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N.Y. school district in court on special-ed placements

EAST RAMAPO, N.Y. — Officials in a New York school district are taking the state Education Department to court — again — to continue their battle against what the state says is repeated noncompliance with a law that requires disabled students to be educated in the most mainstream setting available.

N.Y. school district in court on special-ed placements

Superintendent Joel Klein speaks at East Ramapo School District Board of Education meeting at the East Ramapo School District offices in Spring Valley on Sept. 2, 2014. The school district is being assessed as out of order and in need of technical assistance from the Special Education Quality Assurance Office to correct problems with private-school placements of special-education students.(Photo: Ricky Flores, The (Westchester County, N.Y.) Journal News)

EAST RAMAPO, N.Y. — Officials in a New York school district are taking the state Education Department to court — again — to continue their battle against what the state says is repeated noncompliance with a law that requires disabled students to be educated in the most mainstream setting available.

The East Ramapo, N.Y., school board has agreed to pay attorney David Butler and his associates at their regular rate, $650 to $450 per hour, to initiate an appeal of the education officials' recent determination that the district "needs intervention" to satisfy requirements of the federal Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA).

In the Dec. 9 board resolution, the district said the state's assessment is "arbitrary and capricious" and "threatens critical district resources without any rational basis." Butler initiated the suit two days later in state Supreme Court in Albany by asking a judge to set aside the determination. A court appearance is set for Jan. 23.

The district is pursuing the lawsuit rather than comply with the state's requirement, started two years ago, that school officials submit applications for tuition reimbursement for the private school special education student placements it funds at the Rockland Institute for Special Education, the Community School and Woods Services and a Pennsylvania-based organization serving people with disabilities.

"There are times when the state gets it wrong," district spokesman Darren Dopp said in an e-mail Friday. "There are times when state agencies give bureaucratic answers instead of considering what's right for the individuals involved."

He said the district hopes to resolve the matter through discussion. The case involves only about 20 of the nearly 2,400 special-education students East Ramapo serves, he added.

The lawsuit follows a state fiscal monitor's recent criticism of East Ramapo's spending on attorneys, including an unsuccessful appeal of a similar case in 2013.

A spokeswoman for the state Education Department declined to comment.

“There are times when the state gets it wrong. There are times when state agencies give bureaucratic answers instead of considering what's right for the individuals involved.”

Darren Dopp, spokesman East Ramapo (N.Y.) school district

The Individuals with Disabilities Education law is meant to ensure that students with disabilities are educated in the "least restrictive environment" possible, which typically means in a public rather than a private school.

East Ramapo, however, has long defended its practice of settling student placement disputes with parents — mostly from the district's large ultra-Orthodox Jewish community — who prefer their special-needs children be educated in an environment that accommodates their religious customs and their Yiddish language. Many such parents have fought to send their children to private schools even if the district recommends a public setting.

Education officials have cited the district for violating the law multiple times since 2010 and withheld funding as a result. That this practice by the majority Orthodox school board has helped decimate the public schools' budget is a key allegation in an ongoing federal civil rights lawsuit filed by hundreds of East Ramapo parents.

The Dec.11 filing follows the Education Department's latest assessment, this summer, that the district remains out of order and must get technical assistance from the Special Education Quality Assurance Office to correct problems with private-school placements.

If it doesn't act, future tuition reimbursement from the state could be subject to special conditions or the district could face further withholding, Assistant Education Commissioner James DeLorenzo wrote to East Ramapo schools Superintendent Joel Klein on Aug. 4.

The state assesses school districts each year to ensure they meet the law's requirements and may classify a district as "Needs Assistance," "Needs Intervention" or "Needs Substantial Intervention." DeLorenzo said East Ramapo was assigned "Needs Intervention" for 2014-15, the fourth consecutive year, prompting a series of argumentative responses from Butler.

Butler asked for clarification on what exactly the district had failed to comply with; when DeLorenzo provided specifics, Butler said his conclusions were wrong.

Four months of back and forth concluded Dec. 3, when DeLorenzo reminded the district that, since December 2012, it has been required to submit applications for state tuition reimbursement for the three schools and it hadn't done so in 2013-14 and 2014-15.

Despite Butler's requests to meet with state education officials to discuss the issue, that never occurred, Dopp said. The department had told the district it could request a meeting "to demonstrate why NYSED should not make this determination of needs intervention" and said the district should indicate in writing what facts supported its request.