Governance gets Reprieve

Judge refuses to remove Highland Park schools manager

But he’s willing to hold a hearing

By Melanie D. Scott Free Press Staff Writer

   MASON — An Ingham County circuit judge denied a request seeking to immediately remove Highland Park schools emergency manager Jack Martin for a second time, but he said he was willing to conduct a hearing on the issue.

   Chief Judge William Collette said Thursday he would not remove Martin and would allow him to finish the school year, but he said Martin’s reinstatement as emergency manager deserves a closer look.  

   Gov  . Rick Snyder appointed Martin to head the financially strapped school district in January but asked him to step down weeks later after Collette ruled the state financial review team, which advised Snyder to appoint an emergency manager, violated the Open Meetings Act.

   Collette’s decision made Martin’s appointment invalid. The review team reconvened publicly and again declared a financial emergency in the Highland Park district. Snyder reappointed Martin on March 2.

   Highland Park school board Secretary Robert Davis, who filed the lawsuit alleging the Open Meetings Act violation, said Martin should not have been reappointed.

   “This is not a loss,” Davis said. “The judge just set it for a hearing and invited us to argue all of the issues.”

   Martin did not return calls seeking comment.

   Highland Park parent La-Keisha Brown said she was pleased with Collette’s decision to leave Martin to run the struggling district.

   “The kids have been through enough, and sometimes I think they get lost in the legal stuff,” Brown said. “They should let him finish the school year.”

   Collette said he was not prepared to remove Martin but will allow for a hearing because he thought the review team had a term of 60 days. He was under the impression that when the team reconvened, the members’ terms had expired.

   But Assistant Attorney General Michael Murphy said the review team does not operate on terms and members serve at the will of the governor.

   Collette said that was the opposite position taken by attorneys representing the state in a previous hearing.

   “I have never seen a more convoluted change of position in any case,” Collette said. “The whole thing remains in existence when I was told it was out of existence.”

   A second issue on whether Public Act 4, the state’s emergency manager law, violates the Headlee Amendment also will be heard by Collette, said Andrew Paterson, Davis’ attorney. No date is set.

   Paterson said the Headlee Amendment prohibits the state from making local governments add new services or costs without a vote of the people. He alleges that by making Highland Park schools pay for Martin’s $100,000-a-year salary, the state is in violation of the law.

   “We were seeking an injunction from paying those costs,” Paterson said.

   ! CONTACT MELANIE D. SCOTT: 313-222-6159 OR MDSCOTT@FREEPRESS.COM  

Emergency manager Jack Martin

Governance: AAA or EAA? (But WHAT about the KIDS?)

Editorial

A sobering situation in Highland Park schools

   
What is to become of the poor Highland Park school district?

   The district got its most recent round of fixes Friday, as Gov. Rick Snyder reappointed Jack Martin to the position of emergency manager and then transferred most day-to-day personnel functions to the Detroit Public Schools for the remainder of the school year. Earlier in the week, the governor had arranged to get money to teachers and other staff who had not gotten their paychecks on time the week before.

   The fixes will get students through to June, but they don’t really solve anything. For small districts like Highland Park, the problems go beyond the steps even an emergency manager can take.

   Yes, Highland Park suffered from fiscal mismanagement, putting the district $1.7 million behind in its bills by last November, when Snyder first declared a financial emergency. And the district ran deficits in five of the last six fiscal years. Only 969 students remained as of November, down from more than 3,000 as recently as 2006.

   When you ask school districts to compete, there are going to be winners and losers. Highland Park looks like a loser. Yet what other district would want to merge with it, absorbing its debts and retirement burden? Nor is there precedent for simply leaving a geographic area unserved by a district, even though the Republican team in Lansing seems to prefer standalone charter schools and sometimes undercuts traditional school districts.

