Source: http://openjurist.org/712/f2d/816
Timestamp: 2015-03-30 01:14:53
Document Index: 293473829

Matched Legal Cases: ['art, 573', '§ 2573', '§ 2573', '§ 2573', '§ 2585', '§ 2585']

712 F2d 816 Arthur v. P Nyquist | OpenJurist
712 F. 2d 816 - Arthur v. P Nyquist	Home712 f2d 816 arthur v. p nyquist
712 F2d 816 Arthur v. P Nyquist 712 F.2d 816
32 Fair Empl.Prac.Cas. (BNA) 822,32 Empl. Prac. Dec. P 33,737, 12 Ed. Law Rep. 663
George ARTHUR, et al., Plaintiffs-Appellees,andCommunity Advisory Board for Bilingual Education of Buffalo,et al., Plaintiffs-Intervenors-Appellees,v.Ewald P. NYQUIST, Individually and as Commissioner ofEducation of the State of New York, et al.,Defendants-Appellees,Buffalo Teachers Federation, et al., Defendants-Appellants.
No. 962, Docket 82-7802.
Argued April 6, 1983.Decided July 22, 1983.
Robert D. Clearfield, Gen. Counsel, New York Educators Association, Albany, N.Y., for defendants-appellants.
Thomas I. Atkins, Gen. Counsel, NAACP, Brooklyn, N.Y. (David Gerald Jay, Buffalo, N.Y., on the brief), for plaintiffs-appellees.
J. Edmund DeCastro, Jr., Buffalo, N.Y. (Jaeckle, Fleischmann & Mugel, Buffalo, N.Y., on the brief), for plaintiffs-intervenors-appellees.
Aubrey V. McCutcheon, Jr., Buffalo, N.Y. (James J. McLoughlin, Acting Corp. Counsel, William E. Carey, Asst. Corp. Counsel, Buffalo, N.Y., on the brief), for defendants-appellees.
This appeal concerns primarily the degree to which a district court can impair the seniority rights of teachers in order to eliminate the vestiges of racial segregation within the faculty of a public school system and to vindicate the school children's right to a desegregated education. The Buffalo Teachers Federation (Federation) challenges a remedial plan adopted by the District Court for the Western District of New York (John T. Curtin, Chief Judge) for the Buffalo school system. See 520 F.Supp. 961 (W.D.N.Y.1981). As part of that plan, the Court approved an elaborate remedy designed to achieve a goal of twenty-one percent minority teachers in all teaching areas through a race-conscious system for hiring and laying off teachers. Although we find the District Court's plan to be basically sound, we conclude that in one respect the Court's remedy is unnecessarily harsh. We therefore affirm in part, reverse in part, and remand for the entry of a modified order.
In April 1976, the District Court found the Buffalo Board of Education responsible for intentionally causing and maintaining a segregated school system. 415 F.Supp. 904 (W.D.N.Y.1976), aff'd in relevant part, 573 F.2d 134 (2d Cir.), cert. denied sub nom. Manch v. Arthur, 439 U.S. 860, 99 S.Ct. 179, 58 L.Ed.2d 169 (1978). Among the Board's discriminatory policies was a purposeful program "that has segregated, and was intended to segregate, the teacher and administrative staffs in the Buffalo public schools." Id. at 946. Between 1967 and 1973, minority employees had held roughly ten to twelve percent of all staff positions, even though the minority population of Buffalo was twenty-one percent, according to the 1970 Census. Id. at 943-46. Moreover, a disproportionate share of the minority staff was assigned to schools with predominantly minority student bodies. Id.
As an initial matter, the District Court left to the Board of Education the task of developing a plan for desegregating its teaching and administrative staffs, but after numerous meetings with the parties, the Court came to the conclusion that judicial prodding would be necessary. Accordingly, on March 26, 1979, the District Court issued an order setting general guidelines for desegregating the staff of the Buffalo school system. With this order, the Court made two basic decisions: first, that the percentage of minority teachers and administrators in every job classification should be the same twenty-one percent that minorities represented in the community at large, and, second, that this twenty-one percent target should be achieved through "one-to-one" hiring, whereby the Board would have to hire one minority teacher for every majority teacher hired.
