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MONROE A judge in Union County will rule early next week on a parents group request to stop a controversial school redistricting plan.
Judge Lucy Inman announced her plans Wednesday afternoon following a three-hour hearing on the parents’ motion for a preliminary injunction...
And in a court filing for the hearing, Sistrunk alleged that maps for redistricting had been illegally changed to exempt prominent individuals, land developers and influential churches. He did not name anyone in those groups but claimed that at least 180 residential and commercial properties were improperly exempted from the redistricting plan.
School district attorney Richard Schwartz denied that school officials did anything improper, said the district held 16 public meetings on redistricting and scoffed at the parents claims of impropriety.
At one point, Inman said the number of public hearings for redistricting “sounds like open and honest government to me.”
...Schwartz noted that school starts in less than five weeks for most students. “The school system would be thrown into chaos at this late date” if parents succeed in stopping redistricting., he said.
Sistrunk also complained that he received more than 100,000 pages of documents from the school district just days before Wednesday’s hearing. Schwartz said every document needed to be reviewed to ensure no confidential information was divulged.
question about the document dump, every time the company I have worked had to hand over documents for anything they were reviewed by legal so that personal info could be "masked" like addresses etc. Also there always seemed to be certain documents that were repeats by the dozens. I can say the same about something my spouse went through here with his company)
Because I have always seen it one this way I assumed it is "more standard:" than people think it is.
Anyone else have any insight on that?
(it was run like any I have seen in my lifetime but people are saying it is not)
^Maybe the school system had to start doing that once the first discovery documents were irresponsibly given to the media and used to as some sort of vendetta against a few individuals.
Given the venomous nature that I've observed by some, I don't blame the school system if they took their time to redact the documents.
Thanks for the link. That's the most detailed article yet.
Indeed. It's the difference between reporting, and repeating gossip and hearsay. In comparison it's interesting how that not "impartial reporter" from WJZY has remained silent about the details of what happened in that court room even though he sat in there the entire time. That while his article on WJZY's website has all the complaints that CAPS has made and absolutely no counterpoint from the school system.
They need better standards at WJZY if they want to be taken seriously as a real news station. Otherwise it's just a bunch of millennials running around with video cameras with nothing relevant to say.
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In any case, it all comes down to what I said months ago. CAPS has to demonstrate the "harm" caused by the redistricting to the students. They have yet to answer that.
Allegations of a secret meeting were supported by all school board members attending a facilities committee meeting eariler that day, Sistrunk [the CAPS laywer] said.
“Where is the evidence that there was a facilities meeting earlier that day?” Inman [the judge] asked.
“I believe that’s a matter of public record,” Sistrunk said.
“And do you have that public record here today?” Inman said.
“No, we do not,” Sistrunk said.
...
Before recessing the hearing, Inman asked Sistrunk to name what harms would be done to the plaintiffs if redistricting was allowed to move forward. He said the people would have been robbed of open and honest government. Inman disagreed, citing the multiple public hearings.
“There’s an immediate impact on property values,” Sistrunk said.
“So we are talking about property values? Before you said that wasn’t a reason,” Inman said.
“Yes,” Sistrunk said.
He also cited disruption for families who might need to move. Safety is a concern for families who take advantage of the grandfathering amendment and use their own transportation to stay at former schools. And students assigned to new schools would be harmed by leaving behind friends and teachers.
Inman said she did not see those as “harms that stem from violations of the open meetings law.”
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