Following an executive session during a regular meeting of the Coos Bay School Board, all seven members voted to join a lawsuit against the state of Oregon for failing its constitutional mandate to adequately fund public schools.

The lawsuit is being pursued by Eugene 4J, Crow-Applegate-Lorane, Pendleton, Corvallis and now Coos Bay school districts, and supported by the Oregon School Funding Defense Foundation. The foundation, a statewide nonprofit organization formed for the purpose of pursuing the litigation, is spearheading and funding the lawsuit on behalf of the participating school districts.

“Over the years, we've tried as individuals and parts of various groups, to encourage, plead, cajole, and petition the legislature to fund our schools at the appropriate level. Despite all these attempts we have seen no movement from the legislature,” said Don Blom, chairman of the Coos Bay School Board. “We have been assigned enough dollars to keep our doors open, but we haven't been assigned enough dollars to provide the quality education model we would like to.”

According to Coos Bay Superintendent of Schools, Karen Fischer Gray, student enrollment has decreased by 840 students in the last 10 years to about 3,500 students.

In order to consolidate costs and meet the needs of remaining students, the district closed three elementary schools, displacing more than 700 students from neighborhood schools. The district also eliminated four administrators and 29 teachers, along with nearly half of the maintenance personnel. The only staff increases have been in classified staff, such as instructional assistants, to meet the growing number of students with disabilities. Coos Bay has an average of 16 percent special needs students - 5 percent higher than the state average.

The district also will eliminate 14 days of school between 2005 and 2006, Fischer Gray said.

Other school districts participating in the lawsuit face similar problems. According to Kathryn Firestone, executive director for the foundation, the Coos Bay School District illustrates the impact faced by all of Oregon's 198 school districts as a result of the legislature's failure to fully fund the quality goals established by law in 1991.

“Coos Bay School District is a prime example for this lawsuit. We have lost so much over the last 12 years that we have nothing left to cut,” Fischer Gray said. “We're now cutting school days, and that is unacceptable to me, I take that very seriously. And I think the state needs to figure out what they're doing wrong.”

Even though the school district, like all Oregon public school districts, has faced ongoing budget cuts every year, Coos Bay has continually met the standards established by the Oregon Education Act for the Twenty-first Century, a 1991 bill that required the Legislature to fund public schools in order to meet the high standards for education mandated by the public. At the heart of the lawsuit is the 1991 bill, a piece of legislation that was adopted as part of the state constitution, and requires the Legislature to adequately fund public education to meet the high standards set by the bill - and provide a report to the public each year.

According to the Oregon School Funding Defense Foundation, the Legislature has interpreted the funding as an option, which if it could not provide, had to be explained in a public report. The foundation believes the funding was not an option, and that the legislature has violated the constitutional mandate of the people of Oregon.

Blom said the School Board felt this was the time to make a stand with the Legislature, before things got worse.

“It's time to fish or cut bait. We just felt it's time to stand up, and be more proactive in our approach to the Legislature,” he said. “This wasn't taken lightly. A majority of the board felt passionately that if we don't join this lawsuit, then we're really not living up to our promise as leaders of education. We couldn't pass up this opportunity.”

The foundation anticipates filing the suit in the next two weeks, making Oregon the 39th state to seek an answer from the courts for legislative failure to adequately fund public education. Of the 38 states that have previously filed such litigation, 21 verdicts have gone with the plaintiffs, and another 10 cases are pending, Firestone said.

The organization was formed by attorneys who are also concerned parents, including Paul Kelly, former global director of Public Affairs for Nike; Arthur Johnson, a Eugene attorney; Bruce Samson, an attorney and former general counsel for NW Natural; Bill Deatherage, a Medford attorney; Dennis Karnopp, a Bend attorney; and former Oregon Supreme Court Justice Betty Roberts, of Portland.

Fischer Gray said she hoped this move would change things for schools throughout the state, not just help a couple schools districts.

“I hope the lawsuit will shine a light, a beacon on Oregon education funding,” she said. “That's the purpose of the lawsuit.”