To appreciate the plan eventually devised to implement the District Court's order, as well as the Federation's objections to that plan, some understanding of New York law and the Federation's collective bargaining agreement is necessary. In the Buffalo school system, there are three types of teachers: tenured teachers, probationary teachers, and temporary teachers. Probationary and permanent teachers are on the "tenure track" of the system. When a tenured position becomes available, the Board must appoint a probationary teacher. N.Y.Educ.Law § 2573(1)(a) (McKinney 1981). If satisfied with the appointee's services after three years, the Board then makes the teacher a tenured and therefore permanent member of the faculty. Id. § 2573(1)(a), (5). Under New York law, probationary appointments in the Buffalo system must be made from an eligibility list containing the names of all qualified applicants for a particular tenure area who have passed an examination administered by the Board.1 Id. § 2573(10-a); see Serritella v. Board of Education, 58 A.D.2d 645, 396 N.Y.S.2d 57 (2d Dep't 1977). Applicants are ranked on the eligibility lists according to their performance on the Board's examination, and the Board is supposed to offer probationary appointments to those at the top of the relevant lists.
Outside the tenure track, the Buffalo system has a considerable number of temporary teachers, who serve on a year-to-year basis without any guarantee of being rehired. Temporary teachers fill positions left vacant by permanent and probationary teachers on sabbaticals and sick leave. Many temporary teachers in the Buffalo system have served for a number of years. Typically, these long-term "temporary" teachers have many qualifications for permanent positions, but either have not passed the Board's examination for permanent employment or have not placed high enough on the eligibility list to be offered probationary positions. In selecting temporary teachers for a new school year, the Board looks first to the current eligibility list for qualified candidates. However, if the eligibility lists are empty or if no one on the eligibility lists wishes to accept the temporary positions, then the Federation's collective bargaining agreement requires that the Board offer the positions to those who have held temporary appointments in the past. In this way, the perennial temporary teachers have a limited, but apparently valuable, form of job security.
Under New York law, if the Board of Education elects to reduce the number of tenured positions, it must lay off teachers according to seniority. N.Y.Educ.Law § 2585(3). For example, if the Board had to eliminate several full-time positions for mathematics teachers, it would first discontinue the most junior probationary teachers in that area and, when there were no more probationary incumbents, begin to lay off permanent teachers. Laid-off permanent and probationary teachers (known in the statutory jargon as "excessed" teachers) are placed on "preferred eligibility lists." When new full-time positions become available, the Board is supposed to reinstate excessed teachers from these preferred eligibility lists based on their seniority. Id. § 2585(4). Teachers on preferred eligibility lists also have a right of first refusal for any temporary teaching positions that become available.
Having no guarantee of reemployment from year to year, long-term temporary teachers are not directly affected by layoffs. However, these teachers are indirectly affected. Layoffs create preferred eligibility lists and prevent a decrease in the number of names on the regular eligibility lists because fewer probationary appointments are made. Since the Board must offer all temporary positions to qualified teachers on both of these lists before hiring anyone else, long-term temporary teachers are less likely to be rehired when the Board reduces the number of tenured faculty members.
The District Court's March 26, 1979, order mandating one-for-one hiring to reach a twenty-one percent minority target placed the Board in a dilemma. At least for the foreseeable future, the Board had no obvious means of obeying the order without violating the seniority system established by statute and collective bargaining agreement. Under that system, a large group of predominantly majority teachers was entitled to whatever new positions become available. In 1978, fiscal difficulties and a declining student population had forced the Board to eliminate many tenured positions. In 1979, these laid-off teachers, most of them majority members, filled the preferred eligibility lists. Further layoffs were expected in the near future. Moreover, the normal eligibility lists were also composed largely