   In Highland Park, teachers and other staff deserve kudos for coming to work last week even though they did not get the biweekly paychecks due them Feb. 24. But more confusion may follow, as parents must decide whether to use the $4,000 bounty on each student’s head and leave for another district or charter school, using a list that was to be available to parents Friday.

   And what about next year? One solution might be to put Highland Park schools in the Educational Achievement Authority that Gov. Rick Snyder is trying to get in place by next fall. But many questions remain about its structure and financing — and whether it, too, will indirectly push more costs onto traditional districts.

   Highland Park’s payless payday stirred remarkably little controversy, perhaps on the assumption that it was a glitch. Perhaps, though, it’s the canary in the coal mine.

   When Kalkaska schools went broke nearly 20 years ago, school refinancing became a major topic in the state. Eventually, then-Gov. John Engler and the Legislature put together the plan now known as Proposal A and campaigned hard for its passage with voters in 1994.

   These days, districts fall into emergency management and still no one takes on the big questions, chief among them how to handle long-promised retirement benefits when fewer and fewer students attend the traditional district schools that have to cover the legacy costs. Nor is anyone asking whether Michigan should dismantle or rearrange school district boundaries or even abandon the idea of assigned neighborhood schools altogether. Certainly that’s where proponents of choice seem to be headed, without saying so forthrightly.

   Yet, in Highland Park and everywhere else in the state, there needs to be a school where, when you go, they have to take you in. Until Michigan’s leaders figure out how to make all this work, and chart a path from here to there, there is no good answer to the question of what to do about the poor Highland Park district.

Jack Martin

Quick-fix for Emergency!

DPS to co-manage Highland Park district

Agreement is aimed at helping students

By Lori Higgins Free Press Education Writer

   The troubled Detroit Public Schools district will co-manage the fiscally foundering Highland Park School District for the next four months under a new agreement announced Friday by the state.

   An agreement was signed Friday by Jack Martin, the newly reappointed emergency manager for the Highland Park district; Roy Roberts, emergency manager for DPS, and state Treasurer Andy Dillon.

   “This unique agreement will ensure that students, who did not cause the district’s financial emergency, will have the ability to finish the school year at HPS,” Dillon said in a news release.

   DPS — itself in financial and academic turmoil — started assisting Friday with the management and operation of the district, including handling personnel-related functions. Martin will continue to handle Highland Park’s financial issues.

   As for why DPS was chosen, despite its own problems, Sara Wurfel, spokeswoman for Gov. Rick Snyder, said there were multiple issues, including that DPS is already managing some services for Highland Park; the proximity of the districts, and because it ensures Highland Park kids can remain with their teachers and classrooms. Leadership also was key.

   “With Roy Roberts at the helm of DPS, he’s really making strides at turning things around, both financially and academically,” Wurfel said.

   But the move was criticized by Robert Davis, secretary for the Highland Park district’s Board of Education.

   “It’s an absolute joke,” said Davis, who has filed lawsuits against the state’s emergency manager law. “DPS has its own issues, and for them to try and enter into an agreement with a failing school district is kind of contrary to what he’s saying he’s about,” Davis said, referring to Snyder.

   Davis said he would decide by Monday whether to take legal action to challenge the agreement.

   Board President John Hollo-way declined to comment because he said he hadn’t heard about the agreement. The agreement comes amid deepening financial turmoil for Highland Park — which has an $11-million deficit — that resulted in employees not getting paid Feb. 24. They got paid Friday after the state decided earlier this week to give the district a $178,000 advance on its March 20 state-aid payment.

   Last week, Snyder signed emergency legislation that provides $4 million to allow students in the Highland Park district to complete the school year despite the district’s insolvency.

   The legislation provides a supplemental 2012 appropriation of $4,000 for each student enrolled in Highland Park, mon ey that could have been used to maintain current operations under new management or to follow students who transfer elsewhere.

   DPS will receive that $4,000 per pupil. Highland Park has 969 students, down from 3,179 in 2006.

