[Baltimore Sun] Appeals court rules against resurrecting Baltimore City Schools consent decree in longtime Bradford case
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In an opinion last week, Maryland’s second-highest court rejected arguments to bring back a decades-old consent decree stemming from a lawsuit over state funding for Baltimore City Public Schools.
In a 2-1 decision, the Maryland Appellate Court sent the long-running Bradford v. Maryland State Board of Education case back to Baltimore Circuit Court with instructions to dismiss a 2019 petition that alleged that education provided at the school system remained “constitutionally inadequate.” The 1996 consent decree that mandated increased state funding, which the plaintiffs had sought to re-enforce, should also be dissolved, Senior Judge Deborah S. Eyler wrote in the majority opinion.
Baltimore City Public Schools, which was not a defendant in the case but benefitted from the state funding reforms enforced by the decree, said in a statement that the system was “deeply disappointed” in the court’s ruling.
“We are exploring our legal options for moving forward,” the statement reads. “In the meantime, City Schools calls upon Governor Wes Moore and the General Assembly to act in the best interests of the children of Baltimore City by ensuring adequate state funding necessary for Maryland to live up to its constitutional obligations fully.”
The Maryland Attorney General’s office, which represented the state, declined to comment.
The latest decision in the 30-year-long legal saga vacated a Baltimore Circuit Judge’s previous ruling but still ultimately rejected the plaintiffs’ attempt to revive the litigation over deficient education standards at city schools. The lawsuit, initially lodged against the Maryland State Board of Education in 1994 by parents of city school students, had led to the consent decree, funding fixes at the state level and an overhaul of the city school system’s governance.
The plaintiffs, represented by the ACLU and NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund, had filed new claims in 2019 highlighting dilapidated building conditions as evidence the state still did not adequately fund Baltimore schools. But the appellate court’s majority ruled in its opinion last week that the consent decree was no longer relevant, as the state had reached its funding benchmark in 2008 and “circumstances affecting the constitutionality of public education in Baltimore City changed substantially” after that.
“If parents of children currently enrolled in the BCPSS are so inclined, they may file a new lawsuit upon allegations of a present violation of the children’s constitutional right to a thorough and efficient public education, based on circumstances as they now exist,” the appellate court said in a summary of the majority’s opinion.
Appellate Court Judge Andrea M. Leahy wrote in a dissenting opinion that the consent decree should be modified, rather than dissolved, as city schools students still don’t receive a “thorough and efficient” education guaranteed by the Maryland Constitution. She wrote that city schools “still fail to provide an adequate education as measured by contemporary educational standards.”
She wrote that while the state has been “very generous with the time and resources it has dedicated” to improving city schools, including with legislation such as the Blueprint for Maryland’s Future education reform plan, “we are left with the sobering fact that the goal has yet to be achieved.”
“I fail to see how requiring the Bradford Plaintiffs to file a new lawsuit will serve the best interests of the children, the City, the State, or judicial economy,” she wrote.
Have a news tip? Contact Dan Belson at dbelson@baltsun.com, 443-790-4827, on X as @DanBelson_ or on Signal as @danbels.62.
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