In the first step toward a potential lawsuit, a public interest law firm on Monday filed a complaint with the state alleging that the West Contra Costa Unified School District violated the disclosure requirements of the state’s Local Control Funding Formula when it approved a pay raise for district staff.
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The 11-page complaint by San Francisco-based Public Advocates doesn’t claim that the district categorically cannot grant the pay increase – totaling $25.8 million over three years – it approved last month. But the law firm says that West Contra Costa Unified never told the public last summer that it might use $4.3 million that it is required to spend this year to improve programs and services for high-needs students to help pay for the across-the-board raises for staff.
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But Public Advocates’ complaint says the school board should amend the LCAP after a public hearing to spell out how all this new money will benefit high-needs students. Otherwise, the public cannot track the money and make sure the district spends it as it says it will and not as a back-door plan to fund pay increases now or in the future.
John Affeldt, managing attorney of Public Advocates, said that he suspects that West Contra Costa Unified is not alone in skirting the law. “We are seeing a lot of districts giving pay increases,” he said Monday. “We want to see teachers fairly paid, but this must be done in a way that honors the community conversation. An involved community is sacrosanct under the Local Control Funding Formula.”
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Public Advocates filed a complaint with State Superintendent of Public Instruction Tom Torlakson – a step that precedes going to court. Claiming “irreparable and immediate” harm from further delays, the complaint gives state officials 10 days to order the district to suspend spending on the raises. The district must consult with the community on revising the LCAP to include $3.3 million for the raises this year and to measure the impact of the full $25.8 million raise over three years, the complaint says. The state should also require the board to explain how it is using the $4.3 million for high-needs students, the complaint says.
If the department doesn’t step in, Public Advocates said it will seek a temporary injunction in Superior Court. The law firm filed the complaint on behalf of three parents: Isabel Cruz and two unnamed parents, all of whom serve on an LCAP district advisory committee, the complaint said.
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West Contra County Unified’s 67-page LCAP for 2015-16 lays out in great detail how it plans to spend money for the high-needs students on five primary goals, including improving school climate, parent involvement, the use of technology in schools and raising achievement. But the district noted in an early LCAP draft that $4.3 million – 12 percent of its supplemental and concentration funding – would be put in a reserve account, then deleted any reference in the final LCAP about moving it after Public Advocates publicly questioned the expenditure, the law firm said. Public Advocates said that the district has ignored repeated inquiries about its failure to specify what it intended to do with the money. The complaint says the law firm also raised the issue in a letter to the Contra Costa County Office of Education, which approved the district’s LCAP without commenting about the $4.3 million.
