LITTLE ROCK — Arguing that a buyout of Little Rock Superintendent Roy Brooks' contract is a violation of state law, a group of school district residents filed a class-action lawsuit Wednesday against the district and the School Board to stop a potential payment of more than $500,000 to Brooks.
The suit, assigned to Pulaski County Circuit Judge Tim Fox, contends that the publicly funded buyout amounts to severance pay, which is not authorized bystatute. It further argues that paying a public employee to not work is unconstitutional, and it asks that the provision in Brooks' contract that permits a buyout be declared null, void, inoperative and unenforceable under state law.
Left unanswered in the lawsuit is the question of what would happen to Brooks' employment status if the case is successful and the board is prevented from buying out the contract.
The School Board voted 4-3 on May 24 to exercise a clausein Brooks' contract that permits the board to unilaterally terminate the contract upon 90 days' notice to the superintendent and payment of all compensation that he would otherwise earn if he remained on the job for the duration of the contract, which is two more years.
The move to buy out the contract put a halt to the board's initial plan to conduct a hearing on charges against Brooks that if proved would warrant his firing without any compensation. The list of charges, which he hasdenied, included unauthorized pay increases to some employees, disrespectful and disparaging treatment of board members and staff members, and failure to show satisfactory student achievement gains during his three-year tenure.
The group of plaintiffs in Wednesday's lawsuit is headed by Teresa Gray, who has served as the spokesman for Little Rock Mothers for Progress in Our Schools. That fledgling, grassroots group bought newspaper advertisements in support of Brooks in his fight with the fourmember majority of the sevenmember School Board to keep his job.
However, Wednesday's lawsuit seeking temporary and permanent injunctions against a publicly funded buyout says the case is not about the leadership battle.
"Plaintiffs state that this is not an action regarding the existing disputes between the Defendants and the Superintendent," the lawsuit filed by a team of lawyers headed by John P. Gill said.
"Instead, this is a public funds illegal exaction case brought by patrons and taxpayers of the LRSD ... to enjoin the use or disbursement of public funds of the LRSD for the illegal and improper purpose of paying the socalled 'severance pay' [and] for a declaratory judgment that such payment to a public employee for not working is unconstitutional, a violation of Arkansas law and against the public policy of the state of Arkansas."
Gray, who is the mother of an elementary pupil enrolled in the Little Rock district, said thesuit is about the money and not Brooks. She said she didn't know what would happen with Brooks if the lawsuit is successful and that there are many scenarios that could play out.
"Our whole position is that we feel this money should be spent for the education of children," Gray said. "And it shouldn't be given to somebody to not work. There is so much that the kids deserve right now and the kidsneed. It's real important."
School Board President Katherine Mitchell, one of Brooks' harshest critics, said Wednesday that the plaintiffs in the new lawsuit are "wasting their money" because the buyout is permitted in the contract.
"When did the law pass that you can't buy out a contract?" Mitchell asked. "The PulaskiCounty Special School Board has done it twice lately," she noted in reference to the buyouts of Gary Smith in 2002 and Don Henderson in 2005, both in the neighboringPulaski County Special School District.
Mitchell declined to respond any further to the lawsuit, saying that the plaintiffs "can do whatever they feel is in their power to do and as a board member I'll do what is in my power to do. They'll exercise their rights, and I'll exercise mine."
Brooks, 56, is paid $198,000 a year plus benefits that include a $25,000-a-year annuity and an $11,000-a-year car allowance. The cost of buying out his contract was initially estimated at $400,000 to $500,000. More recently, Mark Milhollen, the district's chief financial officer, put together figures showing that the buyout of the contract could be as much as $656,357.
That figure would include not only the salary, annuity and car allowance but also a $30,000 service bonus, accrued vacationtime, teacher retirement fund contributions and insurance premiums.
Mitchell said Wednesday evening that she will ask at a board meeting scheduled for 5 p.m.
today that the School Board "leave it in the hands of the School Board's internal auditor" to determine the cost of the buyout.
The internal auditor, Sandy Becker, is the only employee besides the superintendent who reports directly to the board.Mitchell said that relationship makes Becker the logical choice to compile the final figure.
Milhollen, she said, "is very deeply involved and is still doing whatever Brooks wants him to do."
Becker could be more independent, she said.
Becker was expected to be a key witness in the case that School Board attorneys planned to present against Brooks had the May 30 termination hearing taken place, according to correspondence exchanged between attorneys for Brooks and for the School Board before the hearing was canceled.
Besides Gray, the plaintiffs named in Wednesday's lawsuit are Keith Broach, Renita L. Thompson, Steven B. Thompson, Eleanor Burress and Marnita Bisbee.
Attorneys in the case besides Gill are Kelly McNulty and Roger H. Fitzgibbon Jr., all from the Gill Elrod Ragon Owen & Sherman law firm; Don Trimble of the Trimble Law Firm; and Eugene G. Sayre of the Jack, Lyon & Jones law firm.
No date has been set for a hearing.
The case details the different laws that are applicable including Article 14, Section 3 of the state constitution, which restricts the use of the money raised by the mandatory 25-mill property tax for schools to maintenance and operation of the schools.
The 1923 Little River Board of Education versus Ashdown Special School District case is cited as restricting maintenance and operation expenditures to those costs directly and immediately connected with the public school system.
And Arkansas Code Annotated 6-13-620 is cited because it lists the items that must be contained in a school district superintendent contract, of which severance pay is not included.
The plaintiffs state in the lawsuit that they are "seeking to protect the entire class of affected patron taxpayers against the imposition of an illegal exaction of public funds that will otherwise be imposed upon all members of the plaintiff class, unless this court grants the relief sought in this complaint."
Front Section, Pages 1, 8 on 06/14/2007