race. It is further alleged that the defendants are operating a dual education program at the Grant *354 School, one of which is virtually all black, and have been responsible for de jure segregation of the Ferndale School System. Count Two of Civil Action 75-70958, which relates to the use by the State of revenue sharing funds, is dealt with in later portions of this opinion.

The two actions were consolidated for trial, since although arising under separate statutes requiring different pre-complaint procedures or requirements, the claims of the plaintiff in both actions seek the same relief (aside from the revenue sharing claim) and require the same proofs. The evidence received at earlier hearings on motions for preliminary injunction were made a part of the trial record as provided for by F.R.Civ.P. 65. The procedural history of these cases is set forth in detail in this court’s earlier opinions and summarized in large part in the decision of the United States Court of Appeals in United States v. Ferndale School District, 577 F.2d 1339 (6th Cir. 1978), and will not be repeated here.

PRESENT OPERATION OF SCHOOL DISTRICT

Defendant School District is a suburban school district located immediately north of Detroit and serving an area of about 4.5 square miles. The district includes all of the City of Pleasant Ridge, the greater part of the City of Ferndale, a part of the City of Oak Park, and a part of Royal Oak Township. Thus, although it is called the School District of the City of Ferndale, its borders are not coterminous with that city. The total student enrollment of the district in the 1977-78 school year was 5940 students, 595 or 10 percent of whom were black. During that same school year, District operated eight kindergarten through sixth grade (K-6) elementary schools with a 1977-78 enrollment of 3,212 students; 325 of these elementary students, approximately 10.1 percent, were black. The District employed during that year 115 elementary teachers, 17 of whom, or 15 percent, were black. In the 1977-78 school year, each elementary school had full-time black elementary classroom teachers. All of the elementary schools in the district had black children enrolled during the 1977-78 school year. District has always operated a single high school and all students from the entire district have attended that high school.

Prior to the 1976-77 school year, District operated a single junior high school and students from the entire district attended that school. During the 1976-77 and 1977-78 school years, the former junior high school was closed and the district operated two junior high schools. Attendance boundaries for these two junior high schools were drawn in a manner that resulted in each having the same percentage of black students. Thus, each reflects the percentage of black students in the district in grades seven and eight attending junior high school. The plaintiff has made no claim that the prior operation of the single junior high school or, now, of the two junior high schools, or of the high school has been or is in violation of any student’s constitutional rights. The faculties as well as the student bodies of these schools are integrated. The plaintiff’s entire claim is directed towards the construction, maintenance and operation of a single elementary school, the Grant school. It has presented evidence with regard to other schools in the district but only insofar as it affected Grant school or its attendance area or bore on the issue of intent.

The present two junior high schools, Best and Coolidge, were until the 1976-77 school year K-6 elementary schools. The former single junior high school, Lincoln, required very extensive and expensive repairs and rehabilitation if it was to continue in use. The school population of the district has been declining for several years. Rather than expend the large sums necessary to renovate Lincoln, the school board elected to take two of the larger elementary schools and turn them into junior high schools. The closing of Coolidge as an elementary school has required the school board .to furnish some transportation to some of its former students because of a railroad, distance, and major thoroughfares. The only other transportation ever provided elementary students by the district, aside from those pupils in special education or pro *355 grams for the handicapped, is the transportation of children from the Grant attendance area participating in the open enrollment program, begun in 1975-1976, and to Grant for the open classroom program which commenced that same year.

Beginning with the 1975-1976 school year, continuing during the 1977-1978 school year and contemplated to continue in the future, Grant had two educational programs: one, the so-called traditional self-contained classroom program, and the other, the so-called open classroom program. The open classroom program or method of elementary teaching is less formally structured than the self-contained classroom in that students in the same class may be involved in many different projects or activities at the same time. Parent volunteers participate directly in the teaching process in the classroom. Students work in small groups, and the same students do not remain with a single group. The evidence established that teachers for such an open classroom program have different demands on them than traditional classroom teachers, that they must believe in this method of education and must be especially motivated to teach in such a program. The School District has had a declining enrollment for the past several years with a resulting decline in need for faculty. Rather than employing teachers, it has been laying them off or not replacing them as they resign or retire. Teachers for the open classroom program were recruited system-wide from the elementary faculties.

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Cite This Page — Counsel Stack

Bluebook (online)
460 F. Supp. 352, 1978 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 15562, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/united-states-v-school-dist-of-ferndale-mich-mied-1978.