Court Opinion

ID: 9732391
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-26 16:18:37.27379+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T15:23:23.122162
License: Public Domain

DISSENTING OPINION BY
Senior Judge JIULIANTE.
I respectfully dissent. Unlike the majority, I would not conclude that the presentation of the petition for an independent school district satisfies Petitioners’ burden under Section 242.1(a) of the Public School Code of 1949 (School Code)1 and shifts the burden to the Borough.
The Farrell Area School District (FASD) is a public school district pursuant to the School Code and encompasses the City of Farrell and the Borough. By way of answer to Petitioner’s Petition, the FASD stated that it was without sufficient information to determine whether the adult individuals who signed the petitions were a majority of the taxable inhabitants of the Borough.
The trial court held a pre-hearing conference on February 3, 2003, at which time the court set hearings for February 24 and 25, 2003. The purpose of the hearings was to provide Petitioners with an opportunity to demonstrate the “status of the signatories of the Petition as being taxable inhabitants of the Borough and to verify their desire for the relief requested in the Petition.” (O.R. at 7) The trial court further indicated that it would also accept deposition testimony from those Petitioners who could not attend the hearings due to their employment or health.2
At the close of the hearings, the trial court accepted the deposition testimony of 20 Borough residents and the live testimony of 51 individuals, including those stipulated to by the parties, that they were taxable inhabitants of the Borough.3 The trial court thereafter determined that although Petitioners had proven that 71 inhabitants of the Borough favored the proposed independent district, the number fell short of the number of required taxable inhabitants to create an independent district.
Section 242.1(a) of the School Code provides, in pertinent part, as follows:
*777A majority of the taxable inhabitants of any contiguous territory in any school district or school districts, as herein established, may present their petition to the court of common pleas of the county in which each contiguous territory, or a greater part thereof, is situated, asking that the territory be established as an independent district for the sole purpose of transfer to an adjacent school district contiguous thereto.... Such petitions shall set forth a proper description of the boundaries of the territory to be included in such proposed independent district, and the reasons of the petitioners for requesting such transfer to another school district and the name of the district into which its territory is proposed to be placed.
The court shall hold hearing thereon, of which hearing the school district or districts out of whose territory such proposed independent district is to be taken and the school district into which the territory is proposed to be assigned, shall each have ten days notice....
In all cases where such proceedings result in the creation and transfer, by decree of court, of an independent district, the cost and office fees shall be paid by the petitioners or, otherwise, by the receiving district. Such independent districts created under the provisions of this act shall not become an operating school district but will be created for transfer of territory only. (Emphasis added.)
Pursuant to Section 242.1(a), Petitioners must first establish that they represent a majority of the Borough’s taxable inhabitants upon filing of their petition for an independent school district. In their Petition, Petitioners failed to aver the actual number of taxable inhabitants residing in the Borough. Before the trial court, however, they argued that the Borough had 463 taxable inhabitants; a majority would therefore be 232 residents. Conversely, the Borough maintained that there were 677 taxable inhabitants; a majority of 677 would be 339 residents. Because the Borough challenged Petitioners’ claim of the number of taxable inhabitants of the Borough, I believe that Petitioners bore the burden of proving the actual number of taxable inhabitants of the Borough in order to demonstrate that they represented a majority. Thus, assuming that all the signatures on the Petition represented taxable inhabitants of the Borough, there was no evidence showing that they represented a majoHty of the Borough’s taxable inhabitants as required by Section 242.1(a).
Moreover, because Section 242.1(a) is silent as to which party bears the burden of proof when a challenge is made to the Petition, I would look to other provisions of the School Code to determine which party bears the burden of proof.
