A federal judge has partially approved and partially denied an award of legal fees and expenses by the Jacksonville/North Pulaski School District to attorneys for black students in an ongoing school district desegregation lawsuit.
Chief U.S. District Judge D. Price Marshall Jr., the presiding judge in the 36-year-old federal Pulaski County case, approved the award of $4,313.80 for expenses and $138,900 for the work of attorneys and their staff -- a total of $143,213.80.
That is just over half of the approximately $270,000 that the legal team headed by Rep. John Walker, D-Little Rock, requested from the Jacksonville/North Pulaski district for work done between June 2017 and October 2018.
Walker and his team represent black students and their families previously known as the Joshua intervenors. It was so named because the late Lorene Joshua was the first name on the list of parents in the 1980s who wanted to represent the interest of black students in a desegregation lawsuit filed by the Little Rock School District against the state and its two neighboring school systems.
Most recently -- including in the order in which he addresses the legal fees -- Marshall has approved replacement representatives of the black students in the Jacksonville/North Pulaski and the Pulaski County Special school districts. Those two districts and the intervenors are the only remaining parties in the long-running case.
The newest intervenor representative is Linda Morgan, who is involved in her grandson's school -- Warren Dupree Elementary in the Jacksonville system.
Marshall overruled the Jacksonville district's objection to Morgan as a representative of black students, calling her "an educated person with a willingness to serve."
"The court believes that she, working with Tiffany Ellis [who was added earlier], can and will stand up for JNPSD's non-white students, parents, and others acting as parents," Marshall wrote.
Ellis was previously approved by the judge to represent the class of Jacksonville's black students and their families.
"Discipline and student achievement remain under the Court's supervision," Marshall noted in his July 26 order. "These are key issues. Morgan can learn about the staffing-incentives, facilities, and monitoring issues."
Regarding the legal fees, Marshall approved the expenses portion in full.
As for the pay for the legal team: "The Court concludes that $138,900 is a reasonable fee for all necessary work during this period," Marshall wrote. The time period includes a multi-day court hearing in February 2018 on operations -- including staffing and the updating of school facilities -- in the Jacksonville district.
"First, the intervenors are prevailing parties in the case in general," Marshall wrote. "It's their place to monitor the remedy embodied in Plan 2000 and defend it," he said about the Pulaski County Special district's court-approved desegregation plan, the provisions of which also apply to the Jacksonville system.
"Second, success, and the lack of it, are important considerations," he said. "Intervenors persuaded the Court that all of the District's elementary schools must be replaced sooner than JNPSD proposed and before any expansion of the new high school and new middle school."
Marshall noted that the accelerated building schedule was not the intervenors' first choice -- they wanted immediate replacement of the schools. But it was a fallback position.
The judge also noted that the district had volunteered to accelerate the elementary school building schedule, and he commended the district for that. But he also noted that the decision came only at the end of the trial "after the Intervenors' full court press and pointed inquiries from the Court."
On the issue of how the Jacksonville district has been staffed since its 2016 detachment from the Pulaski County Special district, Marshall said the intervenors did not prevail and their requested fee must be reduced in that regard.
He also said a reduction was needed in requested fees for the intervenors' monitoring of programs such as the Donaldson Academy that is intended to improve academic achievement of students in the Pulaski Special and Jacksonville districts.
He also reduced fees in regard to disputes about the new intervenors and the court-ordered monthly meetings among representatives of the districts and intervenors.
"The court has reduced the claim accordingly," Marshall wrote.
The judge also reduced the hourly fees for three attorneys and three staff members. He awarded Walker 160 hours at $350 an hour, which is $56,000. He approved 60 hours at $300 an hour for Austin Porter, or $18,000, and 80 hours at $300 per hour for Robert Pressman, or $24,000.
Joy Springer, a paralegal, is entitled to $100 an hour for 325 hours, or $32,500. Charles Bolden was allotted $4,900, and Marva Smith was awarded $3,500.
In the request for fees submitted to the judge late last year, Walker had asked for 256.83 hours at a rate of $450 an hour -- a total of $115,573.50. Porter had asked for $350 an hour and a total of $21,297.50, and Pressman asked for $360 an hour and a total of $70,491.60. Springer had asked for $137.50 an hour and a total of $68,763.75.
Walker said in the request for fees last year that he served in the dual role of trial counsel and monitor and that his team members spent "considerable unclaimed time in monitoring issues."
"The time submissions of Counsel Pressman, Counsel Porter, Monitor Spring and myself reflect billing judgments mindful of the court's admonitions to avoid charges for work that may appear unreasonable or to be duplication of other work or charges," he told Marshall earlier.
Metro on 07/30/2019