   “Our mutual goal will continue to be to educate the children first,” Roberts said. “Detroit Public Schools is willing to fill a role as current legislation allows to ensure that Highland Park students can continue to learn in a stable and consistent fashion.”

   Martin, a certified public accountant and former federal education official, was reappointed Friday morning to his role as Highland Park emergency manager, at an annual salary of $100,000. Snyder first appointed Martin to the post in January. But a judge ruled recently — in response to a lawsuit Davis filed — that the state review team whose recommendations led to the appointment had violated the state’s Open Meetings Act.

   DPS has been under the leadership of an emergency manager since 2009 and is undergoing a comprehensive restructuring to improve achievement. DPS students have posted the worst scores on a rigorous national exam in recent years.

OTHER OPTIONS

   The state updated a website on Friday that it created to explain the crisis in the Highland Park School District with a list of nearby schools parents can send their children instead.

   The list, prepared by the Wayne Regional Educational Service Agency, lists the names of the schools and how many openings they have available at each grade level.

   Sixty schools are listed, many of them charter schools.

   To see the list, go to http://www.michigan.gov/highlandparkschools and click on “List of Schools With Openings in the Area.”

To the TEACHERS at Highland Park Schools (THANKS! We are not worthy)

Highland Park teachers, staff to get paid

District receives 2nd advance on state aid

By Lori Higgins Free Press Education Writer

   The Michigan Department of Education gave the Highland Park School District an advance on its state aid Wednesday, meaning employees will get paid Friday — a week late.

   The $178,000 advance on the March 20 state payment — the second advance the district has received this year — will provide a short-term fix to a financial crisis in the district that has led to an $11-million deficit.

   Despite the lack of a payday, employees came to work every day this week.

   More news could come Friday, the end of a seven-day waiting period Gov. Rick Snyder has to reappoint an emergency manager for the cash-strapped district. Earlier this year, he appointed Jack Martin, a certified public accountant and former federal education official. But that appointment was invalidated by a court ruling.

   For now, though, the focus is on paying staff.

   “The teachers of Highland Park have stepped up and shown extraordinary commitment to their students by coming in this week, even though they did not receive a paycheck last Friday,” state Superintendent Mike Flanagan said in a statement.

   “Neither the teachers or students are responsible for the financial mismanagement of the Highland Park School District. This action today acknowledges the efforts the teachers are putting forth.”

   The Department of Education said the $178,000 advance is being given with assurances from the district that the money will go toward payroll.

   Last week, the Legislature pushed through emergency legislation to provide $4 million to allow Highland Park’s students to complete the school year, despite the district’s insolvency. But that didn’t provide money to pay employees.

   “It’s a good thing,” John Holloway, president of the district’s Board of Education, said of the latest advance.

   The state appointed Martin as emergency manager in January and is going through that process again because a judge found that the state review team whose recommendations led to the appointment had violated the state’s Open Meetings Act.

   Holloway and board Secretary Robert Davis said the advance is a step the state needed to take.

   “The state only did what they should have done in the first place,” said Davis, whose lawsuit against the state’s emergency manager law prompted the court ruling.

   The district’s Board of Education approved a resolution Tuesday night requesting an advance of $248,000. The $178,000 the state is providing will be used with existing district financial resources to cover the payroll expenses of $237,000, according to the Department of Education.

   Asked what will happen for future payrolls, Holloway said he’s not sure. “We do not know at this point what the governance will be for this district,” he said.

   The governor’s office sent a letter to parents late last week, telling them they could decide in coming days to either have their child continue in the Highland Park district — which would be run by a different district or charter school operator — or have their child transfer to another district or school that has available space.

   Sara Wurfel, a Snyder spokeswoman, said the state is working with the Wayne Regional Educational Service Agency and others on a variety of fronts, “including compiling a list of all the area schools with available space to make it as easy as possible to know and consider their options.”

   The state has also launched a website to explain the financial emergency in the district, www.michigan.gov/highlandparkschools