The purpose of the School Code is to provide a thorough and efficient system of education for the children of this Commonwealth. Saucon Valley Sch. Dist. v. Robert O., 785 A.2d 1069 (Pa.Cmwlth.2001). In furtherance of that goal, the General Assembly amended the School Code in 1997 to include the Charter School Law,4 which allows for the establishment and maintenance of schools that operate independently from an existing school district.
Section 1717-A of the Charter School Law, 24 P.S. § 17-1717-A provides that in order to convert an existing public school or portion thereof to a charter school, the applicant must show that more than 50% of the teaching staff and parents and/or guardians of pupils attending the public school have signed a petition in support of *778the school becoming a charter school. See generally Brackbill v. Ron Brown Charter Sck, 777 A.2d 131 (Pa.Cmwlth.2001), appeal denied, 573 Pa. 673, 574 821 A.2d 584 (2003) (where petitioners demonstrated that application for charter school was supported by teachers, the State Charter School Appeal Board’s determination that said application had the requisite community support was supported by the evidence of record).
Inasmuch as both Section 242.1(a) of the School Code and the Charter School Law allow students to be removed from a school district, and thus adversely affect the taxes received by the students’ home school district, it seems logical that those wishing to remove themselves from the school district bear the burden of proving their status as taxpayers.
Furthermore, as the trial court noted, it is fundamental in our system of jurisprudence that a party who maintains the existence of certain facts bears the burden of proving those facts, Wingert v. State Employes’ Ret. Bd., 138 Pa.Cmwlth. 43, 589 A.2d 269 (1991), and that a party defending an action is not required to prove a negative in order to prevail. In re Property Situate Along Pine Road in Earl Tp., 743 A.2d 990 (Pa.Cmwlth.1999).
“When a statute defines the factual basis of an offense or entitlement, and then states a further factual element as a basis for an exception, the Pennsylvania Supreme Court has treated the exceptional element as a matter for affirmative defense, placing the burden on the defending party to show the affirmative, rather than subjecting the other party to proof of a negative proposition.” Pennsylvania Liquor Control Bd. v. T.J.J.R., Inc., 120 Pa. Cmwlth. 313, 548 A.2d 390, 392 (1988). In other words, where an exception is found in a statutorily defined right or offense, it is the party wishing to assert the exception that bears the burden of proving it.
The School Code provides that the court of common pleas is to secure the reaction of the Superintendent of Public Instruction, who must approve the petition before the court can grant it. Under the terms of the statute, there is no exception that can be asserted and no affirmative defense that may be raised. The only recourse left to the home school district, if it so chooses, is to challenge the averments of the petition for an independent school district. Otherwise, the court of common pleas must grant the petition if it complies with the School Code and is approved by the Superintendent of Public Instruction. Thus, the parties filing the petition for an independent school district should bear the burden of showing that they are taxable inhabitants of the school district as required by Section 242.1(a) of the School Code. T.J.J.R., Inc.
Based on the foregoing, I would affirm the trial court’s order.

. Act of March 10, 1949, P.L. 30, as amended, added by the Act of June 23, 1965, P.L. 139, 24 P.S. § 2-242.1(a).

. On February 18, 2003, Petitioners filed a motion for special scheduling wherein they averred that "[t]he limited purpose of the testimony of the approximately 250 [Petitioners] will be to verify the validity of their signatures and their desire for the Petition to proceed” and "[Petitioners] believe that ordering all of the signors to come to Mercer for a short period of time creates an undue burden and hardship for the following reasons-" (O.R. 11) In their Prayer for Relief, Petitioners requested that the trial court schedule a hearing in the Borough rather than at the Mercer County Court House. Thus, at least initially, Petitioners agreed that they had the burden of proving their status as "taxable inhabitants.”

.Although the trial court accepted all the deposition testimony offered, I note that three individuals were not asked whether they were taxpaying residents of the Borough and that three other individuals did not personally sign the petitions; rather, someone else signed on their behalf. Although Counsel for Petitioners filed a praecipe to attach the signatures garnered at the deposition to the Petition, the trial court was not presented with a formal Motion to Amend the Petition.

. Act of June 19, 1997, P.L. 225, 24 P.S. §§ 17-1701-A — 17-1732-A.