Opinion ID: 2075881
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: The Post-Evans Settlement Stipulation

Text: We begin by noting that both the Board and the District agree that Order 90-103, as applied to the Board, clearly and unequivocally violates the unambiguous terms of the post- Evans Settlement Stipulation: Defendants [the District] hereby stipulate that neither the Mayor nor his subordinates will unilaterally reducewhether by apportionment, reapportionment, allocation, encumbrance, prohibition, freezing, or change in accounting, budget, procurement, or financial procedures the authorized spending level or preclude the expenditure of monies duly appropriated by Congress to the Board of Education and to the District of Columbia Public Schools in any given fiscal year; provided, however, that the Board of Education recognizes the authority of the Mayor to submit a supplemental or deficiency budget, pursuant to Section 442(c) of the District of Columbia Self-Government and Government Reorganization Act (P.L. 93-168), to the Council of the District of Columbia and, upon the latter's approval, to the Congress of the United States, to authorize a rescission of budget authority theretofore granted to the D.C. Public Schools. [10] Judge Mitchell signed the Stipulation and explicitly retained continuing jurisdiction to enforce, if necessary, the terms of this Settlement Stipulation. As Judge Salzman properly held, the Mayor violated the express terms of a judicially supervised settlement agreement that was the result of full and complete litigation. [11] Thus, the Mayor's only proper course in this matter was to return to Superior Court, before implementation of Order 90-103, to seek judicial permission to modify the decree in light of the legal position the Mayor now advances in defending his unilateral action. See Local No. 93, Int'l. Assoc. of Firefighters v. Cleveland, 478 U.S. 501, 515-24, 106 S.Ct. 3063, 3071-76, 92 L.Ed.2d 405 (1986); Berger v. Heckler, 771 F.2d 1556, 1568 (2d Cir.1985); see also D.D. v. M.T., 550 A.2d 37, 44 (D.C.1988) (party that fails to seek modification of court's mandate acts at his or her own peril). The District argues that statutory changes (see infra Part III.) which occurred after the Mayor signed the post- Evans Settlement Stipulation have made the Mayor's continued adherence to that Stipulation a violation of his statutory duty to balance the District's budget. [12] Even if the District were correctthat subsequent statutory changes have affected the legality of the Stipulationwe have found no precedent for the District's proposition that parties to a court-endorsed settlement agreement are entitled, if they perceive a relevant change in the law, simply to ignore their signed commitments. [13] In fact, at least one case the District cites suggests that, with a subsequent change in the law or the facts, courts will modify such decrees if it is equitable to do so. See, e.g., New York State Ass'n for Retarded Children, Inc. v. Carey, 706 F.2d 956, 970 (2d Cir.), cert. denied, 464 U.S. 915, 104 S.Ct. 277, 78 L.Ed.2d 257 (1983). The decisions which the District cites, see id. and supra note 13, should have convinced the Mayor to return to the trial court before applying Order 90-103 to the School Board. The District's positionthat it can rely on subsequent changes in the law as the basis for ignoring a settlement agreementis untenable because it would allow a party arbitrarily to opt out of an agreement with any perceived statutory change and thus would weaken the incentive to settle disputes. See Berger, 771 F.2d at 1568 (A defendant who has obtained the benefits of a consent decreenot the least of which is the termination of litigation cannot then be permitted to ignore such affirmative obligations as were imposed by the decree.) In this case, however, the District's failure to seek judicial modification of the Settlement Stipulation did not go unnoticed the Board suedand Judge Salzman ruled on the merits of the District's legal position. For us to remand the case to reopen the settlement, therefore, before ruling on the merits of the applicable statutes, would be a waste of precious time [14] and judicial resources at this point. In the event we were to agree with the Board's position on the merits, the terms of the settlementas applied to this casewould remain in effect as a matter of law, not merely as a matter of stipulation; no further trial court consideration would be required. Only if we were to conclude that the Mayor does have the claimed unilateral authority to reduce the Board's budget would there be a role for the trial court to consider whether equitable considerations, in light of the Settlement Stipulation, might constrain the Mayor's use of that authority in this case. [15] We therefore turn to the merits.