Opinion ID: 2048181
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 6

Heading: The Issue of Deference

Text: The heart of the majority writing is that substantial deference is owed to the executive and legislative branches of government, particularly in matters of budgeting and policymaking ( see majority op at 28-30). I agree wholeheartedly. When the Executive and the Legislature have acted together on matters within their particular province, the courts should indeed tread lightly. That, however, is not what happened here. There is no state budget plan for bringing the schools into constitutional compliance; that is precisely the problem. When, as here, the Executive and the Legislature are specifically at odds as to the cost of providing the opportunity for a sound basic education to New York City schoolchildren, the approach of a single branch, rejected by another, cannot legitimately be considered the State's estimate (majority op at 29), and is entitled to no special weight. In CFE II we directed defendants to ascertain the actual cost of providing a sound basic education in New York City; to ensure that every city school have the resources necessary to provide the opportunity for a sound basic education; and to ensure a system of accountability to measure whether the reforms actually provide the opportunity for a sound basic education. Although there is no dispute that defendants failed to comply with our second directive, I cannot agree with the majority that they complied with our first. To be sure, the Governor, in undertaking to determine the cost of a sound basic education, and in proposing $4.7 billion in increased annual funding for the New York City public schools, took important steps toward that objective. And in most cases, of course, we can assume that the Governor, in whom the executive power is vested, speaks for the State. But not so here. The enactment of an appropriation bill that ensures adequate educational funding requires agreement among the Governor and both houses of the Legislature, and plainly that has not occurred. [2] As the deadline for compliance approached, defendants advised the trial court, to which we had remitted the case, of the actions they had by then undertaken to satisfy this Court's order. Based on defendants' failure to fulfill the CFE II mandate, the court appointed three referees to hear and report with recommendations on what measures defendants have taken to follow the [ CFE II ] directives and bring this State's school funding mechanism into constitutional compliance insofar as it affects the New York City School System. The referees shall also identify the areas, if any, in which such compliance is lacking. Even today, it is hard to see what alternative the court had. The Executive and Legislature were at loggerheadsthere was no agreed amount to be implemented. The majority faults the trial court and referees for undertaking to determine the actual cost of a sound basic education, believing instead that calculations proffered by certain of the defendants should have been beyond question. For more than 200 years, however, it has been the province and duty of the judicial branch to enforce compliance with constitutional norms, including (when necessary) as against the other branches of government. Defendants' continued failure to cure the violation properly obligated the courts to determine the extent of noncompliance and to direct a remedy. When courts undertake to resolve a controversy that others have brought before them, they appropriately resort to the tools of the judicial tradetestimony, evidence and fact-finding. The referees thus conducted seven days of evidentiary hearings on the primary question before themthe actual cost of a sound basic education for New York City schoolchildren. Based on the testimony of 15 witnesses, expert evidence, and extensive briefing and argument, they rationally determined that the actual cost of providing a sound basic education in New York City required an annual increase in operational funding of $5.63 billion, calculated in 2004-2005 dollars. The Appellate Division, too, determined that constitutional compliance required additional annual expenditures of between $4.7 billion and $5.63 billion. The majority, however, rejects the findings of the referees, and indeed the very process undertaken by the courts, and instead accepts at face value $1.93 billion as sufficient to satisfy the Education Article. The origins of that number are instructive. In response to our decision in CFE II, the Governor established the New York State Commission on Education Reformthe Zarb Commissioncharged with, among other things, study[ing] and mak[ing] recommendations regarding ... [t]he actual cost of providing all children the opportunity to acquire a sound basic education in the public schools of the State of New York (Executive Order [Pataki] No. 131 [9 NYCRR 5.131]). The Commission, in turn, retained Standard & Poor's School Evaluation Services, which produced a lengthy Resource Adequacy Study offering a wide variety of possible amounts of education spending, each based on different assumptions and variables as to the desired level of educational achievement and the costs required to attain it. Inasmuch as the Commission was asked to study statewide costs, even though this Court's mandate had been limited to New York City, Standard & Poor's used each scenario to calculate both statewide amounts and their citywide equivalents. With respect to New York City, Standard & Poor's calculated resource gapsdefined as the difference between the amount actually spent in the most recently completed fiscal year and the amount that would be required to fund the particular scenarioranging from $1.93 billion to $7.28 billion in core operating expenditures. [3] In so doing, however, Standard & Poor's itself repeatedly made clear that it does not recommend any spending level or the adoption of any particular achievement scenario (Standard & Poor's School Evaluation Services, Resource Adequacy Study for the New York State Commission on Education Reform, at 23 [2004]). Relying on the Resource Adequacy Study, and specifically endorsing the cost effectiveness variable considered by Standard & Poor's, the Commission similarly reported a wide range to the Governorthat is, from $2.45 billion to $5.57 billion statewide, which translated to between $1.93 billion and $4.69 billion for the Cityconcluding that [t]he State's elected leaders should make a choice of funding within this range (New York State Commission on Education Reform, Final Report, at 24 [2004]). At no time did either Standard & Poor's or the Commission undertake to conclude that any particular amount within the proffered ranges was sufficient to ensure the opportunity for a sound basic education to all New York City schoolchildren ( see Standard & Poor's School Evaluation Services, Resource Adequacy Study for the New York State Commission on Education Reform, at 12-13 [2004] [Standard & Poor's does not recommend any particular spending level; nor does it define a `sound, basic education']; New York State Commission on Education Reform, Final Report, at 24 [2004] [The Commission believes the decision on which educational standard to use should be left to the State's elected leaders]). Nevertheless, the majority accepts the calculations performed in the Resource Adequacy Study as sacrosanct, and from there concludes that the lowest number reached using any possible combination of variables must equal the amount needed to provide a sound basic education. Even defendants did not recommend these numbers. Rather, defendants, through the Attorney General, submitted to the referees an education plan prepared by Governor Pataki setting forth his proposal for complying with the June 23, 2003 decision of the Court of Appeals in this action. The Governor's plan proposed additional annual operating funds for New York City of $4.7 billion, and $8 billion statewide. As the Attorney General wrote in a letter to the referees: Governor Pataki is a named defendant in this action, and this office therefore is presenting the plan prepared by the Governor, as his counsel, and a description of that plan as prepared by the Governor's office. We also note, however, that the decision of the Court of Appeals requires the enactment of legislation by the State of New York, and this office is the institutional counsel for the State. Unfortunately, the two houses of the Legislature and the Governor have not been able to agree upon a single unified plan for submission to this panel. On this record, the $1.93 billion figure is not entitled to special deference.